A Presentation on Leadership: By Brent Gleeson & Former Burger King CEO Jeff Campbell (Part 1)

As some of you know I generally write and speak on two topics: (1) integrated digital marketing, and (2) leadership and entrepreneurship.  In an event next week on September 18^th at the amazing offices of the law firm Mintz Levin in San Diego, former Burger King CEO Jeff Campbell and I will be giving a dynamic and interactive presentation to local business owners and executives about leadership.  Jeff Campbell, a former Army officer, and I carry with us well over a decade of combined military leadership experience.  We have been able to successfully apply these tools to build teams and foster growth within our organizations.

The six key areas we will be focusing on in this presentation include:

• Pass the Word:  Defining Reality for Your Team – It is the leader’s responsibility to ensure that the whole team from the top down understands where the business is headed, how they are going to get there, and what each individual’s role is in making this happen.
• Mission Planning:  Strategic Planning in a Chaotic Environment – We talk about this a lot in Vistage of course and we all know planning is just as important in business as it is in battle.  There are many externalities that we as executives and business owners face in this new economy.  We will be discussing how to address these in your planning process.
• Building Your Own Special Operations Team: Maximizing Engagement and Inspiring Innovation – Effective leaders know how to inspire creativity and hard work.  Recruit the best talent, give them the vision, provide boundaries, and then let them innovate within those confines freely.  Your team will be happy and so will your shareholders! 
• Mission Debrief:  Allowing Your Team to Have a Real Voice and Offer Transparent Feedback – As leaders we always want to be reassessing our team’s performance and learning from both successes and failures.  More importantly we need to be analyzing our own performance.  What better way to do this than by having your team provide you with honest and transparent feedback.  It is both humbling and healing!
• Respecting the Chain of Command:  From the Top Down – Chain of command is as important in business as it is in the military, even if you run a more “flat” organization.  The whole team needs to understand it and respect it.  The best way they learn to respect it is by watching senior leadership.  Following the chain of command from the top down is just as important as from the bottom up.  When leaders don’t do this it erodes middle management authority and causes mass confusion. 
• Lessons Learned:  Encouraging Constant Growth and Development – What matters more than the experiences we have in running our businesses, is how we go about learning from them and growing as leaders and business owners.  We must also encourage this same type of growth and development in our team.  The more they develop professionally and personally the more effective they will be.

Part 2 of this post will include a video of the presentation and a recap of the event.  Stay tuned for more!

________________________________________________________

Former Navy SEAL combat veteran and passionate entrepreneur, Brent Gleeson is the Co-Founder and CMO of Internet Marketing Inc.  You can follow him on Twitter at @BrentGleeson

7311 views