- Published on
Turn the Ship Around
- Authors
- Name
- Josh Haines
- @joshhaines
A Great Ted Talk
This is a book that I first heard about from Rick Randjelovic. He recommended that I listen to David Marquet's Ted Talk on the same subject. I did and wasn't disappointed. I then grabbed the book and it's been on my to read shelf for probably 4-6 months. It finally came up and it was a great read.
The book isn't super long. I would say if you watch the TED talk you've probably gained at least 80% of the value of the book. The core concept is around trying to move from a leader-follower model to a leader-leader model. David discusses that you aren't so much empowering your people, but helping them to realize that they are already empowered. You are just helping them to see it and ensuring you are no longer blocking that empowerment. This is a subtle but powerful distinction. Often people can simply choose to be empowered and start moving. I used this method with the Software Factory. I sort of just decided that no one was stopping me from creating a whole new organization and just continued with that acceptance in mind.
"Very Well"
The author discusses the heavy use of a specific phrase to lock in this type of thinking. It consists of the lower level person saying something to the effect of "Captain, I intend to dive the ship.". The captain then responds with "very well.". This is a powerful exchange because it is the lower level person taking ownership of the decision and the captain simply verifying that the decision is sound and that any type of consequences have been considered. I like this model and plan to look for ways to apply his related concepts with my teams in the future.
