Great Leadership Begins With Three Commitments: Pete Rogers (Transcript)

Here is the full transcript of Pete Rogers’ talk titled “Great Leadership Begins With Three Commitments” at TEDxSoongChingLingSchool 2023 conference.

Listen to the audio version here:

TRANSCRIPT:

The Great Blondin

In the 1860s and 70s, one of the most popular people in the United States wasn’t even an American. He was a Frenchman whose name was Jean François Gravelet, but he was better known by his stage name, “the Great Blondin.” What made Blondin great? Blondin was an acrobat and a tightrope walker, and he did something that no one had ever done before.

He went to Niagara Falls, a beautiful and dangerous place, and he threw a two-inch-wide tightrope across the falls and walked across it safely. There were 25,000 people in attendance. Over the course of years, Blondin would come back to Niagara Falls, and he would do something more daring every time.

The next time, he might be blindfolded. The time after that, he literally sat down in the middle of his crossing and made himself an omelet. Another time, he took a camera and took a photograph of the persons on the other side of the falls.Every time, something more daring, something more unique, something creative and astounding, and his fame grew and grew and grew.

Then after one particular crossing, with an assembled crowd there screaming his name, chanting his name, he calmed the crowd, and he said, “I’m going to do something more daring than I’ve ever done before. Do you believe that I can do it?”

The Invitation

They yelled back, “We believe! We believe!” And then he said, “I’m going to take someone on my back, and I’m going to cross the falls safely. Do you believe that I can do it?” And they all screamed, “We believe! We believe!” And when they said, “We believe,” Gravelet looked at them, the Great Blondin looked at them and smiled, and he said, “Which one of you will be that person? Which one of you will be that person?”

And there was silence. Until finally, one person did come forward, it was actually his manager. And that moved Blondin very deeply, but Blondin did take him on his back, and they did cross the falls safely. I’ve been fascinated with this story since the day that I first read it. Fascinated with it. Because I do not understand why more people didn’t line up to go with Blondin across the falls.

Trusting Oneself

And the obvious answer would probably be, well, they didn’t trust him. But that can’t be true. If they had seen him again and again and again and again do something outstanding, do something creative, do something bold, and every time be successful, it couldn’t be that they didn’t trust him.

So the reason they didn’t go was probably because they didn’t trust themselves. And they probably didn’t trust themselves because they had ignored a fundamental lesson about leadership and life. And that is, you cannot lead other people unless you can learn to lead yourself first. Until you can lead yourself, leading others is nearly impossible. And until you can lead yourself, listening for invitations and accepting invitations is also very difficult.

ALSO READ: Getting Rid of 1000 Things: Liz Wright at TEDxBedford (Transcript)

I’ve been studying leadership for years. I’ve been mentored by amazing leaders. I have served with many amazing leaders. And I believe that there are three commitments that all exceptional leaders make that allow them to self-lead and thus allow them to make daring change possible in the world.

Commitment 1: Value Consistency Over Intensity

And the first of these commitments is to value consistency over intensity. We read stories every day in the news about the epidemic of anxiety and sadness that’s impacting the world today, especially among young people, their parents as well. This is clear.

And the reasons for that are many, and I’m not going to get into all of that. Social media plays a part, obviously. But I believe an overlooked contributor is simply the fact that so many young people today are exhausted from throwing themselves into every class, every activity, every relationship as if it’s the last one they will ever have.

And I believe that the reason for this is because most people, and especially young people, overestimate what you can do in a short period of time. Maybe it’s a month, two months, three months. And underestimate what you can accomplish and what you can achieve in a year or two years or three years.

And when you only believe that you can overestimate your contribution in the moment, that only leads to exhaustion because you need to do, by definition, two months’ worth of work in one month or one year’ worth of work in eight months. And it leads to sadness, exhaustion, frustration. And exceptional leaders know that leadership is a long game.

Commitment 2: Be Motivated by Higher Standards, Not Shame

And that your contributions, your consistent contributions every day, a little bit every day is going to give you the ability to far surpass the contributions of your intensity. So let’s remember to value consistency over intensity. There is a place for intensity.

But if you’re intense all the time, going 100% all the time, and underresting all the time, I would invite you to consider a daring change in your life, and maybe the daring change will be pulling yourself back, slowing down a bit, and taking a long view. It might make a huge difference in your life.

The second commitment that exceptional leaders make is that they are motivated by higher standards and not by shame. Motivation is simply another word for energy. We need motivation. We need energy to make daring things happen in the world, to make good things happen in the world.

But what are your motivations? Are you motivated to have higher standards and grow into higher standards, to reach things that are just out of your reach, to do things that are just beyond your capability, to grow into the person you can be tomorrow?

