Today we are going to start a series of videos based on the book “The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership”, by John C. Maxwell.
Initially, we will explain the first law of leadership in detail for you to be inspired. We decided to separate them in series because unfortunately people in general are not interested in very long explanations, and this way you can choose which law interests you most at the moment.
The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership was released in 1998, and it immediately became a phenomenon book as it brought easy-to-understand and applicable aspects. Over more than three decades John Maxwell has gained a reputation as a communicator. And, as he says, communication “makes the complex simple.”
For the author, leadership requires the ability to do more than one thing.
Instinctively, successful people understand that concentration, consistency in goals and resilience are important for achievement. But leadership, besides being fundamental, is something very complex.
In order for us to lead well, we need to do 21 things well. I know you're thinking, how am I going to be able to remember and apply 21 things in my busy day to day life to learn how to lead?
Calm! According to Jonh, although we need to do 21 things well to be excellent leaders, the reality is that none of us apply all of these laws well.
He uses himself as an example, stating that he is at or below average in five of the laws — and he wrote the book!
So what's a leader to do? Ignore these laws? No way! You should just develop a leadership team.
Therefore, let's start with the first law of leadership, that is, the law of limits.
Leadership capacity determines the person's degree of effectiveness, the more capable they are of leading, the greater their results and the effectiveness of their decisions.
This is the reason why leadership capacity is the limit that determines a person's degree of effectiveness. The lower a person's leadership ability, the lower the ceiling on their potential. The greater the ability to lead, the greater the limit on your potential.
Note the following: If your leadership is worth 8, then your effectiveness cannot be higher than 7. Your leadership capacity — for better or worse — always determines your effectiveness and the potential impact of your organization.
Sit back on the sofa because now I'm going to tell you a story that you probably don't know, but I'm sure you know the most famous fast food brand in the world, present in practically 119 countries.
Have you ever heard of the brothers Dick and Maurice? What do they have in common with the McDonald's brand?
I'm going to explain to you:
In 1930, two young brothers named Dick and Maurice moved from New Hampshire to California. They did not see opportunities in the place where they were raised. So, they went directly to Hollywood, where they ended up getting a job at a film studio. Some time later, they decided to open a theater in Glendale, a city eight kilometers northeast of Hollywood. But despite their efforts, the brothers were unable to make the business profitable.
The brothers' desire for success was great, so they continued to look for better business opportunities. In 1937, they finally discovered something that worked. They opened a small drive-in restaurant in Pasadena, just east of Glendale.
Dick and Maurice's little drive-in was a huge success, and in 1940 they decided to take the business to San Bernardino.
They built bigger facilities and expanded the menu. Annual sales reached $200,000, and the brothers found themselves sharing $50,000 in profit a year — an amount that placed them among the city's financial elite.
In 1948, intuition told them that things were changing, and they made changes to the business. The menu has been reduced, focusing on burgers. They eliminated metal waiters, plates, cups and cutlery, starting to use paper material. They reduced costs and prices charged. The brothers' goal was to prepare the customer's order in 30 seconds or less. After all, the profile of its customers were people in a hurry. By making these changes they innovated and were successful.
In the mid-1950s, annual revenue reached $350,000, and Dick and Maurice began to share a profit of around $100,000 a year.
A neon sign just said McDonald’s Hamburgers.
Dick and Maurice McDonald hit the American Dream jackpot, and the rest, as they say, is history, right?
You might be thinking, but why have I never heard of these guys? And I tell you, you never heard because they were trapped by the limit law.
The McDonalds never went further because their weak leadership set a limit on their ability to achieve success.
It is true that the McDonald brothers were financially secure. They even had the idea of marketing the McDonald’s concept. The idea of franchising restaurants was not new. It had existed for decades. They started in 1952, but the effort failed. The reason was simple. They didn't have the leadership needed to make a larger business effective. They were efficient owners of just one restaurant.
They were efficient managers. But they were not leaders. Their reasoning mechanism set a limit to what they could do and achieve.
In 1954, the brothers met Ray Kroc, a leader. Kroc ran the small company he had founded to sell milkshake machines. He knew McDonald’s.
