The Power of Strategic Sacrifice

If you've been on my mailing list for over four years, you may remember my interview with John Bell on his book, Do Less Better, but most of you will not have seen it.

John retired from Jacobs Suchard as CEO where he led a storied career in turning around a near-bankrupt company and transforming it into a powerful brand in the coffee industry.

John recently re-shared the interview on LinkedIn and prefaced it with this admonition:

"Most leaders struggling to succeed make the same mistake, over and over. They can’t break the paradigm of driving their organizations and their people to do more and more. Stop it."

We are all guilty of falling into this trap of trying to do more and more. There's so much coming at us from every direction as our technologies advance and connect us more and more.

At some point, we reach a limit or breaking point and finally summon the courage to make some changes.

However, this is a time when we can make a major breakthrough by understanding the difference between strategic choices and strategic sacrifice.

According to John:

Tough strategic choices are about the business. Tough sacrifices are about you. Tough sacrifices claw at your emotions because they require you to do something you don't want to do.

This idea of strategic sacrifice is such an important point and so easy to overlook. It's an idea that has become top of mind for me when I need to make some changes.

Your day is undoubtedly busy today. However, I encourage you to make a strategic sacrifice and carve out the time to really digest the excellent advice John has to share.

Read the interview at What's Stopping You from Doing Less Better?

To your forward-thinking life & great success!

— Bill

P. S. I also believe that today's world is calling upon each and every one of us to step into our own leadership to deal with the enormous complexity and challenges we face today.

On August 17, 2022, I'm running a webinar where we'll discuss my latest article, The Team Member of the 21st Century Is a Leader of One: Themselves, published by Cutter in a recent issue of the Amplify journal. Learn more and sign up here.