Great leaders still make mistakes.

Leadership

Bill Novelli: I don’t know that I have a particular hero. I just finished Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book called “A Team of Rivals”. It’s a book about Abraham Lincoln and his cabinet. And one of the most powerful lessons I got out of that book is that Lincoln was a flawed leader. In other words Lincoln was a human being. And we think of him in terms of the Emancipation Proclamation; in terms of winning the Civil War. But what . . . what you really get out of this book is that Lincoln made mistakes. And we all are gonna make mistakes; but we can all be leaders. You don’t just have to be at the top. You can be a leader throughout an organization. You can be a leader in your town, in your neighborhood, in your community. So I think what we have to think to ourselves is we can do it. Yes it’s partly obligation; but it’s partly our desire to leave a legacy, to give back. And then if we make mistakes, that’s okay. Just keep on going.

Recorded on: 9/27/07