3 Ways To Be A Stronger Leader | Simon Sinek EP 207

0:00Hi, my name is Lewis Howes and welcome to the Daily Motivation show.

0:10I firmly believe that taking charge of your mindset allows you to be in the driver's seat of your life and unlock your potential. And that's why I'm thrilled to share that my new book is out right now. It's called The Greatness Mindset. In it, you'll learn how to build a plan for greatness through powerful exercises and toolkits designed to propel your life forward. This is the book that I wish I had 20 years ago. It's everything I've learned in the last decade with the research and the science to help you unlock your mind. Make sure to go to lewishouse.com slash 2023mindset to pick up your copy of my book, The Greatness Mindset, today.

0:52What would be three things that a leader of an organization who's listening to this or watching this right now could start to apply? Something that they could do tomorrow. And also three things that an employee of companies could do tomorrow going into work. Okay, so the tomorrow thing is a good constraint. So I would say that there are three concepts in there that can be done tomorrow. One is to build trusting teams. And we've talked about this already, which is being the person in charge doesn't make you the leader. Every single person has the capacity to be the leader they wish they had. And so I'm a great believer that leaders are made, not born.

1:29It's a skill set. Yeah, you can learn it. You can practice it. Not everybody wants to learn it Not everybody's gonna be good at it and it takes a lifetime of work It does and you'll never be the best right and so for people who want to be the leader They wish they had they have to become students of leadership. You have to read books You have to watch talks. You have to read articles. You have to have conversations about it You and I have these conversations when we're not on camera all the time all the time All right. We are genuinely interested in the subject and when we hang out with each other and that's what we talk about That's what we talk about.

1:58We talk about this stuff all the time. You know, I talk to small companies all the time and say, we don't have a budget for leadership training. I'm like, do you have the budget to buy a book? Once a week, get together over lunch and talk about a chapter of a book that everybody's reading. Or an article that you read. Or a TED Talk. Or a podcast that, you know, give everybody homework to watch something for 18 minutes. And then talk about it on Friday at lunch. Congratulations, you have a leadership development program. And don't assign anybody to run it. Ask the people who are already reading the books watching the pod the the talks and listening to the podcast ask them to leave it because they have genuine interest Every single one of us can be the leader.

2:37We wish we wish we had so on Monday If you want to be the leader you wish you had then start really learning become a student of leadership and just do it yourself Whether the company endorses it or not do it. Yeah, that'll make you a better qualified leader Okay of the people to the left and people like that so you can do that on Monday What else can you do on Monday? So one of the things that I go into in this book is about changing our mindset away from having competitors to having rivals. A competitor in the game is someone who's beat, right? But in this game, there's no such thing. And so we have to change our mindset away from having competition, which is finite, and direct it towards having rivalry, which is infinite.

3:16We should not have internal competition. But having rivals internally is fine. You know, we've all had the experience where somebody in our company got promoted and we got angry. Like, what's going on inside you? You got mad at someone else's success. And I generally believe that a worthy rival is someone whose strengths reveal to you your weaknesses. And we can take that energy and direct it against them in a competitive spirit. Or we can take all those uncomfortable feelings and say, where can I grow? It's the same in businesses. I'll give you a great example. of worthy rivalry. So go back a bunch of years when Starbucks was really becoming a thing.

3:55There was a huge backlash because they were putting mom and pops out of business. Do you remember? Turns out that when Starbucks moved into a neighborhood, mom and pops actually did better because a few things happened. One, there was a sort of a grassroots rumble to support the local business. And the other is it brought customers. Now, the problem was, remember what coffee shops used to be? Coffee shops used to be some dingy little hole in the wall with a ripped couch. Right? Right, right. And when Starbucks moved into a neighborhood, it was nice. It was nice. So the ones that thrived were the ones that saw Starbucks not as a competitor, but as a worthy rival.

4:35That Starbucks' existence revealed to us our weaknesses, and we upped our game. The ones who went out of business are the ones who got mad that Starbucks was stealing all the customers because they didn't change a thing. You went out of business because you wouldn't up your game. That's worthy rivalry. Worthy rivalry is someone else who's really good at what they do, reveals to me my weaknesses, and it's an opportunity for me to grow and be better at what I do. Competition I set out to beat, which if it means I have to bring them down, I'll bring them down. Rivalry is about lifting me up. I don't care.

5:07It's nothing about winning or losing. This is about constant, constant, constant improvement. Starting tomorrow, find your worthy rivals at work and outside work. In other words, who are the people at work? Our colleagues. Let's be honest. They're better than us. They're better than us. Let's be honest. They're either better leaders or they're smarter or they're better product development or they're better salespeople or they're better designers. Admire them. Learn from them. Grow. Don't see them as people to be beaten. See them as people to reveal to us where we have opportunities for growth.

5:35And the same goes for companies. Who are the companies out there in your industry, outside your industry? You pick your own worthy rivals. It doesn't matter. Pick as many as you want. who is out there doing a better job than you? So it reveals to you, your opportunities for improvement. And then the third one is just the courage to lead, which is the finite game is just easier. It's more fun. It's the thrill of competition, all of that stuff. It's a thrill, man. The finite game is thrilling and exciting and seductive. The infinite game and an infinite mindset, it's work. It's going to the gym.

6:10It's making sure you get enough sleep. It's sacrificing for your friends. It's eating healthy. Do I want to do it? No. Can I cheat? Of course I can. But, you know, it's hard work. It's hard work to change an organization's incentive structure away from individual achievement. And include, not abandon, but include a team effort. You know, it's hard not to see the end of the quarter, the end of the year as the end of the bill. Rather just a guidance that are we on the right path?

7:09greatness. And if you are loving the daily motivation, please follow us over on Apple podcast and Spotify and leave us a review over on Apple podcast right now. And if you want more exclusive content and ad free listening experience, make sure to subscribe to our greatness plus channel on Apple podcast right now. And if you want to get even more inspiration from our world class guests and learn how to improve your life and take it to the next level, then make sure to sign up for the Greatness newsletter and get it delivered right to your inbox over at greatness.com slash newsletter. Again, have an amazing day and I'll see you tomorrow with another episode of the Daily Motivation Show.