Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win

their troops, their subordinate leaders, or the scenario. They blamed the
SEAL training instructor staff; they blamed inadequate equipment or the
experience level of their men. They refused to accept responsibility.
Poor performance and mission failure were the result.
The best-performing SEAL units had leaders who accepted
responsibility for everything. Every mistake, every failure or shortfall—
those leaders would own it. During the debrief after a training mission,
those good SEAL leaders took ownership of failures, sought guidance on
how to improve, and figured out a way to overcome challenges on the
next iteration. The best leaders checked their egos, accepted blame,
sought out constructive criticism, and took detailed notes for
improvement. They exhibited Extreme Ownership, and as a result, their
SEAL platoons and task units dominated.
When a bad SEAL leader walked into a debrief and blamed everyone
else, that attitude was picked up by subordinates and team members, who
then followed suit. They all blamed everyone else, and inevitably the
team was ineffective and unable to properly execute a plan.
Continuing, I told the VP, “In those situations, you ended up with a
unit that never felt they were to blame for anything. All they did was
make excuses and ultimately never made the adjustments necessary to
fix problems. Now, compare that to the commander who came in and
took the blame. He said, ‘My subordinate leaders made bad calls; I must
not have explained the overall intent well enough.’ Or, ‘The assault force
didn’t execute the way I envisioned; I need to make sure they better
understand my intent and rehearse more thoroughly.’ The good leaders
took ownership of the mistakes and shortfalls. That’s the key difference.
And how do you think their SEAL platoons and task units reacted to this
type of leadership?”