Contrary to what many might think (and many practice), the most important job of a leader is not to speak, preach, direct or advise….

The most important job of a leader is to listen.

In a recent interview I did with management guru Tom Peters, he revealed the four most important words in business leadership are “What do you think?”

Tom said listening should be a leader’s full-time profession. They should be the professional gatherer of input, ideas, feedback, opinion, perspective and personal experience in order to make informed, well-thought-through leadership decisions.

Richard Branson once said to me, “If you are a good leader, you are a good listener.”

This is true for everyone in every aspect of life, but it’s one of the most neglected skills I observe every day. I am always fascinated by how poorly people listen. There are many ways people invalidate and hurt their relations with others by their lack of listening skill.

Here are a few…

The Offenders. These people are the worst. They make it clear you are read more »

When Les Brown, speaker, speech coach and author of Live Your Dreams, called me to offer his enthusiastic endorsement for my soon-to-be-released (June 1) book, The Compound Effect (I’m very excited about it! The picture is me receiving the first shipment!), he said something very profound:

He told me, “This is the first time I learned who you are. I have known your title, your position, your accomplishments, but I didn’t know your story—how you grew up, what shaped you, how you have failed, what adversity you have come through. It is not until this book that I really connected with who you really are.”

Les Brown is well-known for training speakers. He continued and talked to me about the power of influencing an audience. He said, read more »

Look for our latest issue of SUCCESS with Steve Jobs on the cover on newsstands now… or better yet, order your subscription now.

Innovate or die? I know that sounds dramatic. And while you might not physically die, your greater hopes and dreams and your chances to accomplish your big goals will. Innovation has always separated leaders from followers, those who succeed and those who just get by. Innovation is what creates progress, and progress is what advances companies and people beyond the competitive herd of the masses, average and the status quo.

There was a time when innovation seemed to come from the minds of a select few and “special” people, like Franklin, Einstein, Edison, Gutenberg, the Wright brothers. Today, with the speed of progress and the competitive global marketplace, just to keep up, every single person in every position needs to be an innovator, or risk being permanently sidelined.

So what is innovation? Innovation is not a task, project or something you only do at an off-site meeting. Innovation is read more »

When it comes to influencing others, recruiting, selling or motivating people to take action, it has very little to do with WHAT you say.

Typically, however, this is what most focus on. Having trained many salespeople, recruiters, and even stage speakers, most of them are mostly concerned with what to say… what’s my script, what’s my presentation, what do I say when they have this objection, etc.

I was reminded of this principle because I recently had a colleague reviewing a transcript of a talk from a speaker friend of mine. She was very unimpressed and actually very critical. On paper, his grammar was less than polished, sentences were fragmented and many of his concepts left unfinished. She rated him a terrible speaker and someone of little influence. Then I brought her to one of his talks.

She was awestruck! It was the same speech, same words, same grammar and sentence structure, but he delivered it with such feeling, passion, energy and conviction that it moved her—deeply.

What is the difference?

This is wisdom that will forever affect your ability to influence, persuade, motivate and inspire others…

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I did a keynote presentation for a great company last week called Ingram Micro, a $300+ billion, Fortune 100 company. In my keynote, I discussed:

• How these are the most exciting and opportunity-rich times to be an entrepreneur in all of human history (why that is, statistically).

• How technology is leveling the playing field (redistributing the wealth) between big business and small business, disrupting status quos, control of distribution channels, and direct and immediate access to massive global consumer markets.

• How more “new wealthy” and new millionaires will be produced in the next 10 years than have been created in the last 110 years—combined.

I also talked about tuning out creative-spirit-crushing negative news media (as we’ve discussed in How to Change the World, Fuel for Growth, Info Power) and focusing instead on what is positive and right with the world—the abundance and prosperity, and the role models, mentors and people doing extraordinary things in the world today (a la SUCCESS magazine).

Afterward, in the lobby, an attendee asked me this question for clarification: read more »