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14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Military Leadership Applied to Business, December 31, 2003
This review is from: Leadership Lessons of the U.S. Navy SEALS : Battle-Tested Strategies for Creating Successful Organizations and Inspiring Extraordinary Results (Hardcover)
I chose to buy and read this book because one of its authors was a Navy SEAL, and it promised to highlight military leadership lessons from a SEAL perspective. I soon discovered an outstandingly balanced and informative organizational leadership book that took an honest military leadership perspective and effectively applied it directly and indirectly to civilian business environments. This real-world leadership book should appeal to any military-related person and anyone interested in better understanding the military and business leadership connection. This book was written by a brother duo, one a successful corporate executive and the other an experienced SEAL officer. In their introduction, they accurately assessed what made the book stand apart from other leadership books I have read: "Be forewarned: This book does not pay homage to godlike CEOs, legendary generals, and other corporate cult figures. It is our view that masterful leadership and effective teams, not colorful mavericks, produce success...Every great leader has a great team above, around, and behind him or her...[The book is] a collection of lessons from SEAL training and SEAL operations that have been tested in the business world." The book is broken down into six chapters (Setting Goals, Organization-Create Structure or Fight Alone, Leadership-The Hardest Easy Thing, The Thundering Herd, Building a Thundering Herd, and Now Maintain Your Momentum), with embedded lessons related to each chapter title. Each lesson starts with a SEAL mission (a SEAL team sea-story or experience) and ends with a suggested business take-away. The lessons stimulated thought and offered ideas for improving individual and organizational leadership. The authors left it to the readers to decide which lessons applied to their situations and then challenged them to apply those lessons. The authors' candid perspectives and observations were refreshing and were reflected in their equally straightforward lessons. A sampling of the authors' colorful lessons includes: *Avoid creating a capability and then looking for a mission to justify it
*Build boundaries to prevent infighting and cannibalism
*If you think no one else can replace you, you're an egotistical S.O.B. who's failed
*There are probably good reasons why your marching orders seem screwed up
*Identify your lead dogs, feed them well, and build a pack around them
*If you need to scream, you need to practice The team-building and teamwork concepts emphasized in this book apply to military and business leaders and organizations. If you want time-tested ideas to improve your leadership, or your organization's effectiveness, then you should read this book.
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Extraordinary Teams, March 17, 2004
This review is from: Leadership Lessons of the U.S. Navy SEALS : Battle-Tested Strategies for Creating Successful Organizations and Inspiring Extraordinary Results (Hardcover)
I liked the book. I think it hit the mark for it's intended audience. The lessons learned from the school of hard knocks are clear, simple, direct; very military at the front lines. Each point is illustraged with a war story from both the civilian and military perspective. Being ex-military I liked the war stories. The lessons are very useful, but like many books of its ilk, not new. The key lessons were learned and documented many years ago by the Greeks and Romans. I think the thing to keep in mind is that communication has not ocurred until both sides understand the message. In that line, I think this book does a very good job of describing key leadership traits and tools and introducing them to a new audience. The book is organized by chapters, and key points and illustrations within each. There are contradictions in the points that are not brought up or discussed. I think this is true due to the nature of human interaction and its complexities, that a tool or technique works until it doesn't. The key is for the leader to recognized the difference. The book is weak here, but I also think that is something better learned from experience. Some major take aways for me was the dicussion on organizational structure, the need to follow SOP, until there is a greater need to not, good leadership demands good followership, followers have major responsibilities towards their leaders (how and when to tell the boss the path we are following is wrong). For me this is not new, but it is great to be reminded of these things. This book is not the best I have read on the topic, but very useful for the key insights form practical life and death experience.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Insightful!, June 11, 2004
This review is from: Leadership Lessons of the U.S. Navy SEALS : Battle-Tested Strategies for Creating Successful Organizations and Inspiring Extraordinary Results (Hardcover)
If you've declared war on your company's lackluster performance, this book will help you launch an all-out assault. Leadership Lessons of the Navy Seals demonstrates through the experiences of this elite military unit of Sea, Air and Land commandos that combat lessons can apply to the corporate world. The book provides examples of SEAL tactics and missions, along with their corporate applications, particularly in strong team building. Authors Jeff Cannon and Lt. Cmdr. Jon Cannon combine their experience in business and the U.S. Navy in a no-nonsense, practical guide. They zero in on setting goals and commanding your troops with deadly accuracy. While their problem-solving text gets straight to the point, it isn't novel and they repeat lessons under different titles. The book is a laundry list, a useful approach in allowing you to choose what you need. We found that the Cannons fire off a good how-to book for corporate strategists who want to develop battle plans for improving their teams and organizations.
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