How Leaders Lead with David Novak

#157: Liz Elting, Cofounder and former CEO of TransPerfect — Develop a bias toward action

Oct 19, 2023

Former CEO of TransPerfect, Liz Elting, discusses her strong bias toward action in leadership and shares insights on building a billion-dollar business. Highlights include focusing on scaling quickly, overcoming personnel mistakes, hitting goals, hiring for sales roles, and practical sources of new ideas. She also stresses the importance of critical safeguards in business partnerships. The episode emphasizes the value of taking action, setting goals, and executing them.

48:48

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Episode guests

Liz Elting

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Episode notes

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Quick takeaways

Having a bias towards action is crucial for effective leadership and achieving success in business.

Creating a motivated and autonomous sales team, aligned with company goals, is essential for business growth and scalability.

Deep dives

Developing a Bias Towards Action

One of the biggest derailing factors in leadership is a lack of urgency and action to galvanize teams and get things done. Liz Elting, former CEO of TransPerfect, emphasizes the importance of taking action and having a bias towards getting things done. She believes that dreaming, planning, and strategizing are important, but without the urgency and action to execute those plans, success cannot be achieved. Liz's success in building a billion-dollar business involved putting in hard work, long hours, and being goal-oriented. She also emphasizes the importance of motivating teams to operate in the same way, creating a powerful force for accomplishing big goals.

Introduction

2min

Passion for Languages and Building a Better Translation Company

10min

The Development of TransPerfect: From a Dorm Room to Global Success

2min

The Importance of Suspending Judgment and Allowing Ideas to Develop

13min

Building a Partnership and the Importance of a Shareholders Agreement

4min

Overcoming Challenges and Rising Above Drama

13min

Burning Out and Replenishing Energy: Family, Exercise, and Travel

2min

Developing a Bias Towards Action and Execution

3min

There are few things more frustrating than a leader who sets up a bunch of meetings, presents ideas, and talks strategy…

… but then doesn’t know how to motivate everyone to actually get all that stuff done!

Fortunately, our guest today is NOT that kind of leader.

Liz Elting is the former CEO of TransPerfect, a translation solutions company that she started and built into a billion-dollar business.

Today you’re going to hear how she did it. And as you’ll see, a huge part of her success comes from Liz’s strong bias toward action.

She is willing to put in the hard work and long hours. She is incredibly goal-oriented. And best of all, she knows how to motivate a team to go out and operate in the same way.

If you’re feeling stagnant or weighed down by too much bureaucracy, this episode is going to help you be the kind of leader who’s biased toward action – and whose teams are, too.

You’ll also learn:

What to focus on early in a startup if you want to get out of the weeds and scale quickly
A big personnel mistake Liz made early (and how she fixed it)
One big reason you might not be hitting your goals
A key characteristic to look for when you’re hiring for a sales role
Practical sources of new ideas that you’re probably overlooking
Three critical safeguards EVERY business partnership needs

Take your learning further. Get proven leadership advice from these (free!) resources:

The How Leaders Lead App: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go

Daily Insight Emails: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day

Whichever you choose, you can be sure you’ll get the trusted leadership advice you need to advance your career, develop your team, and grow your business.

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How Leaders Lead with David Novak

#157: Liz Elting, Cofounder and former CEO of TransPerfect — Develop a bias toward action

Episode guests

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

Deep dives

Developing a Bias Towards Action

Lessons from Childhood: Resilience and Motivation

Following Passion and Taking Risks

Building a World-Class Sales Organization

Remember Everything You Learn from Podcasts