Or are you motivated by a need to please other people all the time?

The Speaker’s Personal Story

Or a need to perform for people all the time? Or a need to prove over and over and over again your worthiness by achieving all in some made-up fantasy that you would like to be perfect? And let’s be clear, two leaders who have those motivations look the same on the outside.

ALSO READ: Kristen Bell’s Commencement Speech 2019 at USC (Full Transcript)

They look the same on the outside, and they both accomplish amazing things on the outside. But on the inside, those different motivations are going to lead down two very different paths and two very different destinies. And this was never more clear to me than when I was 16 years old and we discovered as a family that my father had terminal brain cancer and would be dead within a year.

And during that year, I learned many things, but nothing more powerful than the lesson I learned on a cold winter night when I had broken a promise to my mother. And I drove home, and I got out of the car only hoping that my mother would be asleep so I wouldn’t have to speak with her that night. And as I snuck into the side door into the kitchen, took off my shoes, closed the door gently, walking through the kitchen into the dining room, trying to be as quiet as I could, my heart sunk when I heard the master bedroom door open.

And I heard my mother coming down the hall, and then I saw her coming down the stairs to greet me in the dining room with one lonely light to light the way. And my mother was so exhausted, so tired, but she wasn’t angry. She stood in front of me quietly for a moment.

The Speaker’s Mother’s Question

I stood there quietly for a moment. The only thing I could hear was my father snoring. And her tears started to flow, and she gestured up over her shoulder towards the bedroom, and she said, “Son, your father is dying upstairs. Is this the best you can do?”

“Is this the best you can do?” And she turned around and just walked back upstairs. And as I stood there in that lonely light alone, tearing up, I have to admit I felt shame. I felt disconnected. I felt unworthy in that moment. But then in the days and the weeks and the months after that, I recognized that my mother’s question to me was not meant to shame me, but was meant to invite me to self-leadership. It was inviting me to have a higher standard.

And that lesson that she gifted me with all those years ago has stayed with me to this moment on this stage where I’m sharing it with you. My mother believed that I could do better tomorrow than I did today. My mother believed that I could grow into a more compassionate person tomorrow than I was today.

Commitment 3: Practice Gratitude Every Day

My mother believed that I could be smarter tomorrow than I was today. She gifted me with a higher standard. She did not shame me by perfect standards or by an expectancy to perform all the time.

And during that very, very difficult year, at this point in my life, I can say I feel nothing but gratitude. Which leads me to my third point. The third commitment that exceptional leaders make is that they practice gratitude every day.

And notice that I’m using the word “practice,” and I’m using that word intentionally. It’s not enough to feel gratitude. We have to practice gratitude every day. What we get better at, we practice. We need to practice. But most people only practice gratitude when they’re feeling good things in life, when they get an A on a test, when a relationship is going well, when they get a promotion at work.

ALSO READ: One Size Doesn't Fit All: Democracy is Not Always the Best Form of Government (Transcript)

Being Grateful in All Circumstances

And that’s fine. But life isn’t only about the good pieces. And when can we learn to be grateful and practice gratitude for even the frustrations, the setbacks, the failures? We’re not grateful for the failure, but can we be people of gratitude in the midst of the failure? Can we be people of gratitude in the midst of a setback?

And when you are grateful for all of your life, all of your life, the things that are going well and the things that are challenges, two things are going to happen to you, I guarantee it. The first thing is, when you practice, you’re going to figure out that there are patterns to your gratitude. You’re going to figure out patterns. You’re going to see gratitudes in your life again and again and again.

And you’re going to be drawn by those gratitudes like a spotlight, illuminating a path. And suddenly what you considered to be maybe moving towards a job now becomes a mission in your life because of gratitude. The other thing that’s going to happen when you’re grateful for all of it, all of it, is that you will become generous people.

Becoming Generous People

You cannot be grateful for all the good things in your world and all the negative things in your world without being a person of generosity. And in 2023, we have global problems that require your generosity, your generosity, your generosity of your mind, the generosity of your heart, the generation of your contribution. We cannot afford anyone being small.

You need to be the best, most complete, beautiful version of yourself. Not in a perfectionistic way, but in a higher standard way. So let’s commit ourselves to consistency over intensity so that we don’t burn out. Let’s commit ourselves to be motivated by higher standards that we can grow into rather than being motivated by deficit mentality or shame or this need, not a desire, a need to please, to perform, to prove, to be perfect.

And let’s do all that swimming in a sea of gratitude. And if we can commit ourselves to those three things, I hope that if you are ever asked the question, “Is this the best that you can do?” you will be able to look that person in the eyes with compassion and love and give a full-throated and affirmative yes.

Thank you.