Leadership should mean giving control rather than taking control and creating leaders rather than forging followers.”
David Marquet, an experienced Navy officer, was used to giving orders. As newly appointed captain of the USS Santa Fe, a nuclear-powered submarine, he was responsible for more than a hundred sailors, deep in the sea. In this high-stress environment, where there is no margin for error, it was crucial his men did their job and did it well. But the ship was dogged by poor morale, poor performance, and the worst retention in the fleet.
Marquet acted like any other captain until, one day, he unknowingly gave an impossible order, and his crew tried to follow it anyway. When he asked why the order wasn’t challenged, the answer was Because you told me to.” Marquet realized he was leading in a culture of followers, and they were all in danger unless they fundamentally changed the way they did things.
That’s when Marquet took matters into his own hands and pushed for leadership at every level. Turn the Ship Around! is the true story of how the Santa Fe skyrocketed from worst to first in the fleet by challenging the U.S. Navy’s traditional leader-follower approach. Struggling against his own instincts to take control, he instead achieved the vastly more powerful model of giving control.
Before long, each member of Marquet’s crew became a leader and assumed responsibility for everything he did, from clerical tasks to crucial combat decisions. The crew became fully engaged, contributing their full intellectual capacity every day, and the Santa Fe started winning awards and promoting a highly disproportionate number of officers to submarine command.
No matter your business or position, you can apply Marquet’s radical guidelines to turn your own ship around. The payoff: a workplace where everyone around you is taking responsibility for their actions, where people are healthier and happier, where everyone is a leader.
Great read for all leaders – from Moms to Management! just finished this book with my highest regards and compliments to Captain Marquet! very enlightening and thought provoking. thoroughly enjoyed hearing his stories at sea and how he unequivocally shaped his men to be thinkers instead of doers. Although I do not think my three sons “will intend to make their bed” everyday, it did make me stop and and think how better I can give direction, both at home and at work as a manager of a restaurant. A must read for everyone – corporate leaders,…
Great book on leadership – so sayeth another sub commander Full disclosure – David Marquet and I are U.S. Naval Academy classmates. I didn’t know David back then but interestingly enough we were both in command of improved 688 fast attack submarines at the same time, David on Santa Fe in the Pacific and me on USS Toledo (SSN-769) in the Atlantic. Also interestingly I actually used some of the techniques David describes in this book (for example, having your people come up with a plan and say “I intend to” rather than “Request permission to” or even…
This is one book about leadership that you should read! I am skeptical about books on leadership. Most are written by persons who have reached positions of hierarchical authority in organizations and then anointed themselves “leaders.” They don’t talk about the political infighting and maneuvering that got them the job. Instead they wax eloquent about their skill in developing people – skills that frequently exist only in their imagination and the book they have written which book is often fiction parading as non-fiction. I was a contributing editor…