Tag Archives: Norman Schwarzkopf

Investing 100 % -100% Trust Into Each Other

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By Peter Jeff
The Leadership Mints Guy

Here’s an idea to help strengthen your ability to lead with others. Reading time: 2:47

Quick quiz. For an effective partnership, how much of an investment in more than financial terms should each partner make: 50-50 percent sounds about right, doesn’t it? Not to a leader like General Norman Schwarzkopf, who led the United States and its allies to victory in the Desert Storm in 1991.

Leading demands complete and total investment in commitment from both parties.

Forget the quid pro quo 50-50 (percent) focus that by definition places limits on each partner’s investment in time and attention to the business at hand.

Instead think 100-100 percent total commitment from both partners, advises Schwarzkopf.

Think of your business partnership as if it were a marriage. Your business marriage demands total and complete attention to each other. Your business marriage demands a 10-fold increase in attention from both partners for each and every product or service given birth through this union.

At least that’s the way Schwarzkopf sees it. He compares a partnership in business to a partnership in marriage. “Marriage is not 50-50 (percent) . That’s baloney. It’s 100-100 percent. And in raising kids it’s 1000-1000 (percent)!

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Leaders are Lovers On and Off the Battlefield

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By Peter Jeff
The Leadership Mints Guy

Here’s an idea to inspire exemplary performance in yourself and others.

“I shall always love you. I will never, ever, ever forget you.”

No that isn’t a line out of a sexy movie or an excerpt from a sensational tabloid, even though those words of love fell gently from the lips of a giant of a man. So passionately. So poignantly.

General Norman Schwarzkopf

Significantly, those words gushed from the heart of a General in the United States Army during a public speech he delivered so personally in front of his soldiers and a national television audience. The General pledged that he would always love and never forget his soldiers that he had led to victory in the Persian Gulf War in 1991. General Norman Schwarzkopf was retiring from the army after 31 years.

I was surprised to hear the word “LOVE” expressed so passionately by a General in the United States Army to his troops. But I learned a lot about leadership that day from General Schwarzkopf. I learned that the most effective leaders love and respect their followers and consequently bring out the best in them. Continue reading →