Summary

True North shows how anyone who follows their internal compass can become an authentic
leader. This leadership tour de force is based on research and first-person interviews with 125 of
today’s top leaders—with some surprising results. In this important book, acclaimed former
Medtronic CEO Bill George and coauthor Peter Sims share the wisdom of these outstanding
leaders and describe how you can develop as an authentic leader. True North presents a concrete
and comprehensive program for leadership success and shows how to create your own Personal
Leadership Development Plan centered on five key areas: Knowing your authentic self Defining
your values and leadership principles Understanding your motivations Building your support
team Staying grounded by integrating all aspects of your life True North offers an opportunity
for anyone to transform their leadership path and become the authentic leader they were born to
be. Personal, original, and illuminating stories from Warren Bennis, Sir Adrian Cadbury, George
Shultz, Charles Schwab, John Whitehead, Anne Mulcahy, Howard Schultz, Dan Vasella, John
Brennan, Carol Tome, Donna Dubinsky, Alan Horn, Ann Moore and many others illustrate the
transitions that shape the type of leaders who will thrive in the 21st century. Bill George has
spent over 30 years in executive leadership positions at Litton, Honeywell, and Medtronic. As
CEO of Medtronic, he built the company into the world’s leading medical …

 Authors: Bill George · Peter Sims

 First published: 09 Mar 2007
 Number of pages: 251
 Genres: Business · Non-fiction · Leadership · Management · Business

The author, throughout the book, emphasizes the notion of embodying authentic leadership
rather than of trying to be the ideal ‘leader’ for an organization. This mindset of following CEO
archetypes and following what others have done in the past, Mr. George argues, is completely
unrealistic. In the worlds of Ann Fudge he adds:
“Any of us can figure out ways to drive a business for two years and make a boatload of money
and move on. That’s not leadership. That’s playing a game. Leadership is leaving something
lasting, whether it is how you treat your people or how you deal with a problem.”
In interviews with 125 executives of major companies, Mr. George sets out to change our
preconceived notions over what constitutes a ‘leader.’ These executive accounts depict the trials
and errors, as well as the successes, in managing and leading a company, as well as how personal
crises and failures had pushed them to lead their companies through setbacks of their own.
Indeed, the author is equally as honest about his own failings in his college days and later in his
career.

True North demonstrates that there is no set path or leadership model to follow whilst managing
a large corporation. The book gives some excellent examples of leaders who have had moments
of self doubt such as Ann Mulcahy stopping her car on her drive home from work and wondering
if she could continue in her struggle to save Xerox from bankruptcy. Here it was the support of
her colleagues that carried her through. Most leaders go through difficult moments and as Mr.
George so aptly points out, if you think you are having a bad day, perhaps you should think
about Nelson Mandela who was imprisoned and tortured for 27 years. Upon his release, Mandela
fought for peace and harmony rather than for revenge.

Mr George argues that instead of working on one’s individual traits to emulate the CEO of a
successful company, one should be working to motivate the people who work in the organization
to carry out company goals and its vision. By focusing on working through personal trials and
achievements, one ends up finding one’s ‘authentic voice,’ the building blocks towards leading a
company with authentic leadership, which no other executive can copy

Finding one’s personal “true north” should be the mandatory first step for anyone contemplating
an organizational leadership journey. Bill George, professor of management practice at the
Harvard Business School and former CEO of Medtronic, the world’s leading medical technology
corporation, tells us what one must do to discover the compass necessary to take that step.

In True North: Discover Your Authentic Leadership, George shares his own journey and
includes both his steps and missteps along with the journeys of 125 carefully selected subjects
who were interviewed in depth by the author and his research colleagues.
George, assisted by Peter Sims of Stanford University, weaves the most compelling stories of
leaders to help readers understand the journey authentic leaders must embark upon to discover
their own authenticity and empower others to take leadership roles.

The stories are a mixture of successes and failures to illustrate and contrast what George
describes as the authentic leaders who are “genuine people ... true to themselves and to what they
believe” and those leaders who upon close inspection are inauthentic and disingenuous.

