Book Review: Derailed

I just finished reading Derailed: Five Lessons Learned From Catastrophic Failures of Leadership by Dr. Tim Irwin thanks to Michael Hyatt and the good folks over at Thomas Nelson Publishers.  Mike posted his review of the book and then went on to offer a free copy to people who posted a comment on his blog and either tweeted or facebooked a link back to his review.

I had some downtime yesterday waiting on a few things, so I packed Derailed and a highlighter, and I am sure glad I did!  I enjoyed reading Good to Great by Jim Collins and the idea of getting to know the ins and outs of the different companies he profiled and why they made it.  I read GTG with our leadership team at North Cobb Christian School.  During our weekly conversations about the book, we often posed the question of why some companies didn’t make it.  Derailed answers that question.

Patrick Lencioni, author of several of his own books on leadership, wrote the forward.  I was particularly motivated to read the book based on this statement, “No one is immune from derailment.  In fact, we’re all just a moment away from doing something that could wound our organizations, our relationships, and our reputations — and perhaps earn us a chapter in a book about the struggles of leadership.”  NO ONE IS IMMUNE.  You really don’t have to look far to find a leader that has fallen due to compromises they made related to their character.

Irwin profiles six famous leaders that were derailed because of some flaw in their character that ended up disqualifying them for leadership.  Here are the six leaders:

  • Bob Nardelli, former CEO of Home Depot
  • Carly Fiorina, former CEO of Hewlett-Packard
  • Durk Jager, former CEO of Proctor & Gamble
  • Steven Heyer, former CEO of Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide
  • Frank Raines, former CEO of Fannie Mae
  • Dick Fuld, former CEO of Lehman Brothers
Dr. Irwin talks about derailment as a process and breaks it down into five steps:
  • Stage 1: A Failure of Self-/Other-Awareness
  • Stage 2: Hubris – Pride Before the Fall
  • Stage 3: Missed Early Warning Signals
  • Stage 4: Rationalizing
  • Stage 5: Derailment
He sums up all of the characteristics of derailment into these four character categories:
  • Authenticity
  • Self-Management
  • Humility
  • Courage
Irwin also proposed three tests of character:
  • Test 1: Does the leader have a strong moral/ethical guidance system that functions well in ambiguous situations?
  • Test 2: Does the leader make decisions just for expediency?
  • Test 3: Does the leader handle adversity with grace?
Dr. Irwin shares Five Critical Lessons Learned in his quest to understand what leads to derailment:
  • Lesson 1-Character Trumps Competence
  • Lesson 2-Arrogance is the Mother of All Derailers
  • Lesson 3-Lack of Self-/Other-Awareness is a Common Denominator of all Derailments
  • Lesson 4-We are Always Who We Are…Especially Under Stress
  • Lesson 5-Derailment is not Inevitable.  But Without Attention to Development, it is Probable.
Here are some of my takeaways from the book…
  • “How we treat members of our organization makes a huge different in others’ willingness to help us achieve the goals we want to reach.  Respect for others is foundational to the trust that leaders must create to be enthusiastically followed.”
  • “The big lesson is that no matter how brilliant, charming, strategic, or commanding in presence a leader is, the consequences of a failed character are extraordinarily disabling and will bring down even the strongest among us.  Similarly, if our character is inadequate, eventually we will miss the warning signals and slam into a parked freight train.”
  • The keenest insights into human behavior may emanate from our willingness to look not at what is light but what is dark…not from what is seen but what is unseen.”
  • “Nardelli seemed far more concerned about his processes than his people.”
  • “greatness does not result from competence only; it flows from an inspired workforce who trusts the character of its leader.”
  • “As a chief executive, Jager failed by overfocusing the company’s resources on generating the next big idea and introducing products that Time magazine’s Daniel Eisenberg and Daren Fonda noted “left customers yawning,” while underinvesting in the development and marketing of established brands.”
  • “A leader’s primary charge and his foundational role are never mutually exclusive.  Even if a leader excels at the very thing for which the board hired him, if he fails to apply the foundational skills afforded by his position, then he fails overall.”
  • “Fuld was well aware of the wealth he inflicted on others, but stubbornly ignorant to what might happen if he made a wrong move.”
  • “Derailment occurs over time – it really happens before the crash.  An ignored warning signal…the inattention to feedback and one wrong turn leads to another.  The force of momentum in the wrong direction is strong enough that the train leaves the two parallel steel rails.  It’s just that the consequences are more apparent after the crash – the damage and the casualties.”
  • “Those who derail often seem to lack a sense of how to treat others – there’s no interpersonal inner plumb line that guides them.”
  • “Individuals don’t trust someone when they are not sure if the person is authentic and truly committed to the well-being of the organization and its employees.”
  • “Judgement lashes us to the mast so that we make good decisions about relationship.  It’s always easier to prevent a problem than solve a problem – good judgement fuels prevention.”
  • “Humility is about an accurate self-assessment — “My job is important, and I need to do it well” — but it’s also the freedom to not inflate who you are or what you are doing.”
  • “Speaking truth to power does not always achieve the result we want, but it does make a major statement about character.”
  • “A mentor is not a therapist to make us feel better about our jobs, but is someone to challenge us to be better in our jobs and to explore how an improvement in our performance might happen.”
  • “Resilience is the ability not only to bounce back from adversity but also to grow from it.”
I would recommend this book to anyone that is currently in leadership or believes that God has put them on a path towards leadership.  I truly believe that the principles in this book can be applied in any industry and every walk of life.  I will add this book to my top ten leadership books along with Good to Great, Five Dysfunctions of a Team, Developing the Leader within You, The Leadership Challenge, and others.

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