Staring Down the Wolf
7 Commitments that Forge Elite Teams
By: Mark Devine
ISBN: 978-1250231581
READ: July 2022
RATING: 7/10
Summary: Writing out of experience, Mark Divine presents seven commitments that forge elite teams. He weaves stories and principles from his life and career as a Navy SEAL. The strengths of this book are the tight focus and deep insights into what it takes to have an elite team. He touches on such important topics as meetings, implementing culture, innovation, and more. The weaknesses of the book are that some sections feel long and in a few places the stories drag and lack relevance to the civilian world.
Chapter titles are: Introduction Entering the New Terrain, Fear: Failure Expected, Are You Ready? Commitment #1: Commit to Courage, Commitment #2: Commit to Trust Commitment, #3: Commit to Respect Commitment, #4: Commit to Growth Commitment, #5: Commit to Excellence Commitment, #6: Commitment to Resiliency, Commitment #7: Commit to Alignment.
Introduction:
“It is well known in developmental psychology that we operate with differing internal maps of reality.” Pg. 5
“…our mission as humans is to ‘wake up, grow up, and clean up so we can show up as our true selves.” Pg. 7
“To summarize, staring down the wolf means facing your deepest negative conditioned qualities, or fears, and then staring them down to reduce their impact on your life.” Pg. 11
The best way to overcome VUCA battleground is to “evolve your character to be worthy of leading other leaders.” Pg. 17
FEAR: Failure Expected. Are you Ready?
“If at any moment they felt the urge to quit, they agreed to get with me or another teammate to help them through it.” Pg. 22
“Brutal honesty is standard operating procedure (sop), which ensures that remediation happens immediately after a standard is breached. Things are not swept under the rug, and the temporary discomfort of dealing with things emotionally charged issues is always better than the long-term pain of avoiding them.” pg. 29
Leadership Commitment #1: Commit to Courage
“Action is the only way to eliminate doubt.” Pg. 39
“To mitigate uncertainty and overcome your subconscious fear of risk, you must train for it.” Pg. 40
“The more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war.” Pg. 41
“You will stare down the wolf through the practice, through failure, and because your team will expect you to grow.” Pg. 43
“What you do and what you tolerate in your presence best demonstrates your standards.” Pg. 44
“Everyone stands for what ‘feels’ right as opposed to what is best.” Pg. 45
“Clarity and honesty are hallmarks of elite teams, and courage is displayed by taking a stand through the team’s actions.” Pg. 46
OODA Acronym: Observe, Orient, Decide, Act
“We do today what others won’t, so we can tomorrow what others can’t.” pg. 52
Commitment #2: Commit to Trust
Three Elements of Trust: Transparency, humility, and follow-through. Pg. 64
“Humility comes when you stop pretending to be perfect, better, smarter, or more competent than others.” Pg. 69
“Each of the three elements of trust—transparency, follow-through, and humility—have behavioral practices that will further develop the skill.” Pg. 71
“Often, when leaders screw up, they lost courage. They will identify themselves with their mistakes, bringing the entire team down as a result.” Pg. 71
“An elite leader and an elite team will be relentless with follow-through.” Pg. 72
“Blowing off small things and not following up on commitments in a timely manner will erode trust.” Pg. 72
“Trust is like the glue filling in and firming support around the team. They can then operate without being concerned about betrayal, withheld support, or recriminations when something goes wrong.” Pg. 83
Commitment #3: Commit to Respect
“Respect like that is built upon three key character traits: integrity, authenticity, and clarity.” Pg. 93
“To display this level of disciplined integrity requires that you integrated yourself.” Pg. 94
“The principle of communicating integrity brings great respect to an individual from his or her team.” Pg. 95
“Negativity destroys motivation and performance. It also weakens you as an individual.” Pg. 95
“…authenticity is about being emotionally available,. And in an ‘I-we’ as opposed to a ‘me-them’ relationship. Authenticity relieves the leader from the burden of wearing masks because they fear judgment.” Pg. 96
“To be authentic is to be consistent no matter whose presence you are in or what the situation is.” Pg. 97
“Clarity arises from a rigorous analysis of your intentions.” Pg. 102
“A leader must get clear on what his or her full intentions are—including what outcomes are desirable or even acceptable.” Pg. 102
“It is also important to be sure about what ultimate victory looks like. The team will need to understand what the bounty is and where the boundaries are in relation to the actual outcomes desired.” Pg. 102
Commitment #4: Commit to Growth
“…most failed because…they could not bear the temporary discomfort that their transformation required. Those who failed would likely agree with me that the temporary pain of transformation is far better than the long-term pain of regret.” Pg. 115
“That means getting out of your comfort zone and embracing discomfort to break the status quo that locks you in weak patterns.” Pg. 120
“Challenging the whole of an individual leads to what we will call vertical development.” Pg. 121
“…the situation demanded that I show up with my whole being focused on a singular challenging task.” Pg. 123
“…hire those already committed to growth and then provide challenging horizontal training so those hired can master the tools of their trade.” Pg. 124
“Train your mind to focus intently and be more present and engaged.” Pg. 124
“Fundamental to the concept of challenge for growth is to be sure to come back to the basics often…” pg. 125
“You will benefit greatly by constantly exposing yourself to new things, new places, new people, and new ideas.” Pg 129
“Leaders and followers are the yin and the yang of a team.” Pg. 131
“In elite teams, everyone is both a leader and a follower, and the roles shift frequently and seamlessly.” Pg. 132
