10,000 NOs

CHAPTER 10Leadership

“It all starts with humility. Everything I've learned about leadership, whether it's fatherhood, being a husband, being a fullback … if you're not humble, you don't have a chance to be happy in this life.”

—Heath Evans, 10-Year NFL Veteran, Super Bowl Champion

One of the benefits of sitting down on my 10,000 NOs podcast with so many guests who have made larger-than-average impacts by leading men and women through various organizations and teams is that I've been able to boil down their intricate stories and varied backgrounds into simple-to-digest commonalities. Each episode, just like each chapter in this book, concludes with Three Takeaways. Regardless of the various words, phrases, and metaphors that different people from different industries, cultures, and walks of life use, I have found three overall tenets on great leadership that apply to all of them: service, communication, and accountability.

You Can't Have Leadership Without Relationships

Service, in this context, pertains to the leader basing each and every one of their actions, as well as every command or assignment given to their team, on a mandate to serve the higher good of the organization's mission statement. This means that team members will only be asked to carry out tasks that serve the organization's stated purpose, rather than orders that solely benefit the leader.

Communication is the leader's ability to convey the mission statement to team members clearly and concisely and to ...