Extreme Ownership (2015) is about how Navy SEAL Team commanders lead. These blinks discuss the complex, life-and-death combat situations that Navy SEALs often have to deal with and how you can apply their skills in the world of business.
ABOUT AUTHOR
The authors served as Navy SEAL officers during the Battle of Ramadi, in Iraq, leading what would become the most highly decorated special-operations unit in the Iraq War. They now run a leadership consulting firm that teaches business leaders how to build their own high-performance teams.
Take extreme ownership of your leadership role
Leadership can sometimes be extreme. This holds especially true if your mission is to secure the city of Ramadi, which, during the Iraq War, was one of the most violent battlefields in the country.
You may be wondering how this is relevant to you if you’re not in the military. Luckily, the principles that underlie the success of Navy SEAL units can be applied to any team or organization that wishes to succeed in complicated tasks and difficult missions.
With strategies such as “cover and move” and “prioritize and execute,” you’ll learn how to lead and win even the most challenging battles
1) How accepting blame can save your job
2) Why teams within a corporation should collaborate rather than compete
3) Why facing explosives and machine guns isn’t necessarily reason enough to abort a mission
KEY IDEAS
1) Leading a team to success means taking responsibility for each and every one of its failures
2) To successfully execute your mission, understand its importance
3) Treat your allies as a support network, not as competition
4) Remain effective under pressure by setting clear priorities and acting upon them
5) Planning for success means comprehensively identifying and mitigating risks ahead of time
6) Instead of resenting interference by your superiors, make sure you’re giving them the information they need
BOOK SUMMARY
As a leader, whether in a military or business context, you need to take total ownership of your team and its work. Doing so means bearing responsibility for your team’s successes as well as its failures, drafting detailed plans that account for risks and maintaining tight lines of communication in all directions
KEY TAKE AWAY
Decentralize command for effective management
As a general rule, people can’t effectively manage more than six to ten people directly. Nonetheless, many business leaders manage much bigger teams. Here, the Navy SEAL management principles can help: First, break your team down into sub-teams containing no more than four to five people, each with a designated leader. Make sure that these leaders understand the larger team’s overall mission as well as its ultimate goal. Then empower your junior leaders to make decisions that help attain that goal on their own. This structure functions well without overwhelming you personally
