The document describes the key characteristics of level 5 leadership as exhibited by leaders who were able to transform good companies into great ones. It discusses that level 5 leaders are humble and driven, taking responsibility for failures. They build disciplined people and thought through confronting brutal facts, developing a clear hedgehog concept, and creating a culture of discipline. Technologies are used to accelerate momentum established through the flywheel effect of consistent, long-term efforts in the right direction defined by the hedgehog concept.

1. Level 5 Leadership
Syed Ali Asad Zaidi
&
Raveel Hameed

2. Good to Great
Buildup
Level 5
Level 5 First Who… Confront the Hedgehog Culture of Technology
Leadership Then What
Leadership Brutal Facts Concept Discipline Accelerators
Disciplined People Disciplined Thought Disciplined Action

3. Level 5 Leadership
5–Level 5 Executive
4–Effective Leader
3–Competent Manager
2–Contributing Team Member
1–Highly Capable Individual

4. Level 5 Leadership
 Leaders who employ a paradoxical mix of personal
humility and professional will
 Set up successors for even greater success
 Compelling modesty, self-effacing, understated
 Devotedly driven to produce
sustainable results
 More plow horse than show 5–Level 5 Executive
horse 4–Effective Leader
3–Competent Manager
2–Contributing Team
Member
1–Highly Capable Individual

5. Level 5 Leadership
 Attribute success to other
than themselves
 Look in mirror and take
full responsibility for poor 5–Level 5 Executive
decisions. 4–Effective Leader
 Many people have the 3–Competent Manager
potential to evolve into 2–Contributing Team Member
Level 5.
1–Highly Capable Individual

6. Good to Great
Buildup
Level 5 First Who…
First Who… Confront the Hedgehog Culture of Technology
Then What
Leadership Then What Brutal Facts Concept Discipline Accelerators
Disciplined People Disciplined Thought Disciplined Action

7. First Who, Then What
Leaders began the
transformation by first
getting the right people
on the bus (and the
wrong people off the
bus).
“Who” questions came before “what” decisions -
before vision, strategy, organization structure, and tactics.

8. First Who, Then What
 Leaders were precise, not ruthless in people
decisions.
 Three practical disciplines for being precise:
1. When in doubt, don’t hire
2. When you know you need to make a people
decision, act.
3. Put your best people on
your best opportunities,
not biggest problems

9. First Who, Then What
 Management teams debate energetically to find
best answers, yet unify behind decisions.
“Right” person has more
to do with character traits
and innate capabilities than
with knowledge,
background, or skills.

10. Good to Great
Buildup
Confront the
Level 5 First Who… Confront the Hedgehog Culture of Technology
Leadership Then What BrutalFacts Concept Discipline Accelerators
Brutal Facts
Disciplined People Disciplined Thought Disciplined Action

11. Confront the Brutal Facts
 Setting off on the path to
greatness requires
confronting the brutal facts
of current reality.
 Must create a culture
wherein people have a
tremendous opportunity to
be heard and, ultimately, for
the truth to be heard.

12. Confront the Brutal Facts
 Four basic practices:
1. Lead with questions, not
answers
2. Engage in dialogue and
debate, not coercion
3. Conduct autopsies, without
blame
4. Build red flag mechanisms
where information cannot be
ignored

13. Confront the Brutal Facts
 Stockdale Paradox:
Retain absolute faith that you can and that will prevail
in the end…
 AND at the same time
confront the most brutal facts
of your current reality,
whatever they might be.

14. Good to Great
Buildup
Hedgehog
Level 5 First Who… Confront the Hedgehog Culture of Technology
Leadership Then What Brutal FactsConcept Discipline Accelerators
Concept
Disciplined People Disciplined Thought Disciplined Action

15. Hedgehog Concept
 Hedgehogs simplify a complex world into a single
organizing idea, a basic principle or concept that
unifies and guides everything.
 Hedgehogs see what is
essential, and ignore the
rest.

16. Hedgehog Concept
 The Hedgehog Concept is a deep understanding of
three intersecting circles translated into a simple,
crystalline concept:
1. What you are deeply
passionate about
2. What you can be best in the
world at
3. What drives your economic
engine

17. Hedgehog Concept
Simplicity
What you are deeply within
passionate about the three
circles
What you can What drives
be the best in your
the world at economic
engine

18. Hedgehog Concept
 Getting the Hedgehog Concept takes an average
of four years.
 It is an iterative process by The Council:
1. The right people
2. Engaged in vigorous dialogue and
debate
3. Infused with the brutal facts
4. Guided by questions formed by the
three circles

19. Hedgehog Concept
All Guided by An Iterative
Ask Questions
the Three Circles Process
Autopsies The Dialogue &
Debate
& Analysis Council
Executive
Decisions

20. Good to Great
Buildup
Culture of
Level 5 First Who… Confront the Hedgehog Culture of Technology
Leadership Then What Brutal Facts Concept Discipline
Discipline Accelerators
Disciplined People Disciplined Thought Disciplined Action

21. Culture Of Discipline
 Getting disciplined people who
engage in disciplined thought and
who then take disciplined action,
fanatically consistent with three
circles
 Not about a tyrant who
disciplines

22. Culture Of Discipline
 Involves a duality.
 Requires people who
adhere to a consistent
system.
 Gives people freedom and
responsibility within
framework of that system.

23. Culture Of Discipline
 Includes willingness to reject opportunities that fall
outside the three circles.
 Budgeting is to decide which arenas fit Hedgehog
Concept and should be fully funded and which should
not be funded at all.
 “Anything that does not fit with
our Hedgehog Concept, we will
not do.”

24. Good to Great
Buildup
Technology
Level 5 First Who… Confront the Hedgehog Culture of Technology
Leadership Then What Brutal Facts Concept Discipline Accelerators
Accelerators
Disciplined People Disciplined Thought Disciplined Action

25. Technology Accelerators
 Good-to-greats avoid technology
fads and bandwagons.
 Yet they often become pioneers
in the application of carefully
selected technologies.
 Does it fit directly with your
Hedgehog Concept?
 Good-to-greats used technology
as an accelerator of
momentum, not a creator of it.

26. Technology Accelerators
 “Technology by itself is never a root cause of either
greatness or decline.
 “Crawl, walk, run” can be a
very effective approach,
even during times of rapid
and radical technological
change.

27. Good to Great
Buildup
Level 5 First Who… Confront the Hedgehog Culture of Technology
Leadership Then What Brutal Facts Concept Discipline Accelerations
Disciplined People Disciplined Thought Disciplined Action
Flywheel

28. The Flywheel
 Good-to-great
transformations never
happened in one fell
swoop.
 Instead they followed a predictable pattern of
buildup and breakthrough.
 Like pushing on a giant, heavy flywheel, it takes a
lot of effort to get the thing moving at all, but . . .

29. The Flywheel
1. With persistent pushing
2. In a consistent direction
3. Over a long period of time
 The flywheel builds momentum . . .
 In good-to-great companies problems of
commitment, alignment, motivation, and
change largely take care of themselves.
 Alignment follows from results and
momentum, not the other way around.

30. The Flywheel
Buildup
Level 5 First Who… Confront the Hedgehog Culture of Technology
Leadership Then What Brutal Facts Concept Discipline Accelerators
Disciplined People Disciplined Thought Disciplined Action

31. THANK YOU
QUESTIONS?