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TED Talks Daily

Are we celebrating the wrong leaders? | Martin Gutmann

TED Talks Daily

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4.1 β€’ 11.9K Ratings

πŸ—“οΈ 24 May 2024

⏱️ 18 minutes

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Summary

We tend to celebrate leaders for their dramatic words and actions in times of crisis β€” but we often overlook truly great leaders who avoid the crisis to begin with. Historian Martin Gutmann challenges us to rethink what effective leadership actually looks like, drawing on lessons from the famed (but disaster-prone) explorer Ernest Shackleton.

Transcript

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0:00.0

Ted Audio Collective.

0:02.0

Audio Collective.

0:04.0

You're listening to Ted Talks Daily,

0:11.0

where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day.

0:14.5

I'm your host to Lee's Hugh. Today the case for boring leadership.

0:18.0

Historian Martin Gutman says the people who can most effectively lead teams or

0:22.4

expeditions or big changes don't seek attention.

0:25.7

They go unnoticed and we're making a mistake when we confuse loudness for leadership.

0:31.5

He delves into this idea after a short break from our sponsors.

0:37.0

Like TED Talks, you should check out the TED Radio Hour with NPR. Stay tuned after this talk to hear a sneak peek of this week's episode.

0:46.7

And now our TED Talk of the Day. I would like to invite you on a little thought experiment.

0:54.0

Let's pretend that we're going on a polar expedition together.

0:57.0

All of you and me, and we need to hire a captain.

1:02.0

And we have two resumes in front of us. One comes from a man who has

1:11.0

already successfully achieved all four of the major polar goals,

1:15.0

the North Pole and the South Pole and the Northeast and the Northwest Passage.

1:20.0

In fact, three of these, he was the first person to accomplish.

1:25.0

Let's call him candidate A.

1:29.2

Candidate B is a man who set off for the Antarctic four times, three times is the man in charge, and every time resulted in failure,

1:42.0

catastrophe. resulted in failure, catastrophe, or death.

1:47.8

Who should we hire?

1:51.0

That's not meant to be a trick question. I think it's obvious we want candidate A.

...

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