Discover Your True North. George Bill
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Bill George
Discover Your True North
BEST-SELLING BOOKS BY BILL GEORGE
Authentic Leadership: Rediscovering the Secrets to Creating Lasting Value (2003)
True North: Discover Your Authentic Leadership (2007) (with Peter Sims)
Finding Your True North: A Personal Guide (2008) (with Nick Craig and Andrew McLean)
7 Lessons for Leading in Crisis (2009)
Cover image: Compass © iStock.com/LdF
Cover design: Wiley
Copyright © 2015 by Bill George. All rights reserved.
Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.
Published simultaneously in Canada.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
George, Bill (William W.)
[Finding your true north.]
Discover your true north/Bill George. – Second edition, Expanded and Updated Edition.
pages cm
Revised edition of the author's Finding your true north, 2008.
Includes index.
ISBN 978–1–119–08294–1 (hardback); ISBN 978–1–119–08297–2 (ePDF); ISBN 978–1–119–08295–8 (ePub)
1. Leadership. 2. Organizational effectiveness. I. Title.
HD57.7.G45814 2015
658.4'092-dc23
2015013574
DEDICATION
PREFACE
THE REMARKABLE LEGACY OF WARREN BENNIS
Warren Bennis was one of the great pioneers in the field of leadership. Small in physical stature, he was a giant in his intellect, his heart, and his spirit. Just as Peter Drucker was the father of management, Bennis was the father of leadership.
Bennis transformed our understanding of what it means to be a leader. He was the first scholar who said leadership is not a set of genetic characteristics, but the result of a lifelong process of self-discovery. Rejecting the notion that leaders are born with certain traits, he opened the door to the real source of leadership: within you. He wrote:
The most dangerous leadership myth is that leaders are born – that there is a genetic factor to leadership. This myth asserts that people simply either have certain charismatic qualities or not. That's nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born.
He showed how leaders develop through their life experiences, are shaped by their crucibles, and emerge ever stronger to take on responsibilities of leadership. He said unequivocally, “Leadership is character,” adding,
It is not just a superficial question of style, but has to do with who we are as human beings, and with the forces that have shaped us. The process of becoming a leader is much the same as the process of becoming an integrated human being.
Bennis's early life was deeply influenced by his association at Antioch College and later at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with Douglas McGregor, author of The Human Side of Enterprise. While in Cambridge, he connected with Abraham Maslow (creator of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs), Peter Drucker, Paul Samuelson, and Erik Erikson, whose theories on the eight stages of human development influenced Bennis's own generativity in his later years. He went on to write 30 books. Many of today's influential leadership authors, such as Tom Peters, Nitin Nohria, David Gergen, Jim O'Toole, Bob Sutton, Jeff Sonnenfeld, and Doug Conant are indebted to Bennis for their ideas.
As president of the University of Cincinnati, he realized his personal truth, “I was never going to be able to be happy with positional power. What I really wanted was personal power: having influence based on my voice. My real gift is what I can do in the classroom and as a mentor.” Following a heart attack in 1979, he found his home at the University of Southern California.
Bennis's influence on business leaders was widespread and profound. Thousands of leaders who never knew him were inspired by his writings and adopted his approach to leadership. Many chief executive officers (CEOs) have told me personally what a profound influence he had on their leadership.
I first encountered his writing in 1989 when I read On Becoming a Leader. It was a revelation: Finally, I had found a philosophy of leadership I could resonate with. Throughout my years at Medtronic and Harvard Business School (HBS), I have built on his philoso-phies in my work and teaching.
We first met at the World Economic Forum in the late 1990s. He suffered from heart problems, and had recently had a Medtronic defibrillator implanted. In December of 2000 I invited him as a guest patient to an annual Medtronic event, where he graciously thanked the employees who designed and manufactured his defibrillator in front of 10,000 people.
He was fond of saying he had Medtronic “in his heart” and then describing how his defibrillator saved his life half a dozen times. I once witnessed this in person in Cambridge. While he was speaking, his defibrillator went off, and he slumped to the ground, dropping his papers. Ever the gracious soul, he picked up his papers, apologized for the disruption, and continued