Good to Great

I have been reading this book 'Good to Great' by Jim Collins,and find it an extremely interesting read. The book is basically trying to find out the factors that differentiate the good companies from the ones that are great. The methodology involves picking up those companies out of the fortune 500 list, that have shown a meteoric rise in performance beyond a transition point, and have sustained that performance for at least 15 years.A time of 15 years has been chosen to isolate those companies, whose great performance is a one-off case, possibly because of some single rejuevnating factor like good leadership or some other market/environmental variable.Normally companies that show good performance for so long  follow certain enduring principles of success, and would have seen at least two change of leaders. The performance of these companies has been compared with laggards in the same industry, and also with good performers who were unable to sustain the momentum after a meteoric rise.What emerged out of this research was a list of 11 companies, one of them being Gillete.There is a common theme that runs across these companies. For today, let us take the first common factor across these star performers.I will try to follow up with more in the days to come.

Level 5 Leadership: There are five levels of leadership-level 1 to level 5.I expect most of my friend to have crossed the four levels, and would not waste time by elucidiating the characteristics of those levels. It is more important to know as to what is level 5 leadership.This kind of leadership is a rare combination of extreme humility and a steely resolve. On the face of it , these people may seem to be weak, because of being too humble, but look deeper, and you will find a firm resolve. They are not the show off kind, like probably Patton,but are more like Abraham Lincoln. All the 11 companies that showed great performance had such leader at the helm at and beyond the point of transition.So what is the point that I am trying to make.One, A flamboyant guy at the helm is not necessarily good for the organisation. In fact the organisation can do without them.Second, Look around you at some great units/companies,and more often than not you will find  a level 5 leader,who is almost shy,awkardly mannered,away from media/attention hype, working quietly with a steely resolve to change thing for the better,rather than continuing with the status quo.