Page 67 - The extraordinary leader

44 • The Extraordinary Leader

Another characteristic of expert performers was that they typically
had coaches who encouraged them to practice intensely. Suppose that
a person decides she wants to learn to play golf. She begins by signing
up for several lessons, and then she hires a personal coach to play with
her. After a few months of lessons, she is performing at an adequate
level and so she begins to “play” golf with friends. Playing is
inherently more fun than intense practice, but the learning curve goes
down considerably. To continue to improve, people need to take the
time regularly for intense practice, and that is most effective when
accompanied by an experienced coach.
Most individuals, as they become managers for the first time, go
through an intense learning period. They receive a great deal of
training, personal coaching, and are open to ideas and suggestions
from experienced managers. They take time to plan meetings,
performance reviews, and how they will give feedback to direct
reports. They also pay close attention to others, watching to
understand techniques and skills. They are practicing leadership with
an intent to get better. Their learning curve is high. Once they get
reasonably competent at being managers, they do something very
similar to the above example of golf. They switch from practicing to
playing. While playing, the intensity of their learning goes down.
Playing leadership is inherently more fun than practicing leadership,
but skill development is very slow and sometimes stops altogether. In a
recent meeting at a large oil company, we asked a group of executives
if they were focused on playing or practicing leadership. The
consensus of the group was that everyone was busy playing and
nobody was practicing to get better.
One implication of this research is that some great leaders are not
born with, but acquire at an early age, the desire to make things
happen with other people. We believe that other leaders can acquire
increased leadership ability with practice at any age. The real key is
that they engage in intense practice. Bad leaders assume that
deliberate practice makes no difference, so they continue to perform
but never improve.
6. Leaders are only willing to be as effective as those who in turn lead
them. Tom Watson, Jr., is often credited as the key architect of IBM’s
culture. One manifestation of that culture was that men wore white