The stories are inspiring and the lessons are both simple and powerful. Adding to the value of the
book is a set of appendices providing 11 sets of exercises to complement each chapter. This book
aligns with the latest works of Ken Blanchard, Stephen Covey, Michael Fullan, Jim Collins and
Warren Bennis. It opens with comments from Bennis and David Gergen, two of the book’s
interview subjects.

This book belongs on the top shelf of any superintendent’s leadership collection, placed there
after it is read cover to cover.

Although George is fairly straightforward in advocating certain authentic leadership processes,

he fails to clearly establish his intended audience and this oversight creates some contradiction
throughout the book. The introduction talks about a “new generation of leaders” who are “much
more diverse than their predecessors, more global in their outlook, and more likely to be
promoted from within” (George, 2015, p. 7). However, the interviews highlighted in each
chapter include very few modern examples and no actual leaders of this so-called “new
generation” are featured, which disconnects the book from young readers. If, however, his
intended audience is more experienced leaders like the ones presented in the examples, they are
inadvertently alienated by George’s assertion that the upcoming generation are moving the
discipline of leadership in the right direction.

A similar inconsistency presented by George involves his view of religion. George has few
reservations about discussing his own experience with faith and its influence on his personal
authentic leadership journey. He also profiles many leaders with similar motivations stemming
from religious beliefs and practices. Apart from a few mentions of Buddhism and meditation
(which he appears to think are the same thing), the narrative presented here is overwhelmingly
Christian. It is hard as a millennial reading this book to disregard the noticeable rise of young
leaders who do not identify with any religion, let alone who actually belong to specific organized
religious institutions. The religious undertones interspersed throughout the book simply won’t
resonate with many young leaders, and the absence of this acknowledgment by the author is
disappointing. George also dedicates an entire chapter to the future of leadership being
increasingly global in nature, which could easily be viewed as a direct contradiction to his
promotion of motivations rooted in faith. This is because George fails to thoroughly discuss how
widely religious beliefs vary across the world, or how this affects leaders’ values and behaviors.
Because George insists that “leadership principles are values translated into practice,” he should
offer a more expansive discussion of these values and how they are developed (George, 2015, p.
106).

The core message is: know how all of your life experiences shaped, and even blessed, you; then
allow this self awareness to evolve into self acceptance. With that, our leadership motivation
shifts from “I to We.” Our focus shifts from needing to be liked to creating an environment
where all involved can thrive and we can focus on building support teams that help us reach our
goals.

At the heart of this book are the frank, honest reflections by successful corporate leaders. (If
nothing else, this book contains a year’s worth of sermon illustrations.) These leaders emphasize
that the hardest moments in their lives opened them up to seeing things differently. They
acknowledge their need for honest feedback, for “one of the most difficult things in becoming
self aware is seeing ourselves as others see us.” (72) Verizon’s Judy Haberkorn emphasizes, “the
best thing you can get in this world is honest feedback from someone who

cares about your success and well being.” (77-78) Pastors, like corporate leaders, are tempted to
surround themselves with people who think like them, and like them. Authentic leadership
requires something more. The exercises after each chapter provide ways to explore that
“something more.”
1. Purpose: Without knowing the reason of why one chooses to be in his/her leadership
position, there is the danger of becoming overconfident and arrogant.Since we as human beings
developed the ability to think rationally and analyze our surroundings, we have been curious
about why things are the way that they are. This holds true on both a relative level, such as when
we want to know how organisms have evolved, and an absolute level, such as when we ask more
broad questions about meaning, god, and the nature of the universe.
Sometimes when we ask a question, we need an immediate answer. At other times the
most appropriate response is to consider why we are asking the question in the first place. This is
particularly relevant for these broad, often subjective questions that have no clear-cut answer.
People come to wonder about the purpose of life for a number of different reasons. Maybe
they’re just inherently curious, or they’ve recently experienced a family tragedy, maybe they’re
questioning their faith, or they’re going through a depression and are looking for a renewed sense
of meaning.
One of the most obvious conclusions we may come to is the need to be happy. Popular
psychology will often promote happiness as the highest virtue, and this is reflected in
mainstream Buddhist teachings as well, such as those of the Dalai Lama. Unfortunately, we often
don’t know exactly what happiness is, and it can therefore, be hard to find. To know how to find
happiness, and whether or not it is an adequate purpose to your life, you need to first discover
what happiness means to you. Once you have a crystal clear image of whatever that is, you can
start to go after it and see if it gives you the sense of purpose that answers the big question.