He soon reached an agreement with Dick and Maurice and, in 1955, created McDonald’s Systems, Inc. (later transformed into McDonald’s Corporation). Kroc immediately purchased the rights to a franchise to use as a model and prototype. He would use it to sell other franchises.
He recruited and hired the best people he could find, and as the team grew in size and capabilities, his people recruited others with leadership capabilities.
For the first eight years with McDonald’s, he did not receive a salary. Not only that, but he also took out personal loans from the bank, backed by life insurance, to help cover the salaries of a few key leaders he wanted on his team.
In 1961, for the sum of 2.7 million dollars, Kroc purchased the exclusive rights to McDonald’s from his brothers.
Dick and Maurice McDonald tried to franchise their service system, until they managed to sell the concept to 15 buyers, only 10 of whom ended up opening restaurants.
The leadership limit of Ray Kroc's life was much higher. Between 1955 and 1959, Kroc managed to open 100 restaurants. Four years later, there were 500 McDonald’s. Today the company has opened more than 31 thousand restaurants in 119 countries.
Success without leadership is practically impossible.
For the author, success is within reach of almost everyone. However, I believe that personal success without leadership skills has limited effectiveness. Without leadership skills, a person's impact is only a fraction of what it could be with good leadership. The higher you want to get, the more you need leadership. The greater the impact you want to have, the greater your influence needs to be.
The higher you want to go, the more you need leadership. The greater the impact you want to have, the greater the need to learn to lead.
To increase your level of effectiveness, you have two options. You can work hard to increase your dedication to success and excellence—work to become a 10. You may be able to reach this level, although the law of diminishing returns says that the effort required to increase the last two points would require more energy. than necessary for the top eight.
But you have another choice. You can work hard to increase your leadership level. Let's say your natural leadership ability is 4 — slightly below average.
By elevating your leadership capabilities—without increasing your dedication to success—you can increase your original effectiveness by 600%. Leadership has a multiplier effect.
Therefore, the concept in the business world is very common that to change the direction of the organization, change the leader.
Leadership capacity is always the limit of personal and organizational effectiveness. If a person's leadership is great, the organization's limit is high.
If it is not, then the organization is limited. Therefore, in times of difficulty, organizations naturally seek new leadership.
When the country goes through difficult times, we elect a new president. When talented teams don't win, study leadership. Personal and organizational effectiveness is proportional to the strength of leadership.
Wherever you look, you can find smart, talented, successful people who are unable to go any further because of the limits of their leadership. For example: when Apple was created in the late 1970s, Steve Wozniak was the brains behind the Apple computer. His leadership threshold was low, but that wasn't the case for his partner, Steve Jobs.
This is the impact of the limit law.
In the 1980s, the author talks about CEO Don Stephenson, chairman of Global Hospitality Resources.
His company ran excellent facilities. Don said that whenever his people took over an organization, they started by doing two things. First, he trained the team to improve customer service and then fired the leader. When he said that, I was surprised. — Do you always fire him? Everytime? - Exactly. Everytime. — Don't you talk to him first to find out if he's a good leader? — No. If he were a good leader, the organization wouldn't be the mess it is.
It's the law of limits. To achieve the highest degree of effectiveness, you need to raise the bar—one way or another.
To apply the law of limits to your life, do the following: List some of your main goals.
(Try to focus on relevant goals—things that will take a year or more. List at least five but no more than ten items.) Now identify which ones will require the participation or cooperation of others. For these activities, your leadership ability will have a great impact on your effectiveness.
— Assess your leadership ability.
— Ask others to rate your leadership.
Talk to your boss, your spouse, two colleagues (with the same background as you), and three people you lead about your leadership abilities.
Ask them to rate you on a scale of 1 (low) to 10 (high) in each of the following aspects:
• Skill with people
• Planning and strategic thinking
• Vision
• Results.
Average the results and compare them to your own assessment.
Based on these assessments, are your leadership abilities better or worse than you expected?
If there is a difference between your assessment and that of others, what do you think is the reason for this? How much are you willing to grow in the area of leadership?
Do this self-assessment and before seeking to take off for success, study with great interest about leadership, models and species. become an expert in leading and motivating people. This way you will be increasing your limit law. It's easier to increase your leadership than increase your dedication. There are people who are dedicated and work twice as hard asthe rest and they never achieve the success they want because they are weak in their ability to lead.
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