The Roundabout That Changed How I lead | John Taylor McEntire | TEDxEtTagammo

Key Concepts

• Self: Understanding oneself, challenging personal narratives, and believing in one's capabilities.
• System: Fostering collaboration, building trust within teams, and caring for team members.
• Mission: Empowering individuals, developing potential through "cultural margin," and building organizational legacy.
• Roundabout Analogy: A metaphor for leadership, where clear rules (Self, System, Mission) enable smooth flow and progress, contrasting with chaotic intersections.
• Facts vs. Stories: A principle for self-awareness, distinguishing objective truths from subjective interpretations.
• Trust: A foundational element for effective collaboration within a system.
• Collaboration: The act of working together, which is contingent on team members feeling cared for.
• Cultural Margin: The space between an individual's current skill set and their potential, representing an investment in their growth and development.
• Legacy: The lasting impact and continuity of an organization, achieved by growing leaders.

Introduction: The Leadership Roundabout

The speaker introduces three key words essential for leadership and team success: Self, System, and Mission. These concepts are likened to a roundabout that transforms a chaotic three-road intersection into a smoothly flowing system. Just as clear rules enable cars to navigate a roundabout efficiently, understanding and applying Self, System, and Mission provides leaders with the "turning on points and turning off points" for effective team guidance.

Self: Understanding and Believing in Oneself

The concept of "Self" is illustrated through a personal anecdote from 20 years ago. A colleague was known for "always saying the wrong thing at the wrong time to the wrong people." After being sent to a professional coach by HR, this individual underwent a dramatic transformation, becoming "so different" that the speaker initially wondered if he had joined a cult, only to realize "he had found himself."

Inspired by this change and experiencing personal "turmoil," the speaker sought out the same coach. During their first meeting, the speaker expressed, "People just don't get me." The coach challenged this perspective by asking, "Why do you think you have the means to know that people are thinking about you?" This question was a pivotal moment, opening the speaker's mind to the realization that they were "telling myself stories about what was going on in my life and in my head and those stories were not true."

The coach taught two crucial truths:

1. Understand facts and understand stories.
2. Challenge the stories and keep the facts.
3. Follow the facts as "they're the ones that are going to take you where you need to go."

These principles, focused on discerning truth from narrative, led to the understanding that one must believe in oneself to achieve personal and leadership potential. This self-belief is fundamental to deciding "who you are going to be and what you are going to be."

System: Fostering Trust and Collaboration

The discussion on "System" moves beyond mechanical processes to the human element of collaboration. The speaker recounts a project from 1990 involving the development of a copy protection system for VHS videotapes. At the time, Hollywood was "aghast" at rampant VHS copying and considered stopping VHS altogether, which would have been a "death knell" for manufacturers.

The speaker's role was to convince 13 different VCR manufacturers (from various countries and cultures, with diverse priorities) and JVC (the inventor of VHS) to adopt this technology. This involved 18 months of meetings in a Tokyo boardroom, where the speaker "translated not just words but intent."

During these extensive negotiations, two main types of concerns emerged:

1. "This is going to be hard": These were typically engineering problems, which were "easy to solve."
2. "You don't understand us": This indicated a deeper issue, often a feeling of disrespect or a lack of trust. When this concern arose, the speaker's job was to "go back in and help rebuild that trust," recognizing that such a statement signaled a need for "better trust here."

The key takeaway for "System" is that leaders must ensure everyone is brought together in a team and works collaboratively. Collaboration doesn't happen if people don't feel like they're being cared for. Therefore, leaders must not only expect their team members to care about them but, more importantly, leaders need to care about their team members.

Mission: Empowering Potential and Building Legacy

The final concept, "Mission," is explored through an experience in Doha, Qatar. Despite a gleaming office building overlooking a city "building the future," the company itself was in "turmoil" with constant restructurings, job losses, budget cuts, and changing organizational charts.

Within this environment, the speaker's team had three individuals handling Intellectual Property (IP) issues (license agreement drafting, patents, copyrights, trademarks). Two of these individuals formed a close team, while the third felt "muted" and "talked over." However, this third person approached the speaker with a plea: "I want more. I want more responsibility."

Recognizing her "hunger," the speaker began feeding her "piece-meal projects" to develop her skills in agreement writing, an area she lacked despite her patent knowledge. These "little assignments" and "stretch points" were designed to help her grow.

A crisis then hit the company: a major restructuring led to the loss of the first two IP team members, leaving only the third person. This situation highlights the concept of cultural margin.

• Profit margin is defined as the space between costs and revenue, allowing a company to breathe.
• Cultural margin is defined as "where you take a person where they're at... with the skills where they're currently at and take them to where their potential is."

By investing in this individual's cultural margin, she was prepared for the crisis. She "picked things up," was not scared, and "ended up doing the job of three people as one person." This achievement was not demanded but "earned" through the collaborative investment in her progression.

The speaker emphasizes that a company's mission goes beyond simply having a mission statement understood by everyone from the janitor to the CEO. It also requires cultivating cultural margin to grow leaders within the organization. Without this, organizations become "stagnant" and fail to build a "legacy."

Conclusion: The Path to Legacy

By embracing Self, System, and Mission, leaders can effectively guide their teams and build lasting success.

1. Self: Leaders first understand their personal mission and get their "acting gear" in order.
2. System: They then work on systems, ensuring everyone learns to collaborate effectively.
3. Mission: Finally, they understand how the big picture makes them unique, where "all those small parts... become so much better bigger than just the as a whole," leading to the building of a business and a legacy.

The speaker concludes that focusing on Self, System, and Mission puts teams on the right path to move forward with leaders at the helm.