2. Practising solid values: One should be wary of losing any integrity in company
practices or in response to pressure from others. One should always seek to maintain this key
value; otherwise, one is at risk of losing others’ trust as a leader.How would you define your
values?
Before you answer this question, you need to know what, in general, values are.
Your values are the things that you believe are important in the way you live and work.
They (should) determine your priorities, and, deep down, they're probably the measures you use
to tell if your life is turning out the way you want it to.
When the things that you do and the way you behave match your values, life is usually good –
you're satisfied and content. But when these don't align with your personal values, that's when
things feel... wrong. This can be a real source of unhappiness.
This is why making a conscious effort to identify your values is so important.Values exist,
whether you recognize them or not. Life can be much easier when you acknowledge your values
– and when you make plans and decisions that honor them.
If you value family, but you have to work 70-hour weeks in your job, will you feel internal stress
and conflict? And if you don't value competition, and you work in a highly competitive sales
environment, are you likely to be satisfied with your job?
In these types of situations, understanding your values can really help. When you know your
own values, you can use them to make decisions about how to live your life, and you can answer
questions like these:
• What job should I pursue?
• Should I accept this promotion?
• Should I start my own business?
• Should I compromise, or be firm with my position?
Should I follow tradition, or travel down a new path?
 Now that I have shared the models, "The Unilateral Control Model" and" The Mutual
Learning Model", and it appears that "The Mutual Learning Model" is a critical tool for
Extension work, I want to describe more how to implement the model. Essential to the
implementation of this model are the core values. Cores values should be what guides the
individual in the facilitative process.
The core values of "The Mutual Learning Model" are:
When working with others around a task or addressing an issue, there must be
information to which all individuals have access. This information is needed by all
members of the group or individuals involved to make the best possible decisions. If one
individual or sub-group has critical information, which includes feelings and
assumptions, that information needs to be shared with the others involved. And this value
means sharing this information in such a way that others understand what the information
means. A good way to assure this will happen is through using examples.
Obviously, individuals need information, valid information, to make an informed choice.
So the second value of free and informed choice builds on the first value of valid
information. The aspect of "free" comes into play by being able to define ones own
objectives and how to go about meeting those objectives. Not only does the individual
need the critical information to make the decision, but the individual must have the
freedom to decide based on that information. The individual must be free from being
coerced or manipulated. Others must respect the individual's ability to decide and meet
ones own needs.
By having the freedom to make an informed choice, the individual is more committed to
that choice. If the decision is made free of coercion or manipulation, then the individual
is internally motivated to follow through with the decision. The individual is more likely
to work to make the decision happen. And, as a result, the individual is willing to be
accountable for the decision.
If an individual holds the first three values, there is a higher possibility that the individual
will be compassionate towards others. By believing that individuals are committed to free
choices, based on valid information, there is a stronger belief that others are doing their
best. Thus, it is possible to now suspend judgment. And, if judgment of others can be
suspended, one can suspend judgment of oneself. The result is the ability to understand
and empathize with self and others.
With these four core values at the heart of "The Mutual Learning Model", it is not only
what a person says and does that become altered, but how that person thinks is also
altered. Holding the values and practicing these values leads to viewing the situation
differently and, therefore, changing a person's behavior to influence the situation.
As you can see describing "The Mutual Learning Model" is relatively easy. However,
living or practicing the model is not so easy. So why would anyone want to spend the
time learning and practicing the model? In the next post I'll explore this question.
3. Heart: This means one should put their heart into their work. This implies being
passionate about what one does in the company, and in having the bravery to maintain the
company morale and carry everyone through hard decisions.
 The heart -- both in symbol and as an organ -- has been inextricably linked to our
emotions, the mind, the soul, and our being since antiquity in the western world. Both the
ancient Egyptians and Greeks considered the heart -- not the brain -- to be the source of
our thought, feeling, and will.
I think there were several factors that contributed to the initial belief that the heart was
the primary organ in humans, the major ones being its anatomical position at the center of
the body and its necessity in sustaining our life. In some sense, it seems intuitive that that
core which allows us to live might be what also allows us to experience life. At the very
least, the intimate connection between heart and life is evident.
As the sciences of anatomy and physiology matured, the importance and function of our
other organs such as the liver and the brain came to light. The Roman physician Galen
seems to have been responsible for postulating the heart as the seat of emotion as a part
of his theory of the human circulatory system.[1] It seems that even after Galen's theory
was dismissed, the heart continued to represent the source of human emotion.
The notion of heart as seat of emotion seems to have sprung from qualitative observations
that changes in emotion appear to have a direct relationship to physical changes in the
body, presumably none so apparent than the rhythm of the heart. When a powerful
emotion such as fear or anger grips us, the changes in blood pressure and heart beat are
the most obvious. I think all of us can attest that love can produce some of the most
violent of these changes. You can literally feel it in your chest.
So love's association with the heart seems to stem from the unmistakable physical feeling
that emanates from it when we experience love coupled with this psychological notion of
the heart as symbol for life and emotion that pervades our collective consciousness.

