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

The emerging-markets VP was an impressive leader and a key driver
of the company’s overall success. Like a good SEAL combat leader, he
was aggressive and exercised Extreme Ownership to solve challenges
and accomplish his mission. While he didn’t have much patience for the
company’s bureaucracy, his drive made him highly successful, and he
pushed his team to the highest standards of performance. His leadership
and personal efforts had directly contributed to the company’s rapid
expansion and growth, with hundreds of new retail stores and hundreds
of millions of dollars in revenue. His team was highly effective,
establishing strong footholds in areas that had traditionally been
dominated almost exclusively by their competitors. They were making
bold moves and, as a result, huge gains.
I had just delivered an Echelon Front presentation on SEAL
leadership concepts to his emerging markets team, and in the discussion
afterward, the VP had turned to planning.
“I constantly harp on my team about planning,” said the VP. He
asked one of his key leaders, a regional manager, “How many times have
you heard me harp on planning?”
“Constantly,” the regional manager responded. I could tell the
regional manager respected her boss, but her body language indicated
she didn’t share his concerns about the importance of establishing a
planning process. No doubt she was thinking: We’re doing well. Why do
I need to take on the additional pain and paperwork requirement of
writing down a planning process and teaching it to my key leaders?
But she was wrong. And her boss—the emerging markets VP—had
great strategic vision in understanding the importance of planning for the
company’s long-term success.
“Early in my career as a SEAL officer, there was a time when I felt