A Real World Example

Santa’s extensive reading led him to realize that a team overcomes individual weaknesses by joining together and contributing their different abilities. It’s an incredibly valuable leadership lesson. Santa doesn’t have the time, or the ability, to do it all. He focuses on doing what he does best and applies his team members’ strengths to make himself and the organization stronger.

A similar lesson in leadership comes from my 25 years at Walt Disney World, inspired by the approach of its founder, Walt Disney. Disney was not a great animator. He was a creative visionary. To bring his visions to life, he had to rely on others. In my book, Care Like a Mouse, one of his team members, Peter Ellenshaw, explained Walt’s approach this way:

He’d fill you with fire. I always tried to understand how he made me feel so good. It was magical really. He said one time he was ‘the bee that pollinated the flowers,’ but he didn’t do it in a way you might think, like, ‘Oh, Peter, this is coming great! Oooh! Very good!’ He’d never say anything like that. He’d talk about the project rather than how good or bad you were doing. He inspired you to create what he wanted.

And it wasn’t just animators he relied on. He’d “use the whole plant for ideas” and demonstrated that approach when it was time to paint the Studio hallways. Walt approached a janitor and asked what color the walls should be. The janitor was stunned. Here was the head of the company, with thousands of paint colors on file to choose from and a staff of color experts to rely on, taking time to ask the janitor’s opinion. Walt knew that the janitor was the closest person to the situation, saw those walls every day, and would know more about them than his animation staff. The walls were painted the color the janitor picked.

Another example comes from early Disney films. They are stuffed with visual sight gags. In Disney’s masterpiece Snow White, for instance, comedy occurs when the dwarf character Dopey places diamonds on his eyes, and the diamonds reflect a multitude of Dopey’s eyes. It’s a funny and, like other gags, happened because Walt encouraged team members to propose gags for his films. He backed that encouragement with cash. If your gag idea was used, you got a bonus.

The best example, however, was the relationship between Walt and his brother Roy. Roy Disney was a wizard at finding money. Insiders joked that Roy’s job was to raise money as fast as he could, and Walt’s job was to spend as fast as Roy raised it. Roy’s tight purse strings grounded Walt’s dreams sufficiently so that they could be actualized. Walt’s creative visions gave Roy the impetus to succeed beyond anything he had imagined. Alone, neither would have accomplished much. Together, they changed the world and provided a timeless example and lesson in leadership.

Questions to Consider

When determining what you should and should not do alone, consider the following:

• Do you know your weaknesses? Do you seek out and engage with others whose strengths cover and protect you against those weaknesses?
• Do you appreciate it when someone tells you that you are wrong? Do you listen closely and without defensiveness? Do you objectively evaluate what they say?
• Do you have a group of advisors who aren’t afraid to tell you what they think? Do you regularly check in with them to verify that what you are doing is correct?

We all have weaknesses. The smart ones amongst us know what they do best and find partners to handle the rest. Does your team include people who have opposite skills to your own? Or do they mirror you? It might be wiser to partner with people who have opposing viewpoints or opposite skill sets. Those people prevent individual mistakes and deliver organizational magic.