Today's guest is Ken Chenault, the Former Chairman and CEO of American Express, and the current Chairman and Managing Partner of General Catalyst, a dynamic private equity firm. Now, if you run a business or lead a team, there are moments when you need to lean into confrontation. And I don't mean dance around the confrontation, I'm talking about facing it head on. For a lot of people, this can be really hard to do, really intimidating. But the great leaders I know, like Ken, have learned how to engage in constructive confrontation. 

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Today's guest is Aneel Bhusri, the Co-Founder, Co-CEO and Chairman of Workday, an American on‑demand financial management and human capital management software vendor. When Aneel started Workday with David Duffield, they defined a handful of core values for their company. Now this is pretty common practice for business leaders, but here's the problem. A lot of leaders write down the company values and never think about them again. They even laminate them, put them up on the wall, but I’ve got to tell you, all they do is collect dust. But that wasn't the case with Aneel and his Co-Founder Dave Duffield, they decided that investing in their people was going to be the number one value at their company. So how did they live out that value? 

Well, believe it or not, they personally interviewed the first 500 team members they hired. Now that's something that says they value people over anything else. The key lesson here is that they aligned their schedules and their priorities with the company's number one value. You see, the great leaders I know walk the talk of their core values. They just don't write them down and forget them. They actually use their core values to dictate how they spend their time, and how they focus their energy. We have a lot to learn from today's conversation, including:

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The How Leaders Lead App: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go 

Daily Insight Emails: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day

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Today’s guest is Ginni Rometty, the Former Chairman, President and CEO of IBM and current Co-Chairman of the OneTen Initiative. Rising through the ranks from systems engineer to CEO, Ginni has learned to be comfortable with situations outside her comfort zone, because that’s where she grew the most in her journey as a leader. While leading IBM, Ginni learned what was essential about IBM that must endure before making changes that set the company up for future growth in new industries. And so what you're about to hear from Ginni, and what you'll learn from her journey to become CEO of IBM, is that great leaders are comfortable being uncomfortable. 

In this episode, you’ll learn: 

Take your learning further. Get proven leadership advice from these (free!) resources:

The How Leaders Lead App: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go 

Daily Insight Emails: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day

Whichever you choose, you can be sure you’ll get the trusted leadership advice you need to advance your career, develop your team, and grow your business.

Today's guest is Dave Calhoun, the President and CEO of Boeing, the largest aerospace company and leading manufacturer of commercial jetliners Defense, Space and security systems. Dave joined Boeing as CEO in January of 2020, and little did he know the challenges that he’d be up against only a couple months later, when COVID hit. But what Dave has shown is the great leaders restore stability in the midst of a crisis. When we are thrown a right hook that we don't expect when things are a bit chaotic, we look to great leaders to show us how we should think and behave. Now what you're going to hear in this interview is how Dave helped Boeing navigate not only COVID and the massive impact that it had on the airline industry, but also how Boeing has handled the situation of their 737 Max, which was banned from flying passengers due to two plane crashes in 2018 and 19. Now it takes a strong leader to navigate those situations and restore stability on the other side.

Take your learning further. Get proven leadership advice from these (free!) resources:

The How Leaders Lead App: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go 

Daily Insight Emails: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day

Whichever you choose, you can be sure you’ll get the trusted leadership advice you need to advance your career, develop your team, and grow your business.

Today's guest is Will Ahmed, the Founder and CEO of WHOOP, a wearable fitness tracker that measures a few key metrics to help top athletes and everyday consumers achieve peak performance. You're going to learn that Will is an incredibly sharp young leader. Believe it or not, he's in his early 30s, running a company that was recently valued at $3.6 billion. Running a company at that level requires a whole other level of discipline, when it comes to focusing in on what truly matters. If you want to keep your business healthy, no matter what size a company you lead, it's imperative that you measure and keep your eyes on a few vital metrics at all times.

You're going to learn:

Take your learning further. Get proven leadership advice from these (free!) resources:

The How Leaders Lead App: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go 

Daily Insight Emails: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day

Whichever you choose, you can be sure you’ll get the trusted leadership advice you need to advance your career, develop your team, and grow your business.

