Willink, Jocko, and Leif Babin. Extreme ownership: How US Navy SEALs lead and win. St. Martin’s Press, 2017.

Leadership: The Single Most Important Factor

Most leadership books focus on individual practices / personal character traits. But without a team there can be no leadership.

Team: a group of individuals working to accomplish a mission.

Leadership requires a diverse team of people in various groups to execute highly complex missions in order to achieve strategic goals

The only meaningful measure for a leader is whether the team succeeds or fails. The two characterizations a of leader that matter: effective and ineffective. Effective leaders lead successful teams that accomplish their missions and win (ineffective leaders do not).

There are no infallible leaders, therefore, the following are essential to success:
- The humility to admit and own mistakes
- The ability to develop a plan to overcome the mistakes
The best leaders focus on the mission and how best to accomplish it

The underlying principle (the mind-set) that provides the foundation for the rest of the book is “extreme ownership”.

Extreme Ownership: leaders must own everything in their world; there is no one else to blame.

The principles empower teams to dominate their battlefields by enabling leaders to fulfill their purpose: lead and win.

Winning the War Within (Principles)

The following principles empower teams to dominate their battlefields by enabling leaders to fulfill their purpose: lead and win.

Extreme Ownership

The leader is truly and ultimately responsible for everything; there is no one else to blame
Extreme Ownership is the fundamental core of what constitutes an effective leader
The leader must acknowledge mistakes and admit failures, take ownership of them, and develop a plan to win
The leader must set ego aside, accept responsibility for failures, attack weaknesses, and consistently work to build a more effective team
The leader does not take credit for his team’s successes, but bestows that honor upon his team members
When people see Extreme Ownership in their leaders, they emulate it down the chain of command
- As a group, they try to figure out how to fix their problems, instead of what to blame

No Bad Teams, Only Bad Leaders

When it comes to standards of performance, as a leader, it’s not what you preach, it’s what you tolerate
Regardless of what’s said or written, if sub-standard performance is accepted (no one held accountable), the poor performance becomes the new standard
Leaders must enforce standards
Consequences for failing don’t need to be immediately severe, but the tasks should be repeated until they meet expectations
Leadership is all about providing a forcing function to get different members working together to accomplish the mission
Leaders should never be satisfied; they must always strive to improve, and push standards higher

Believe

Leaders must be true believers in the mission to convince and inspire others to follow and accomplish the mission
Leaders must always understand that they are part of something greater than themselves
They must impart this understanding to their team
Belief in the mission is critical for any team to win and achieve big results
Leaders must be able to detach from the tactical mission and understand how it fits into strategic goals
When leaders are told to do something they don’t understand, they must ask “why?”
It is critical that leaders impart a general understanding of their strategic knowledge — the why — to their team

Check the Ego

Ego clouds and disrupts everything (planning, ability to take good advice/criticism, seeing the world as it is)
To implement Extreme Ownership, you must check your ego and have a high degree of humility
Admit to mistakes, take ownership, and develop a plan to overcome challenges
The leader and team should be confident but not cocky, and must never get complacent

Laws of Combat (Strategies)

Cover and Move

The most fundamental tactic: cover & moves means teamwork
All elements within the greater team are crucial and must work together to accomplish the mission
- Mutually supportive for that singular purpose
Groups within the team must break down silos, depend on each other, and understand who depends on them
Leaders must continually keep perspective on the strategic mission and remind the team they are part of a greater team/mission

Simple

Simplifying as much as possible (the inherent layers of complexities) is crucial to success
Complicated plans/orders may not be understood
When things go wrong, complexity compounds issues that can spiral out of control into chaos
Plans and orders must be simple, clear, and concise
Every team member must understand their role in the mission (and their responsibility during contingencies)
If the team doesn’t understand the plan/order/tactic, you’ve failed as a leader

