David Marquet: Turn the Ship Around! Turning Followers into Leaders

Biggest takeaways - wow

Change your behavior, then change your thinking (/your thinking will follow)
Delegate decisions to the lowest level possible. Give control. Give responsibility.

Throughout the day, people approached the captain to do this or to do that. The captain would sometimes ask a question or two, then say “Very well.”

He reserved only the tip of the iceberg type decisions for his own confirmation.

The great mass of the iceberg—the other 95% of decisions—were made without any involvement or confirmation of the captain.

I can’t say I actually saw the captain give and order.

If you let your people own the problem and view themselves as a value add, they will produce solutions.

Become a leader-leader. (Empower people to get out of the follower dynamic. Really this is huge…..!)

Reframe: people at the top and people at the front lines (no bottom).

A human being’s genius, passion, loyalty, and tenacious creativity are volunteered only. You can’t buy those, only enable volunteering.

Communicate people’s worth and value so clearly that they are inspired to see it themselves.

Someone might not do a task because it will get shot down, or because it requires approval from above. “Why don’t you just say, ‘Captain, I intend to go active on sonar for training?’. This works.

The captain said “Very well,” and disappeared - leaving the man accountable for all frontline action.

3 pillars to leader-leader

Divest control and distribute it to your leaders.

To do this. Start acting differently and the thinking will follow.

Act like, and make, your chiefs responsible for their divisions.

Review your org’s documents where decision-making authority is specified and push the decision to the next lower level of the organization. Have your chiefs fill in this sentence: “When I think about delegating this decision, I worry that…” discuss the worst worries—they will be in two buckets: issues of competence and issues of clarity.

People are worried that the next level won’t make good decisions because they lack the technical competence about the subject or because they don’t understand what the org is trying to accomplish. Both can be solved.

Short, early conversations allow the crew to get early feedback on how they are tackling problems. They can be 30 seconds, and they also solve #2: understanding what the top goal is / reducing your miscommunication of the top goal.

A little rudder far from the rocks prevents the need for a lot of rudder next to the rocks.

“I intend to.” Rule gives your crew control. Decisions come from them. “Captain, I intend to submerge the ship. We are in water we own, the depth has been checked and is four hundred feet, all men are below, the ship is rigged for dive, and I’ve certified my watch team”

“Very well”

Or “I plan on:”. NO-“Request permission to.,” ”I’d like to,” “what should I do about”

The crew should anticipate what your thinking about in their I Intend To message so you answer Very Well. Not questions first to understand if it’s a yes or no.

Sending the message “we will track and monitor your job performance. We will enforce proper performance,” is counter to the control message: you are responsible for your job.

Instead of metrics and progress discussions, run checkout. A bottom-up dialogue with: what I’m doing, haven’t done, and need help with”. Who’s responsible for the department. Me. Not the boss the boss shouldn’t keep metrics and spend meeting time discussing his view of the metrics.

“We’re checking up on you” has a deleterious effect. Avoid it. Encourage people to come to you when they need something (that thing would be all you would look for when checking in anyway - because “good” is continue as is).

Your control room should have a buzz of discussion among your people. That’s a key metric for how well things are running and whether everyone is sharing info.

Actions to raise morale (act differently and the thinking will follow)

Your chiefs will brag about the company to their family and friends
They’d look visitors in the eye when they met them in the passageway (three name rule: Good morning Mr. Kennedy, my name is Chris Gillaspy, welcome aboard Entelechy.
They’d wear their company ball caps as much as possible
They’d boast about it to their friends in the industry
They’d buy company lighters, pens, and pins from the ship’s store

The lt. told the chiefs and frontline men to act that way. The lt. didnt explain reasons, this is the 3 name rule: . {I act it out}. Any questions.

Lieutenant understood the tip of the iceberg. Actions that lead to all the other necessary actions.

1. Competence

Deliberate action. Say what you’re going to do out loud before you do it. I will turn a into b. Then start. That way there can be no attention to detail deficits. You can’t pay attention more. You can reduce autopilot.

2. Clarity

Take care of your people. Inside of work coach them to get promoted and play the game to reach the right metrics. Outside of work look after their health and relationships.

Use legacy and history for information. Convey why this is important.

Use guiding principles publicly and in decision criteria.

When giving an award or evaluation - Max exhibited courage and openness when reporting… . And give impromptu and informal awards - on the spot when necessary. Speak words of appreciation and professionalism.

Awards should be man vs. nature. Otherwise they are man vs. man and they are limited, finite. Every man that can get a fire hose to the scene in 2 minutes gets an award, because the act is hard.

Misc. tactics (insightful)

Call an all hands meeting. Your chiefs will be in the front (because you interact with them most frequently). Wave everyone as close as possible. A tight huddle. And send your chiefs to the back. The crew should be at the front from now on.
Nobody should follow your order because they think you have secret information for “executives only”. They should push back. If there is secret info it should be explicit. Otherwise you might be wrong and they would blindly execute. Bad
“Can you think out loud?” If you would disagree or override the decision.
Don’t do briefings. Those are passive. One briefer. Everyone else “is briefed.” Do certifications. Test to make sure everyone is prepared and knows what’s going on by asking questions (put the onus of action on the participants; leader-leader dynamic). If the team isn’t ready, postpone. A sales pitch is usually someone being briefed. Think about the preparation. How can they be ready to present their portion of the event? Certification turns the meeting into a decision point: either you’re ready or not. And it’s a mechanism for competence.