To round off 2021, today’s episode features six of David’s favorite insights from the year from leaders like Marvin Ellison, Indra Nooyi, and Tom Brady. You’re going to learn about how to react to overwhelming and scary situations with focus, confidence, planning, and communication. Plus, David will teach you his number one exercise for taking stock of where you are now in order to work towards where you want to go.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

Check out https://howleaderslead.com/best-of-2021/ for more great leadership insights, and go to https://howleaderslead.com/survey to share your great insights about the podcast!

Today's guest is Steve Kerr, the head coach of the Golden State Warriors. Earlier in his career as a player, Steve won three NBA titles with the Chicago Bulls alongside the one and only Michael Jordan. He then went on to win two more titles playing for the San Antonio Spurs, and then he became a coach and won three more titles for the Warriors. Needless to say, this guy knows how to win, and he knows how to build teams that win. What you may be surprised to learn, though, is how he does it. The way Steve leads is by understanding the power of the team, from superstars to bench and everything in between. You're going to hear all about this on today's episode, as well as how you too can apply Steve's insights to whatever team you happen to be leading.

In this episode you'll learn:

Take your learning further. Get proven leadership advice from these (free!) resources:

The How Leaders Lead App: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go 

Daily Insight Emails: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day

Whichever you choose, you can be sure you’ll get the trusted leadership advice you need to advance your career, develop your team, and grow your business.

From the United States Marine Corps to Wall Street, Eric Gleacher believes the world belongs to the aggressive. After one round of golf with the right person, the trajectory of his career changed as he pursued his dream of working in finance. After only four years at Lehman Brothers, Eric became a partner and was a large part of establishing the merger and acquisition department. Against the advice of many around him, Gleacher left Lehman Brothers to start his own firm. These risks and experiences have culminated in Gleacher’s book, Risk, Reward, Repeat. Listen as David and Eric discuss the indelible impact of the Marines, working with flawless integrity, and how to take the right risks.

in this conversation, you're going to learn:

Take your learning further. Get proven leadership advice from these (free!) resources:

The How Leaders Lead App: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go 

Daily Insight Emails: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day

Whichever you choose, you can be sure you’ll get the trusted leadership advice you need to advance your career, develop your team, and grow your business.

A force of positivity and pioneer of Financial Technology, Alexa von Tobel felt so strongly about democratizing financial advice for Americans that she dropped out of Harvard business school to build her first business, LearnVest, in 2008. After revolutionizing digital financial services, she sold LearnVest the very same week that she gave birth to her first child. Now, Alexa von Tobel is the Managing Partner of Inspired Capital, a venture capital firm which she founded in 2019. 

You'll also learn:

Take your learning further. Get proven leadership advice from these (free!) resources:

The How Leaders Lead App: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go 

Daily Insight Emails: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day

Whichever you choose, you can be sure you’ll get the trusted leadership advice you need to advance your career, develop your team, and grow your business.

Scott Mahoney, the Chairman and CEO of Peter Millar, goes the distance to for quality in how he shapes the brand and develops his people. Coming up in business, it wasn’t until Scott worked at Polo that he found his love for golf and apparel sales married in an exciting career. He was inspired to buy Peter Millar during the long drive back from a USGA meeting, and moved quickly to scale the brand up. Scott leads with attention to getting things done more efficiently by getting people excited to do them. For example, knowing that Peter Millar product can only be sold once store associates put it on the floor, Scott and his team designed the shipping arrangements to be intuitive for stockroom employees to handle. He even threw a mint in the shipping box to sweeten the deal. Scott was quick to bring nearly everything in house to ensure the quality of product, marketing, promotion, finance, and production, and has taken the apparel world by storm as a result.

SHOW NOTES

Take your learning further. Get proven leadership advice from these (free!) resources:

The How Leaders Lead App: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go 

Daily Insight Emails: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day

Whichever you choose, you can be sure you’ll get the trusted leadership advice you need to advance your career, develop your team, and grow your business.