4. Relationships: One should embody trust and confidence within their relationships so that
they are able to last, an indicator of one’s commitment to the company. Guys get a bad
rap when it comes to feelings. Basically, people think we don’t have them, don’t want to
share them, and don’t want to listen to them, either. But that’s not true. Let me tell you
about what’s really going on for men when it comes to feelings, and show you how you
can use this knowledge to build a solid foundation for a secure, lasting relationship.
Understand that we don’t feel the way you do
A lot of the pain and frustration I see women in results from thinking that when it comes
to feelings, men function like women. But the truth is that we have a much harder time
processing and handling feelings than you do. We’re not as good at it. We also don’t
 have the extensive support system that women have, which explains why men escape into
things like work, sports, and the television.
If you can understand this and learn to work with us instead of against us, you’re already
getting a huge advantage when it comes to men and relationships. The other thing to
remember is that as men, we want to fix things. And we get really frustrated when we
can’t. Which brings me to…

Take the pressure off him to “fix” your feelings

Of course, you want a man to acknowledge and satisfy your feelings and desires. It’s a
man’s place in a relationship to be a good partner, to care for you, to listen, to be a great
lover, to connect, to be loyal, and to share But, when you demand that a man meet your
emotional needs and you “lean” on him out of your own fears, frustrations, and uncertainty,
you are setting both of you up for disappointment. No relationship can meet all your
emotional needs. Relationships are supposed to be about growth, and not about becoming
dependent on someone else meeting your emotional needs at any time you want.

Take the lead in positive communication

Now that you know you are much more adept at feeling your feelings and sharing them, use
this knowledge to create a supportive environment for good communication with your man.
How? First, always try to come from a place of compassion and understanding. I know this
is hard to do, but think about it – you get what you give. And you will get a lot further with a
man when you approach your interactions with him this way. Understand that he doesn’t
“get” feelings and communication the way you do.

Instead of approaching a conversation thinking he’s doing something on purpose or being

insensitive, shift your awareness to thinking he just needs help understanding where you’re
coming from. Then, communicate from that place. Instead of saying, “I’m fed up that you
never want to hang out with my friends,” try a positive set up like this: “You know I want us
both to feel happy in this relationship, and I always want to be honest with you. I notice that
we don’t do a lot of things with my friends, and I’d really like them to know you better. How
do you think we can make this work for both of us?” When you talk to a man with a positive
set-up like this, you’re priming him to see that you are not looking to fight – you’re looking
to get things right.

