Eric Snow is a true leader; having played in the NBA for over 14 years, leading and coaching players on the basketball court and learning from some of the best leaders, Eric is an authority on leadership.
My first thought when picking up the book was ‘How can I as a businesswoman learn leadership or any business skill from a professional sportsman? What are Eric’s credentials? Aren’t the worlds of business and sports miles apart?’ In reality, leadership is just as predominant in sports as in business and many other professions.
The first section lays down the foundations of leadership. Successful leadership begins with leading yourself first. Unless you are successful at leading yourself, how can you lead others? Being an okay or good leader isn’t enough when leading high performers, your leadership has to rise to the next level.
Elsewhere the book tackles further controversial topics, Eric argues that leaders are not born, they are made. He believes that when creating and leading your team you have to work on yourself and your self-confidence first and he believes that success and leadership go hand in hand.
The second and third sections of the book are your actionable checklists. You come away from reading with a formula for leading the top leaders in your company to even greater heights, you will feel confident about actioning your new leadership strategy and that makes a book worth reading in my opinion.
The book uses basketball examples to back up points, which I struggled with, my basketball knowledge is limited! But, this book still features on my top leadership books list, it is straight to the point, controversial but correct and full of life truths. It will take you on a journey exploring your own leadership beliefs and actions. My most valuable take away is the 6 P’s of leadership potential.
The book’s main leadership focus points:
- Communication
- Developing yourself and your self-confidence and turning that into great leadership
- How to continuously get the best performance from high performers
- Leadership for team development – A leader IS a team member!
For those that have read this book, did you action the steps and who did you place on your list of role models?
