The Art of Leadership Series

Last week, I had the fortune of attending the Art of Leadership conference here in Vancouver. An interesting, insightful and inspiring one-day event, it featured an impressive line-up that included Rudy Giuliani, Hayley Wickenheiser, Charles Duhugg, Dan Roam and Dr. Vince Molinaro.

Given the sheer volume of information presented and exchanged at the conference, I though it best to share the key learnings from each speaker in a series of blog posts to be published in the coming weeks.

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani was the keynote for the event and arguably the most influential speaker, so it seemed appropriate to start by sharing some of his leadership principles.

Rudy Giuliani’s Six Leadership Principles:

1) Establish a set of beliefs: what are your goals? What do you want to accomplish? Always have a plan and an agenda and ensure you are accomplishing it daily. You must be clear when you share your goals and plan with others. People can’t follow ambiguity. And don’t forget that you need to be able to measure your goals.

2) Be an optimist. People follow hope. And they won’t follow someone who can’t provide solutions. Ensure you train and encourage those around you to always bring you solutions instead of problems.

3) Show courage. It’s a fact: most great people fail before they succeed. Take risks, learn from your failings, pick yourself up and overcome your fears.

4) Relentless preparation. Rehearse everything. Think of every possible outcome and prepare for it. Understand that things may go wrong and something unanticipated may happen. But if you’re prepared, your confidence and agility will see you through the tough, unanticipated moments.

5) Team work. Know yourself and build a team that balance your weaknesses with the strengths of other people.

6) Communication. Sharing feedback with those you work with is key. And track metrics to ensure you know exactly where you are as compared to your original goal.

Giuliani was charismatic and charming — as one hopes a leader to be — and often illuminated his principles by applying them to his experiences as a lawyer and as Mayor of New York City on 9/11.

But it was his final point, which didn’t make it onto his toplist of principles, that actually resonated most with me: ultimately, as a leader, you have to love people and care about people. You need to be there and support them in life and in business. In return, people will take care of you and go above and beyond the call of duty.