In order to make a relationship work, it’s critical for you to understand that men simply
aren’t “wired” the same way women are when it comes to connecting on an emotional level.
But when you take responsibility for your own feelings and share them with him in a positive
way, he’ll see that you are a capable, competent woman who puts the relationship first – the
kind of woman he wants to have at his side.
5. Self-discipline: This aspect is crucial as it involves being accountable to one’s
responsibilities, as well as ensuring others within the company are as well. 1.
Acknowledge Your Weaknesses – Whether cookies are the downfall to your diet, or you
can’t resist checking your social media accounts every two minutes, acknowledge your
pitfalls. Too often people either try to pretend their weaknesses don’t exist or they try to
minimize the negative impact their bad habits have on their lives. For example, many
smokers think, “I could quit if I wanted to,” because they don’t want to admit they’re
hooked.
Establish a Clear Plan – No one wakes up one day suddenly blessed with self-discipline.
Instead, you need a strategy. Whether you want to increase good habits – like exercising
more often, or you want to eliminate bad habits – like watching too much TV, you’ll need
to develop a plan to outline the action steps that will help you reach your goals.
Remove the Temptations When Necessary – Although we’d all like to believe we have
enough willpower to resist even the most alluring enticement, it only takes one moment
of weakness to convince ourselves to cave to temptation. Making it difficult to access
those temptations can be pivotal to increasing self-discipline. If your weakness is
Facebook, turn off the internet while you’re working. If you can’t resist overspending
when you go to the mall, leave the credit card at home and only take a small amount of
cash.
Practice Tolerating Emotional Discomfort – It’s normal to want to avoid pain and
discomfort, but trying to eliminate all discomfort will only reinforce to yourself that you
can't handle distress. We can usually stand a lot more discomfort than we think we can.
(See my previous article Think You Can't Stand To Do Something? Prove Yourself
Wrong). Practice allowing yourself to experience uncomfortable emotions like boredom,
frustration, sadness, or loneliness and increase your tolerance to the negative emotions
that you may experience as you increase your self-discipline.
6. Self-Awareness. This is the foundation element in Daniel Goleman’s model of
Emotional Intelligence. One doesn’t typically become self-aware, if ever, until middle
age. But, without knowing yourself, it is difficult to know to what extent you are
motivated by external symbols of success vs. deeper accomplishments beyond your own
benefit.
7. Values & Principles. We don’t know our true values for certain until we are tested under
pressure in life and are faced with making trade-offs between conflicting values. Until
then, our espoused values are just words and honorable intentions. Values describe what
is important in a person’s life. It is values that unconsciously help us to form our
individual principles. Values are the foundation to a person character, attitude, perceptive
and overall behavior. An individual always uses values to make decisions about right and
wrong.

Each individual may have different values. For example, one person will value happiness
above all whereas another will value courage and dedication. An individual who has high
moral values displays qualities such as honesty, integrity, courage, loyalty, fairness,
respect, and compassion. A person’s personal values can be influenced by a wide range
of factors such as background, experiences, education, and religion. However, it is also
possible for a person to change his values with the passage of time. Principles are moral
rules or beliefs that help you know what is right and wrong, and that influences your
actions. Principles are what you stand for in life; they direct your life and act as a moral
compass. In other words, they govern your behavior. Principles are based on the personal
values we hold dear to us. For example, if a person values nonviolence, he’ll never get
into fights with others or behave aggressively. This behavior is prompted by the belief
that he or she will never behave aggressively or violently. If you value honesty, you’ll
never tell lies, not even a white lie. Here, never telling lies is your principle. A person
who strongly believes that lying is wrong will never deviate from the truth, even if it
brings personal harm. Since principles are sometimes equivalent to rules, they can be
quite stern and unyielding.
Although principles are collectively agreed upon by society, a person can have his own
individual principles. Major laws in a country, (i.e., laws that make murder and robbery
illegal) are based on the collective principles of the society that it is wrong to kill or rob.
8. Integrated Life. Become too focused on work, without regular exposure to family,
friends, community, and so forth, and you risk losing touch with your deeper humanity
and taking your leader self way too seriously. It’s not about absolute, equal, work-life
balance. There are times when you have to shift into excessive work mode. Just make
 sure that, over the course of your career, you are experiencing and engaging fully in the
personal side of your life.

9. Support Team. Helps keep you grounded. It can include family, friends, work
colleagues, mentors, etc. Blaming your customer support team for unhappy customers is
like blaming weathermen for the rain. Sure they’re involved, but only on the receiving
end.

