Bootstrap Leadership Blog

Here’s something you need to do to continue your development as a leader.  It’s important to your ability to influence others, and it’s something that will get you noticed by senior leaders.  What is it?  Gaining knowledge and insight about the competition.   As a leader, you need to become intimately familiar with what’s going on with the other players in your industry.  If you don’t take an interest in where your organization stands in relation to your closest competitors, no one is going to take you seriously as an executive. 

It’s OK to admit that you don’t know everything you could about the competition - that’s the first step in making a behavior change.  Heck, I’ll admit it; I didn’t always have a great working knowledge of the companies we were battling when I was in corporate America.  For example, in the four years I spent at America Online, I never did develop a great sense of what Microsoft, NetZero, Earthlink, Yahoo and others were doing in the marketplace.  Now, you could say that since I was in HR, it wasn’t my job to know intricate detail about these company’s business models or marketing strategies.  I knew some of the basics, but not nearly enough.  I’m not proud of this story, but I share it to illustrate how common it can be to put your head in the sand and just focus on your own company.  Would I have been a better thought leader, a better conduit of information for my team, a better executive, if I had developed a keen sense of the competition?  You bet.  And judging by conversations that I’ve had with hundreds of leaders over the years, I’m not alone here.  So let’s explore your approach to getting smart about the competition. 

Turns out you can know quite a bit about your competitors if you focus on just the four pieces of information.  

First of all, you need to know how the competition stacks up – how they compare relative to market positioning.  How big a share of the market do they have?  This information is generally available in analyst reports or on the internet, and your own Finance department probably keeps an updated lead table to track market share.  Get your hands on this information, because this is one of the best ways to “keep score” when comparing companies – who’s winning the battle for customers?  Second, become familiar with the revenue and profit margin figures for the top companies in your industry.  Who’s making (and keeping) the most money?  The annual Fortune 500 list includes a good deal of information that you can easily absorb and share with your team.  Third, try to keep up to date on who’s developing new products and services.  Who’s winning the innovation game?  Set up an alert on your favorite search engine to get articles that are touting your competition’s latest inventions or processes. Finally, try to get a sense of what your competitors are doing from an employment and culture perspective.  This will tell you who’s winning the war for talent.  Fortune magazine’s Most Admired Companies and Best Companies to Work For lists will help you get a sense for this part of the equation.  If you can talk intelligently about these four factors - where your company stands relative to your competitors in terms of customers, financials, innovation and employment practices - you probably will be one of the most knowledgeable leaders in your organization when if comes to the “other guys” in your industry.    

 
In my view, this isn’t something that’s “nice to do” – in today’s competitive climate, this is a “must do.”   Make a commitment to add a strong working knowledge of your company’s competitors to your leadership portfolio.  Set a goal of wowing your peers and boss with a clear understanding of the challenges facing the company this year, relative to the competition.  You’ll be surprised at how good it feels to be the most knowledgable person at the table.  Don’t be the corporate ostrich who only knows their own company; get out there and learn about who’s coming after you!  

In the past couple of years, at least two national publications have put out regular columns under the heading of “the best advice I ever got.”  I was flipping through Fortune magazine this week and came across their latest version of the article – this time it was blown out to include six pieces of advice from the featured guru.  I immediately thought, wow – what a great exercise for any leader!  So here’s the challenge (and we’ve got a long holiday weekend coming up, so you can afford to take a few minutes to do this exercise):

What is your version of “the best advice I ever got”?   Give it some thought, and then write it down - make it concise, instructive, and inspirational.  Then, jot down 5-6 pieces of advice that you would offer to others that could accompany your “best advice” story, and share it with your team.  Encourage your direct reports to do the same, and have everyone share their reflections and tips.  It should spark some great conversations…

Clearly, by the very label of this exercise, this is an enduring story that you can and should perfect, to share again and again with your teams.  The best advice you ever got should be something pretty special, no?

To illustrate, here’s my “best advice” story.  A long time ago, I had a wonderful boss, Rich Millard.  He told me one day – “the only thing that your people will remember about you is how you treated them.  No one will remember what you did, but they will remember what it felt like to work for (or with) you.”  That advice really resonated with me, and has guided me ever since…

What’s your “best advice” story?  Think back to your past colleagues, managers, and mentors, and capture the sound bite.  Then, share it with your team, and talk about what it means to you.  It’s a great reflection exercise that will serve you well as you mentor others throughout your career…

There was a wonderful column in Saturday’s Wall Street Journal by Peggy Noonan about the fact that it’s time for President Obama to “own” his presidency.  Noonan wrote that it’s been 9 months since Obama took office, and it’s time to stop using the excuse that this administration is mopping up the mess they inherited.  Noonan’s premise is that the American people will give that argument only so much playing time before they start asking: “what are you doing to fix things?”  Noonan believes the polls indicate that we’ve collectively declared: “you’re officially responsible now, Mr. Obama.”

I think she’s right.  There comes a time in every leader’s tenure when perception turns from “they’re just getting their feet on the ground” to “what’s taking them so long?”  But in the real world, we don’t have the benefit of regular polls to help us figure out when that perception has shifted.  Sometimes that realization comes hard and fast in a 1:1 with your boss, or in a staff meeting where you get called on to defend a position (or lack thereof). 

We’ve all assumed a new leadership position at some point – do you remember how that felt?  It literally feels different, doesn’t it?  You’re busy getting the lay of the land, meeting your key stakeholders, plotting strategy and putting together a new team.  All the while, people are treating you with kid gloves, because they know you’re assimilating and haven’t had a chance to put your stamp on the role yet.  But sooner or later, you become synonymous with the job.  It’s your position, and people are looking at your body of work.  “What’s she done?” becomes a fair question, and if you’re not careful, you’ll miss the signals of when people feel you’ve had long enough to make your mark.

How long do you have?  That depends on the situation, of course.  If you’re being asked to lead a major turnaround you’ll probably get longer to play the “we were in a deep hole” card that if you take over a successful group.  But I would say you have anywhere from 3 to 4 months, and maybe less, before people expect you to put your stamp on the role. 

I think Obama has the hardest job in the world, so maybe 9 months is about right for him.  Certainly, though, the challenges that he inherited (two wars, economic downturn, etc.) are now his, too.  There’s no getting around it… he has to deliver, because he’s in the big chair now.  These are his problems, and he needs to solve them. 

The same is true for you.  At some point, the job becomes yours, and it won’t matter what your predecessor did.  Know this, and get into this mindset very early; anticipate the bend in the road where this shift in perception is likely to happen for you.  Hopefully, it will spur you to take action and make decisions that you can call your own, which starts you on the path to building your own track record of results.  Don’t wait for others to gauge how long is long enough – adopt the attitude that these are my challenges and issues to solve, and start owning the role from the very beginning.