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+---
+title: How Great Leaders Inspire Action
+published: 2024-07-31
+description: |
+  Simon Sinek has a simple but powerful model for inspirational leadership -- starting with a golden circle and the
+  question: "Why?" His examples include Apple, Martin Luther King Jr. and the Wright brothers ...
+image: './cover.png'
+tags: [ "Leadership" ]
+category: 'Leadership'
+draft: false 
+---
+
+<iframe width="100%" height="468" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/qp0HIF3SfI4?si=K8p6OQFQ3D9N8o0Y" title="How great leaders inspire action | Simon Sinek | TED" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>
+
+How do you explain when things don't go as we assume? Or better, how do you explain when others are able to achieve
+things that seem to defy all of the assumptions? For example: Why is Apple so innovative? Year after year, after year,
+they're more innovative than all their competition. And yet, they're just a computer company. They're just like everyone
+else. They have the same access to the same talent, the same agencies, the same consultants, the same media. Then why is
+it that they seem to have something different? Why is it that Martin Luther King led the Civil Rights Movement? He
+wasn't the only man who suffered in pre-civil rights America, and he certainly wasn't the only great orator of the day.
+Why him? And why is it that the Wright brothers were able to figure out controlled, powered man flight when there were
+certainly other teams who were better qualified, better funded -- and they didn't achieve powered man flight, and the
+Wright brothers beat them to it. There's something else at play here.
+
+About three and a half years ago, I made a discovery. And this discovery profoundly changed my view on how I thought the
+world worked, and it even profoundly changed the way in which I operate in it. As it turns out, there's a pattern. As it
+turns out, all the great inspiring leaders and organizations in the world, whether it's Apple or Martin Luther King or
+the Wright brothers, they all think, act and communicate the exact same way. And it's the complete opposite to everyone
+else. All I did was codify it, and it's probably the world's simplest idea. I call it the golden circle.
+
+Why? How? What? This little idea explains why some organizations and some leaders are able to inspire where others
+aren't. Let me define the terms really quickly. Every single person, every single organization on the planet knows what
+they do, 100 percent. Some know how they do it, whether you call it your differentiated value proposition or your
+proprietary process or your USP. But very, very few people or organizations know why they do what they do. And by "why"
+I don't mean "to make a profit." That's a result. It's always a result. By "why," I mean: What's your purpose? What's
+your cause? What's your belief? Why does your organization exist? Why do you get out of bed in the morning? And why
+should anyone care? As a result, the way we think, we act, the way we communicate is from the outside in, it's obvious.
+We go from the clearest thing to the fuzziest thing. But the inspired leaders and the inspired organizations --
+regardless of their size, regardless of their industry -- all think, act and communicate from the inside out.
+
+Let me give you an example. I use Apple because they're easy to understand and everybody gets it. If Apple were like
+everyone else, a marketing message from them might sound like this: "We make great computers. They're beautifully
+designed, simple to use and user friendly. Want to buy one?" "Meh." That's how most of us communicate. That's how most
+marketing and sales are done, that's how we communicate interpersonally. We say what we do, we say how we're different
+or better and we expect some sort of a behavior, a purchase, a vote, something like that. Here's our new law firm: We
+have the best lawyers with the biggest clients, we always perform for our clients. Here's our new car: It gets great gas
+mileage, it has leather seats. Buy our car. But it's uninspiring.
+
+Here's how Apple actually communicates. "Everything we do, we believe in challenging the status quo. We believe in
+thinking differently. The way we challenge the status quo is by making our products beautifully designed, simple to use
+and user friendly. We just happen to make great computers. Want to buy one?" Totally different, right? You're ready to
+buy a computer from me. I just reversed the order of the information. What it proves to us is that people don't buy what
+you do; people buy why you do it.
+
+This explains why every single person in this room is perfectly comfortable buying a computer from Apple. But we're also
+perfectly comfortable buying an MP3 player from Apple, or a phone from Apple, or a DVR from Apple. As I said before,
+Apple's just a computer company. Nothing distinguishes them structurally from any of their competitors. Their
+competitors are equally qualified to make all of these products. In fact, they tried. A few years ago, Gateway came out
+with flat-screen TVs. They're eminently qualified to make flat-screen TVs. They've been making flat-screen monitors for
+years. Nobody bought one. Dell came out with MP3 players and PDAs, and they make great quality products, and they can
+make perfectly well-designed products -- and nobody bought one. In fact, talking about it now, we can't even imagine
+buying an MP3 player from Dell. Why would you buy one from a computer company? But we do it every day. People don't buy
+what you do; they buy why you do it. The goal is not to do business with everybody who needs what you have. The goal is
+to do business with people who believe what you believe.
