Define Success By Creating Success For Others
By George Zimmer, Founder & CEO of Generation Tux
In business, like in sports, increased energy and loyalty comes from being valued as important members of a team. In this way, it’s been my conviction that conscious business leaders should define success by creating success for others. A conscious business leader can help unleash the synergistic human energy and creativity that comes from motivated, cooperative groups, that are moving forward with a shared intention. This is much like a great coach helps individuals and the team reach high levels of success.
John Wooden, famed basketball coach at UCLA for over 20 years, who died at the ripe old age of 100, understood this well. He also saw the importance of creating a solid foundation on which to build collective success. Nicknamed the “Wizard of Westwood,” he had a program for coaching that he called the “Pyramid of Success.” At the bottom of the Pyramid is all the foundational stuff that makes someone a great player. He would take the freshmen All-American recruits and explain that there’s a right way and a wrong way to do everything. This includes basic things that one might take for granted, like how you put on your socks and lace up your sneakers. Based in his simple philosophy, his team won ten NCAA national championships in a 12-year period, including an unprecedented seven in a row.
To get to the top, you have to set a strong foundation.
Throughout my business career, I’ve always encouraged managers to think with their hearts as well as their heads. As is the case in sports, in business a solid foundation is created when people are able to openly discuss the integration of body, mind, heart and spirit. It’s important to work hard, but also to celebrate success and have fun together. These qualities help to build a strong team. In the process, it’s vital for those in management to understand that leading employees and selling merchandise to customers is as much about authentic caring and building trust as it is about conforming to rules and meeting benchmarks.
Over the decades I have found that this involves three foundational principles:
- Respect
- Listening and demonstrating understanding
- Asking for help in solving problems.
It’s important to create an atmosphere in which people aren’t afraid of failing — since this is the way we learn and prosper together. Our goal as leaders is both to inspire and motivate the people that we manage. We do this by helping them to become their best and brightest selves — this is fundamentally positive reciprocal altruism.
During my career I’ve sought to develop these principles by becoming a servant leader. This concept was originally introduced by organizational development guru Robert Greenleaf, who started writing about servant leadership almost 50 years ago. For Greenleaf, the best test of leadership is helping those who are being served to grow as people, becoming freer, wiser, healthier, more autonomous — and more likely to become servant leaders themselves. Greenleaf was also concerned with the impact that a servant leader can have on the least privileged in society, recognizing that business needs to consider all stakeholders — and society as a whole. If one is fully invested in the long-term viability of any organization, caring for all people in the company should be a prerequisite for quality leadership. And knowing that our success can contribute to the greater good becomes a way of creating long-term value for many stakeholders.
Because those in leadership positions move on, an organization can only prosper when the philosophy of servant leadership is firmly based in the organizational culture. Top companies are companies where leadership takes precedence over management — servant leadership. For me, while a skilled manager is good, being an inspired leader filled with positive intention, good ideas, and the ability to manifest is better yet.
Ultimately, a servant leader’s success is based largely on the success of others. We need to maintain underlying values involving trust, fairness, compassion, and caring. Servant leaders must learn how to implement their personal values and ideals as they skillfully navigate within the real business world. This is the noble challenge accepted by the servant leader.
While it may be easier to create short-term successful business outcomes through competitive motivation, sustainable enterprise success requires a balance of competitive and cooperative approaches. Competition is self-directed; cooperation is us-directed. The servant leader can help unleash the human potential that comes from motivated, cooperative groups, just like great coaches help individuals serve the team. This takes, courage, tenacity, and a sense of humility. The real trick is to know when to lead and when to follow — when to take control and when to trust in the decisions of others. This requires knowing who the true servant leaders are — a kind of discernment that is calibrated over time.
I hope that today I am bringing this spirit to my new endeavor: Generation Tux. As a servant leader, my goal is to deliver value to all stakeholder groups, including employees, customers, communities, suppliers, and investors. As we’ve seen in the sharing economy business models, like Lyft or AirBnB, ultimately the customer must get better value. Online tuxedo rental demonstrates how you can serve multiple stakeholders with a single decision point. Making use of the Internet has transformed the retail business. It is more convenient for the customer, who no longer needs to make three trips to the store; there is less car traffic, which supports the community with a lower carbon footprint.
Together, these qualities and outcomes of shared servant leadership ground conscious capitalism and spell the recipe for success. Servant leadership should not have to be restricted to business — conscious or otherwise. It is a necessary direction for every level of society. It’s in all our best interests.
Radiate is on a quest to enable people to reach their full potential by harnessing the power of expert advice. We offer a snackable collection of videos featuring our experts to help solve problems, gain perspectives and learn new business skills. Sign up for a free day pass here and watch all our videos!
George Zimmer is the Chairman, CEO and Founder of Generation Tux, an online rental platform for tuxedos and suits. He is also the founder and former CEO and Chairman of the Men’s Wearhouse — the largest retailer of men’s tailored suit and dress casual clothing in the U.S. and Canada. A lifelong advocate of servant leadership as the most effective business management model, he is also an advocate for “conscious capitalism” to address income inequality and excessive CEO pay. He is the father of four children and self-described in his LinkedIn profile as a “Business Warrior Monk who roots for the underdog.” George serves on the Board of Directors for the Institute of Noetic Sciences, and the Oakland Zoo.
You can follow George on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Hear George talk to Betty Liu about his own career adventures on Radiate’s podcast here!
Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com on October 29, 2015.
