505: Your Leadership Motive, with Patrick Lencioni

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Dec 21, 2020

Patrick Lencioni, founder of The Table Group and bestselling author, dives into the core motivations behind leadership. He discusses the stark difference between reward-centered and service-oriented leaders, revealing five critical omissions that can hinder effectiveness. The conversation emphasizes the importance of difficult conversations and managing team dynamics. With insights on over-communication and understanding individual strengths, Lencioni challenges leaders to reflect on their motives and embrace authentic leadership for better organizational health.

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INSIGHT

Two Motives for Leadership

Leaders have two central motives: serving others or seeking personal rewards.
Reward-centered leadership often leads to neglecting crucial responsibilities.

ADVICE

Own Team Development

Take full responsibility for developing your team.
Don't delegate core leadership tasks like team building and fostering trust.

ADVICE

Embrace Hard Work and Management

Prepare for difficult conversations and actively manage your team.
Don't make excuses to avoid direct engagement with your people.

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Patrick Lencioni: The Motive

Pat is one of the founders of The Table Group and is the pioneer of the organizational health movement. He is the author of 11 books, which have sold over 6 million copies and been translated into more than 30 languages.

As President of the Table Group, Pat spends his time speaking and writing about leadership, teamwork, and organizational health and consulting with executives and their teams. He is the author of The Motive: Why So Many Leaders Abdicate Their Most Important Responsibilities*.

In this conversation, Pat and I discuss the distinction between reward-centered leaders and service-orientated leaders. We explore the five omissions that reward-centered leaders tend to make and how to avoid these omissions. Plus, Pat introduces his Working Genius model.

Key Points

When leaders are motivated by personal reward, they will avoid the unpleasant situations and activities that leadership requires. -Patrick Lencioni

5 Omissions of Reward-Centered Leaders:

Developing the leadership team
Managing subordinates (and making them manage theirs)
Having difficult or uncomfortable conversations
Running great team meetings
Communicating constantly and repetitively to employees

Many of the reward-focused CEOs I’ve known will attempt to justify their abdication of managing their people by saying, ‘I hire experienced executives and I trust them. They shouldn’t need me to manage them.’ Of course, this is inane. Managing someone is not a punitive activity, nor a sign of distrust. -Patrick Lencioni

Resources Mentioned

The Motive: Why So Many Leaders Abdicate Their Most Important Responsibilities* by Patrick Lencioni
Working Genius assessment (use code COACHING for 50% off)

Interview Notes

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