Want Better Leadership Results? Try Practicing Radical Humility

My late friend Jim Rainey was one of the toughest leaders I ever knew.

When he was hired to lead a giant agribusiness enterprise, the organization had for years been hemorrhaging millions in operating losses. Within 12 months of taking over as CEO, Jim injected a proactive, collaborative spirit into the corporate culture, inspired the workforce and their constituencies to accomplish things never before dreamed, and returned the company to profitability. The impressive turnaround became a case study at the Harvard Business School.

The most pertinent point here, though, is not what Jim Rainey helped his people accomplish. The most pertinent point is how he did it.

He did it with integrity, trust, and respect. And unrelenting humility.

Yes, humility really can co-exist with a tough-minded focus on business performance.

Here’s an example.

A few days after taking over as CEO, Jim walked into an early morning strategic planning meeting. You can imagine the attentiveness of all the eager beavers trying to impress their new boss. When he first entered the room, Jim overheard a young man mention that his wife was in the hospital. Jim inquired about the woman’s heal, and the man said his wife was expecting a baby and would likely deliver that day.

“Let me make a deal with you,” Jim told the young father-to-be. “I promise to give you a personal briefing on the outcome of this meeting if you’ll rush over to the hospital where you belong. You’ll get only one chance to witness the birth of your baby, and you don’t want to miss it.”

On the surface, that may seem like no more than a nice gesture. But it’s that very sort of thoughtfulness that earns trust and loyalty.

Urs Koenig writes about this kind of leadership in his excellent new book titled Radical Humility: Be a Badass Leader and a Good Human.

Some of Koenig’s background is what you might expect for the author of such a book. He’s a widely published university professor, seasoned executive coach, and popular keynote speaker. Then there’s the unusual part about his service as a United Nations Peacekeeper. His focus is creating psychologically safe cultures that are “tough on results and tender on people.”

So, a question might occur to you: With so many egotistical, braggadocious “leaders” crowding today’s consciousness, the notion that humility can produce better results may seem counterintuitive to some. What will it take to change that perception—and the behaviors of people in leadership positions?

In short, Koenig says, it will take more highly visible leaders embracing humility and achieving strong results.

“For example,” he says, “former Best Buy CEO Hubert Joly turned the Big Box store around (and tripled stock value over the first 12 months) by spending his first week on the job working at a Best Buy store, humbly learning from the front lines, with a name tag that read ‘CEO in training.’ Similarly, former Intuit CEO Brad Smith publicly owned his strengths and weaknesses by emailing his 360 report to every single employee at Intuit and, in the process, implicitly encouraged everybody at the organization to start working on their own weaknesses.”

Probably best known, Koenig says, is Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, who resurrected the tech giant by transforming its culture from the aggressive command-and-control Steve Balmer era to a culture based on his own core values: humility, curiosity, and constant learning.

“It’s my humble hope and desire,” Koenig says, “that as more high-level, high-visibility leaders embrace humility and, in the process, achieve strong results, the more ‘braggadocious’ leaders will follow suit.”

You might be asking, what’s the difference between humility and “radical” humility?

Koenig says he uses the term to emphasize the need to go all in on the three tenants of what he calls radical humility: (1) increase self-awareness, (2) develop collaborative relationships, and (3) apply a growth mindset. “And you mustn’t do it just for show or to look good,” he says. “It’s ‘radical’ because you have a sincere and earnest desire to take yourself, your team, and your organization to the next level. And most of all, it’s ‘radical’ because you must be willing to do the work!”

But assuming they don’t employ 360-feedback, how can leaders discover and eliminate their blind spots?

Koenig says they should get in the habit of requesting feedback—frequently. “Simply ask, ‘What do you see me doing well as a manager? What could I do better?’ Or ask ‘What should I start, stop, or continue doing as a manager.’”

If you sense that your people are hesitant to give you honest feedback, Koenig says you might open with, “I know I need to work on xyz and I want to get better. How have I been doing?” That way, he says, your direct reports can view their feedback as helping you achieve a goal you set for yourself. “Most importantly, train your feedback muscle by regularly asking for feedback so it doesn’t become this big, scary ‘one-off’ thing.”

What are some of the myths that prevent some leaders from embracing humility as part of their “style” in working with others?

Koenig says the two he hears most often are that you can’t be both humble and confident, and you can’t be humble and ambitious.

Here are his responses to those myths.

Myth #1—Leaders Can’t Be Both Humble and Confident: “Not only is this false, but I believe you must be confident to lead with humility. Vulnerability is required to share your own weaknesses, receive feedback, understand where you need to improve, and act on it. Only if you are truly confident can you humbly invite others to honestly tell you what they think of your leadership and know that, despite your weaknesses, you have many strengths and can effectively deal with the feedback provided.”

Myth #2—Leaders Can’t Be Both Humble and Ambitious: “It requires self-assurance and humility to question your assumptions and reconsider what you always thought was true. What business are we in? Why are we failing? What is my part in this? These are hard, often painful, things to ask, yet they’re necessary if you are serious about reaching massive goals. Only by constantly learning and growing can you make the necessary changes to truly succeed. And striving for success is, of course, the very definition of ambition. One of the more frequently quoted leaders from Jim Collin’s classic Good to Great is Darwin Smith, former CEO of Kimberly-Clark. After his retirement, he reflected on his secret for success. In his humble words, ‘I never stopped trying to become qualified for the job.’”

Drafting a personal “Why Statement,” Koenig says, is a helpful exercise for someone who wants to be a more effective leader. He explains how it works.

“As a humble leader, you understand that you can achieve almost anything you set your heart on, but you can’t achieve everything,” he says. “A personal ‘Why Statement’ is a concise statement that identifies your core purpose, values, and priorities in life. It helps you focus by providing clear guardrails for what you should and should not be focusing your time and energy on.”

This simple framework and three questions can get you started on your WHY:

“I will____________(action) for________(audience) by ____________(skills) to________________(desired result).”

● What are you most passionate about? What do you truly love intrinsically?

● What does the best version of you look like? In your career and your life?

● What do you want to achieve personally and professionally?

Humble leadership, Koenig says, converts burnout and fatigue to retention, engagement, and productivity.

“As the old saying goes, people don’t leave jobs; they leave bad bosses! One of the three tenets of humble leadership is leading relationally, meaning you build collaborative and trusting relationships with your team members. Studies on employee engagement consistently show that your people hang around longer and are more engaged and productive when they feel their work matters and you, as their boss and their coworkers, care for them on a personal level.”

Koenig suggests two practical action steps leaders can take to embrace the kind of humility he recommends:

1. Increase your self-awareness by regularly asking for feedback on what you do well and what you can improve on from your team members, your peers, and your boss.
2. Build collaborative and trusting relationships with your team members by getting to know them as “human beings” versus just “human resources” who get stuff done.

“One of the quickest and most effective ways to build trusting relationships,” he says, “is to display some vulnerability as a leader. And an easy way to do this is by sharing a meaningful personal goal with your team members. By sharing this, you demonstrate to your team members that you too are a work in progress and always striving to get better.”