Commitment #5: Commit to Excellence
4 Questions:
1. Why is this being done this way?
2. What should be done instead?
3. How can we do it better?
4. Who is the right person or team to do it? Pg. 154
“The curious aren’t satisfied with yesterday’s wins or accomplishments, either.” Pg. 154
“Excellence is always, always striving for the next big thing—always growing and exploring.” Pg. 155
“An innovator thinks, I should probably break this and remake it better. They combine the old with the new through the art of emulation, addition, and subtraction.” Pg. 157
“…innovation is an inside job—that the best ideas come from spontaneous insight, creative expression, reflection, contemplation, and even meditation.” Pg. 160
Concentration has four elements:
1. Intention to focus on something useful and important. The outcome you seek.
2. Controlling your intention while focusing on the object of intention.
3. Concentrated staying power, so you aren’t distracted.
4. Periodic rest to recover and refuel. Pg. 168-169
The Bushido Way/code is from Japan and is made from excellence, innovation, and simplicity.
Commitment #6: Commit to Resiliency
“The obstacles becomes your way to evolve your character and become a better person all around.” Pg. 184
Fall down seven times, get up eight. – Japanese Proverb
“In the SEAL’s we coined the term Semper Gumby, which mean always flexible. This was a nod to our marine brothers, whose motto Semper Fi—always faithful.” Pg. 191
“Durability is a ‘two is one, one is none’ principle. We always had a backup…” pg. 192
“Does your team have an attitude of ‘will do’? Or is there a ‘maybe’ or ‘not sure’ lurking beneath the surface? Is the culture upbeat, positive, and mutually supportive, where everyone’s win is a win for the team, or are there competitive ‘ I win, you lose’ or ‘I got mine, you’re on your own’ attitudes? They must stare down that fear of losing and falling down when obstacles come. Your team’s win is your win.” Pg. 193
“A sincere and positive focus on supporting the goals and needs of your teammates is another method to build resiliency.” Pg. 196
“We would routinely look our teammates in the eye and state with sincerity, ‘I’ve got your back.’ This reinforced a great sense of unity and mutual care. How many of your teammates do you know, beyond a shadow of doubt, have your back?” pg. 197
“When teams aren’t adaptable, they are the opposite of resilient—they are fragile. A challenge occurs and they have a knee-jerk reaction to it. Teams have conditioned reactions in the same way individuals do. Those reactions lead them to reject the potential opportunity that has opened up with the obstacle.” Pg. 200
“The number one way to develop endurance is to have a strong why around your missions, and always connect to that why when you embark on the endurance phase of the op.” pg. 207
“Once you gain a level of conscious competence, start to mentor others in the skill. This will lead to the embodiment of the knowledge, where it emanates from your being, not from your head.” Pg. 213
“Staying in your comfort zone will lead to more fear. That is because the world will change around you while you stay still.” Pg. 213
“Leading and teaming in organizations are real life. Shit happens. Teams that deal with the shit authentically are more resilient.” Pg. 220.
“Resiliency grows the more you practice adaptability, persistence, and learning.” Pg. 225
Commitment #7: Commit to Alignment
“Alignment requires time dedicated to shifting teammates focus from crucial individual missions to synchronize with the grander picture.” Pg. 231
“First, the commander of the team provided guidance on vision, mission, and tactical focus.” Pg. 232
“Since everything was fair game and nothing was to be taken personally, the team could remain radically focused on process and cultural improvement.” Pg. 233
“…complacency is the enemy of resiliency.” Pg. 234
“It takes a network to defeat a network.” Pg. 236
“The three primary aspects of alignment that warrant deeper attention in this chapter are enacting battle communications, maximizing sharing, and developing radical focus.” Pg. 239
“If a meeting has a clear purpose and structure, it is worth the collective weight of the participants in gold. In effective meetings, the purpose of the meeting and the agenda are clear, and only those individuals who absolutely need to be there are present.” Pg. 242
“Most important, include guidance around purpose, vision, mission, and norms in every single meeting. Any time your teams are together in person or via technology, you have an opportunity to deepen alignment.” Pg. 242
“The way you do anything is the way you do everything.” Pg. 247
Questions to regularly answer in order to achieve radical focus:
“What will move me close to fulfilling my personal vision and mission today? My team’s vision and mission?
What is the most important target for me to focus on today, and what action can I take now to move forward?
Is what I’m about to do in alignment with my own and my team’s ethos and what we stand for?
How can I find greater alignment with and bring greater clarity to the team today?
Does my plan for the day include shared experience, risk, challenge?
How and when will I communicate with my team today?
Could anything I’m planning—or not planning—take me out of alignment?
What are the biggest potential distractions to be aware of?
Is there anything else I can do to keep the team radically focused and battle ready?” pg. 254-255
Conclusion: The Final Commitment
“Courage develops from taking a stand and risking bold action.” Pg. 282
“You have to earn your respect every single day, and you do that with communication steeped in integrity.” Pg. 285
“Be authentic by connecting to your heart and then the heart of your team.” Pg. 290