In this solo episode of the No Days Off podcast, host Brian Gubernick explores Jim Collins’s Level 5 leadership model and argues that the most successful leaders achieve greatness by first getting the right people on the bus and removing the wrong ones before setting direction. He explains that Level 5 leaders combine personal humility with fierce professional will, prioritizing the organization over ego and making tough, long‑term decisions. Gubernick emphasizes the “first who, then what” principle: great vision is irrelevant without a team capable of adapting to chaos and adversity. He illustrates the point with examples from sports (Bill Belichick), technology (Steve Jobs), and aviation (Herb Kelleher at Southwest), showing how the presence or absence of the right people impacted each organization’s performance. The episode concludes with a call to action for listeners to assess their own teams, identify mis‑aligned relationships, and take concrete steps to surround themselves with the right people to break through personal and business ceilings.
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Thank you for joining me today. It's Brian Gubernick, and welcome to the No Days Off podcast, where we believe that every single day brings a new opportunity to get better. I want to talk about leadership today, and specifically, I want to talk about how the greatest leaders out there are typically leading the right people. What do I mean by that? Let's start with leadership first. Let's talk about what makes for a good leader or what our friend Jim Collins, who wrote "Good to Great," has to say about leaders, specifically those leaders that he would say took companies from good to, in fact, great. What Jim Collins would tell you is that the best leaders out there are actually what he would call Level 5 leaders. What does that mean? Level 5 leaders possess a blend of personal humility and professional will. They're the highest level of leadership in, in Jim's hierarchy of leadership capabilities, and he described it in, in one of his books. I think it was Good to Great. Level 5 leaders are those who lead their companies to greatness with this unique combination of traits that they have. As I mentioned, they have tremendous humility. They're modest. They prioritize the success of the company over their own ego or their own personal recognition. They credit others. They credit external factors. They even credit luck for their company's success, and they deflect it away, the attention away from themselves. They've got this quiet confidence that they embody way before a, call it flamboyant sort of charisma. They have this personal humility. Again, they are more for the cause than they are for themselves. Level 5 leaders also have this professional will. They have this unwavering resolve to do whatever it takes to achieve the company's longer-term success. Level 5 leaders make tough decisions. They have incredible or extraordinary determination even when they're faced with adversity. And lastly, they focus on creating greatness, lasting greatness for the organization, and they're oftentimes planning and acting for results that will benefit the company well after their tenure with that company. So Level 5 leaders are this, again, rare combination of humility and resolve, and that's what makes them, in fact, Level 5. And that's why they're able to transform good companies into great ones. So, the best leaders though, given all that I just said about Level 5 leaders, what I found, and I think what Jim Collins would tell you, is that Level 5 leaders, they're also leading the right people. And what do I mean when I say the right people? What I've found is that the greatest companies and even the greatest leaders Sure, they can make mediocre people, you know, pretty good. But more oftentimes than not, when you study Good to Great, they're taking the right people, people that are capable, passionate, have that same like resolve that I was describing, that willingness to persevere, taking those individuals to greatness. Those who lead organizations that go from, say, good to great, They get the right people on the bus first and they get the wrong people off of the bus. And then they figure out where to drive that bus. I hope you heard that one— They get the right people on the bus first and get the wrong people off it. And then they figure out where to drive the bus. They don't figure out where to drive the bus and then hope that they get the right people onboard at that point. It's people first. It's "first who" And then it's what? So they get the right people aligned and then they cast that vision. The best leaders are always thinking about who first and then they think about what. When you're facing chaos and uncertainty, when these Level 5 leaders face chaos and uncertainty, they can't predict what's in fact around the corner. Their best strategy is to have a bunch of, like, great people that can actually adapt and perform in the face of adversity, perform brilliantly in the face of adversity. No matter what's thrown at that group of people, they can show up and do their work, which thereby technically makes the Level 5 leader look even better. Great vision without great people is totally irrelevant. You could have the greatest vision, but if you don't have the right people on the bus, it's irrelevant. So I'm sharing today's message because we talk so much around leadership. And don't get me wrong, I want us all to get better at leadership. I want us to develop these characteristics that I just described of the Level 5 Leader. We should all aspire to do that. However, please recognize that even the greatest leaders out there, without having the right people, cannot make the progress they desire. I think you could see that example all throughout sports. I think around Bill Belichick, for instance, if you're a football fan. He led the Patriots. He's arguably one of the greatest, if not the greatest NFL coach of all time. However, once he lost all of his key people and his key leader, that team had a lot less success. We can see that in other sports teams as well. You could look at Steve Jobs during his reign, and there was times where Apple was flourishing, and there was times when it was faced with adversity. There was a time where Steve Jobs was kicked out of his own company. I, I would maintain that maybe he was a great leader, but he didn't have the right people around him at that moment in time. You see it all throughout companies. I think about Herb Kelleher at Southwest. Kelleher was absolutely a Level 5 leader. He fostered this culture of humility. He fostered this kind of employee-centric atmosphere at Southwest Airlines, and he made strategic decisions that were always tied to the airline's profitability and its long-term success. And he kind of shunned his personal ego. Well, Herb led Southwest to greatness, and he left this kind of enduring company. But as of late, Southwest has not been the Southwest of years past. Is it because it lost its Level 5 leader? Maybe. Is it because it no longer has the right people on the bus? Maybe. Point being though, is as great as Herb was, there's no question that during Southwest's ride to the top, Herb also had the right people on the bus, and he cast this massive vision. And the right people were able to go out and execute. So, for you today, what I want you thinking around is while you strive to get better as a leader of your team or your organization, I do want to make sure, I do want you to do an assessment and ask yourself, do I have the right people on the bus? Do I have some wrong people on this bus that have to get off of it? Your people are either going to help you bust through that ceiling or they're going to hold you back. My experience in business and life, for every ceiling that I hit, I usually am a relationship or a few relationships away. It's not how I'm going to do something or what I'm going to do next. It's instead, who must I align with, or who am I missing in my, my business or my life right now in order to get me to that next level? So I want you to look around and assess who you're hanging out with. Do you have the right people on the bus? And if not, what steps are you going to take today to make certain that you, that you get that right group around you? That's all I have for you today, the No Days Off Podcast. Thank you so much for listening. And remember, every single day brings a new opportunity to get better. So let's get after it. [MUSIC] [MUSIC]