Prioritize and Execute

Leaders must remain calm and make the best possible decisions
Relax, look around, make a call
- Leaders must pull themselves off the firing line, step back, and maintain the strategic picture
Leaders must determine the highest priority task and execute
Stay at least a step or two ahead of real-time problems (e.g. anticipate challenges with contingency planning)
- Stay ahead of the curve to prevent being overwhelmed
A team that’s been briefed on contingency plans can rapidly execute when problems arise
When priorities change, communication of that shift (up & down chain of command) is critical

The process:

Evaluate highest priority problem
Explain the highest priority effort to your team in simple, clear, concise terms
Determine a solution (seek input from leaders/team when possible)
Focus all effort towards this priority task and direct execution
Don’t get target fixation; maintain the ability to see other problems developing

Decentralized Command

Humans aren’t capable of managing more than 6-10 people
Teams must be broken down into manageable elements (4-5 people)
Tactical-level leaders must understand both the “what” and the “why” of what they’re doing
Junior leaders must understand what is within their decision-making authority
They must communicate up the chain to recommend decisions outside their authority and be proactive
Information must be pushed both up and down the chain of command (“situational awareness”)

Sustaining Victory (Operations)

Plan

Having a standardized planning process is essential for success
Planning begins with mission analysis
- Understand higher headquarters’ mission, Commander’s Intent (CI), and end-state
- Identify and state your own CI and end-state for the specific mission
Identify personnel, assets, resources, and time available
- Lean on expertise and use all resources
Decentralize the planning process
- Empower key leaders within the team to analyze possible courses of action
- This gives them buy-in, helps them understand the mission, and strengthens their belief in the mission
Determine a specific course of action
- Lean towards the simplest course of action, and focus all efforts there
Empower key leaders to develop the plan for the selected course of action
Plan for likely contingencies through each phase of the operation
Mitigate risks that can be controlled
Delegate portions of the plan and brief to key junior leaders
- Stand back and be the “tactical genius” (ensure compliance with strategic objectives; don’t get lost in details)
Continually check/question the plan against emerging information
Brief plan to all participants
- Emphasize CI
- Ask question and engage in discussion with the team to ensure they understand
Conduct post-operational debrief after execution
- Analyze lessons learned and implement them in future planning

Leading Up and Down the Chain of Command

Down the chain:

Leaders have insight into the bigger picture/strategy, but not the tactical details
Junior members have the opposite insights
It’s critical that each have an understanding of the other’s role
Leader must explain to the troops how their role contributes to the big picture success
Routinely communicate with team so everyone understand their role in the mission
Requires stepping out of the office, and personally engaging in face-to-face conversations

Up the chain:

Leaders must support their own boss
Tactfully engage with your boss to push situational awareness up the chain of command
If you don’t understand decisions being made, ask these question up the chain of command

The major factors:

Take responsibility for leading everyone in your world (both superiors & subordinates)
If someone’s not doing what you want/need, examine how you can better enable them
Don’t ask your leader what you should do; tell them what you’re going to do

Decisiveness Amid Uncertainty

There’s great pressure from uncertainty, chaos, and the unknown, but leaders can’t be paralyzed by fear (this results in inaction)
It is critical for leaders to act decisively amid uncertainty, to make the best decisions based on the immediate information available
There’s no 100% “right” solution, and waiting for it will lead to delay, indecision, and inability to execute
Leaders must be able to make decisions promptly and be ready to adjust those decision quickly based on new information

Discipline Equals Freedom — The Dichotomy of Leadership

A good leader must be all of the following:

Confident but not cocky
Courageous but not foolhardy
Competitive but a gracious loser
Attentive to details but not obsessed by them
Strong but have endurance
A leader and a follower
Humble, not passive
Aggressive, not overbearing
Quiet, not silent
Calm but not robotic
Logical but not devoid of emotions
Close with the troops, but not so close that one becomes more important than the good of the team
Able to execute Extreme Ownership while exercising Decentralized Command