If you outsource or silo your customer support team you’re destined to produce mediocre
products. A product team that is numb to feedback will never learn about their failed
launches, their confusing UI, their obscure labels, or their irrational defaults. If they can’t
be guided by support metrics, alongside product metrics they’ll never understand what
their customers didn’t understand. The damage isn’t just in your product, it’s in your
people too. Designers who fail to learn from their mistakes are destined to repeat them.
Engineers who never hear about the impact of their bugs will continue to add more of
them.

Customer support cannot control, or be accountable for, how often customers contact
them. They have no leverage there. The majority of contacts for a software product are
due to confusion or error. Customers don’t understand how to do something, or they can’t
see why something happened, so they click Support.
The team is responsible firstly for ensuring that all customers receive a fast, accurate, and
friendly answer; and secondly for identifying product problems and passing them to their
rightful owner.
10. Motivations. The key, says George, is not to reject extrinsic motivators, such as money
or fame or influence, but rather to balance these with deeper, internal goals. Motivation is
the reason for people's actions, willingness and goals. Motivation is derived from the
word motive which is defined as a need that requires satisfaction. These needs could also
be wants or desires that are acquired through influence of culture, society, lifestyle, etc.
or generally innate. Motivation is one's direction to behavior, or what causes a person to
want to repeat a behavior, a set of force that acts behind the motives. An individual's
motivation may be inspired by others or events (extrinsic motivation) or it may come
from within the individual (intrinsic motivation). Motivation has been considered as one
 of the most important reasons that inspires a person to move forward.Motivation results
from the interaction of both conscious and unconscious factors. Mastering motivation to
allow sustained and deliberate practice is central to high levels of achievement e.g. in the
worlds of elite sport, medicine or music.

Evaluation/Analysis
Arguably the biggest problem with Discover Your True North exists in its simplicity. The
book reads more like a testimony of what has worked for certain leaders in the past and what
hasn’t, than a guide to leadership. Perhaps the reason it is such an easy and quick read is that
the material isn’t all that original, especially to an assumed audience of MBA students, who
are likely inundated with the same concepts of adaptive and value-driven leadership. While he
doesn’t expressly adopt an existing leadership framework, George does take a firm stance
against the trait model of leadership, insisting that anyone in any position can step up and lead
at any point in time (George, 2015, p. 9). The case studies illustrate this assertion and provide
motivation for leaders struggling with finding their True North, but the book falls short of
establishing a theoretical template which readers can utilize in order to improve.
While Discover Your True North (George, 2015) does not provide a comprehensive leadership
theory, George does present a number of salient points that are absent from a lot of
conventional leadership literature. For instance, his emphasis on self-awareness and leadership
as a lifelong journey gives readers a sense of control and confidence which is needed to
develop as leaders. He takes the stance that “leadership is not a singular destination but a
marathon journey that progresses through many stages
until you reach your peak” (George, 2015, p. 25). Although he outlines these stages
specifically for the reader, the overall message that leadership can be for everyone as an
ongoing process of improvement is a powerful one. George reassures his readers that “some
outstanding leaders…did not see themselves as leaders at all” (p. 20). This expansion of
leadership to include leaders of all ages and levels of experience not only serves as inspiration
for young leaders to improve and become more authentic, but also adds to the leadership
community by bringing all walks of life together around a shared purpose.
Conclusion
In addition to viewing leadership as a process involving self-reflection and introspection,
George also notes that negative events or crucibles have the potential to strengthen leaders and
inspire them to make a difference. He suggests that “by understanding the meaning of key
events in your life and reframing them, you can determine your leadership purpose” (George,
2015, p. 204). This idea is strengthened by the fact that almost all of the interviews featured in
the book include in some way instances of failure, reflection, and growth. This realization that
failure is not only okay but actually quite common is perhaps the catalyst of authentic
leadership, especially for young leaders who may be lacking confidence and experience. Even
if its greatest use is a motivational tool for unsure leaders, Discovering Your True North is
truly unique in its approach and Bill George will no doubt continue to play a role in the future
of authentic leadership.