Power Up: Transforming Organizations Through Shared Leadership

POST-HEROIC LEADERSHIP

Jack Hawkins, the corporate leader in the previous chapter, has his own approach to creating success. But because that approach, which we call heroic leadership, is less potent today than in the past it often fails to optimize the performance potential of organizations and their members. In many industries, Jack’s leadership style could sink a company.

Scott Cook is the cofounder and CEO of Intuit Corporation, one of the most successful enterprises in the computer software industry. Products like Quicken™ and Turbo-Tax/MacInTax™ have made it the leader in its field of personal financial software. This didn’t happen because Cook and his cofounder Tom Proulx had a great new idea. Quite the contrary, when version 1.0 of Quicken™ was released in 1983, there were already 43 competing products in the market. But today Quicken™ is number one and commands 75 percent of the market for software of its type. Nor is Intuit successful because Cook is a master leader of the type described in the previous chapter.

“A truly entrepreneurial company,” Cook contends, “has to feel entrepreneurial for all the people in the company.” The leader cannot be the only entrepreneur. To be successful, a company must create an environment in which “entrepreneurship is something that is ultimately done by the hundreds and thousands of people in the company instead of just by one of them.” ...