+
+Here's the best part: None of what I'm telling you is my opinion. It's all grounded in the tenets of biology. Not
+psychology, biology. If you look at a cross-section of the human brain, from the top down, the human brain is actually
+broken into three major components that correlate perfectly with the golden circle. Our newest brain, our Homo sapien
+brain, our neocortex, corresponds with the "what" level. The neocortex is responsible for all of our rational and
+analytical thought and language. The middle two sections make up our limbic brains, and our limbic brains are
+responsible for all of our feelings, like trust and loyalty. It's also responsible for all human behavior, all
+decision-making, and it has no capacity for language.
+
+In other words, when we communicate from the outside in, yes, people can understand vast amounts of complicated
+information like features and benefits and facts and figures. It just doesn't drive behavior. When we can communicate
+from the inside out, we're talking directly to the part of the brain that controls behavior, and then we allow people to
+rationalize it with the tangible things we say and do. This is where gut decisions come from. Sometimes you can give
+somebody all the facts and figures, and they say, "I know what all the facts and details say, but it just doesn't feel
+right." Why would we use that verb, it doesn't "feel" right? Because the part of the brain that controls decision-making
+doesn't control language. The best we can muster up is, "I don't know. It just doesn't feel right." Or sometimes you say
+you're leading with your heart or soul. I hate to break it to you, those aren't other body parts controlling your
+behavior. It's all happening here in your limbic brain, the part of the brain that controls decision-making and not
+language.
+
+But if you don't know why you do what you do, and people respond to why you do what you do, then how will you ever get
+people to vote for you, or buy something from you, or, more importantly, be loyal and want to be a part of what it is
+that you do. The goal is not just to sell to people who need what you have; the goal is to sell to people who believe
+what you believe. The goal is not just to hire people who need a job; it's to hire people who believe what you believe.
+I always say that, you know, if you hire people just because they can do a job, they'll work for your money, but if they
+believe what you believe, they'll work for you with blood and sweat and tears. Nowhere else is there a better example
+than with the Wright brothers.
+
+Most people don't know about Samuel Pierpont Langley. And back in the early 20th century, the pursuit of powered man
+flight was like the dot com of the day. Everybody was trying it. And Samuel Pierpont Langley had, what we assume, to be
+the recipe for success. Even now, you ask people, "Why did your product or why did your company fail?" and people always
+give you the same permutation of the same three things: under-capitalized, the wrong people, bad market conditions. It's
+always the same three things, so let's explore that. Samuel Pierpont Langley was given 50,000 dollars by the War
+Department to figure out this flying machine. Money was no problem. He held a seat at Harvard and worked at the
+Smithsonian and was extremely well-connected; he knew all the big minds of the day. He hired the best minds money could
+find and the market conditions were fantastic. The New York Times followed him around everywhere, and everyone was
+rooting for Langley. Then how come we've never heard of Samuel Pierpont Langley?
+
+A few hundred miles away in Dayton, Ohio, Orville and Wilbur Wright, they had none of what we consider to be the recipe
+for success. They had no money; they paid for their dream with the proceeds from their bicycle shop. Not a single person
+on the Wright brothers' team had a college education, not even Orville or Wilbur. And The New York Times followed them
+around nowhere.
+
+The difference was, Orville and Wilbur were driven by a cause, by a purpose, by a belief. They believed that if they
+could figure out this flying machine, it'll change the course of the world. Samuel Pierpont Langley was different. He
+wanted to be rich, and he wanted to be famous. He was in pursuit of the result. He was in pursuit of the riches. And lo
+and behold, look what happened. The people who believed in the Wright brothers' dream worked with them with blood and
+sweat and tears. The others just worked for the paycheck. They tell stories of how every time the Wright brothers went
+out, they would have to take five sets of parts, because that's how many times they would crash before supper.
+
+And, eventually, on December 17th, 1903, the Wright brothers took flight, and no one was there to even experience it. We
+found out about it a few days later. And further proof that Langley was motivated by the wrong thing: the day the Wright
+brothers took flight, he quit. He could have said, "That's an amazing discovery, guys, and I will improve upon your
+technology," but he didn't. He wasn't first, he didn't get rich, he didn't get famous, so he quit.
+
+People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it. If you talk about what you believe, you will attract those who
+believe what you believe.
+
+But why is it important to attract those who believe what you believe? Something called the law of diffusion of
+innovation, if you don't know the law, you know the terminology. The first 2.5% of our population are our innovators.
+The next 13.5% of our population are our early adopters. The next 34% are your early majority, your late majority and
+your laggards. The only reason these people buy touch-tone phones is because you can't buy rotary phones anymore.
+
+(Laughter)
+
+We all sit at various places at various times on this scale, but what the law of diffusion of innovation tells us is
+that if you want mass-market success or mass-market acceptance of an idea, you cannot have it until you achieve this
+tipping point between 15 and 18 percent market penetration, and then the system tips. I love asking businesses, "What's
+your conversion on new business?" They love to tell you, "It's about 10 percent," proudly. Well, you can trip over 10%
+of the customers. We all have about 10% who just "get it." That's how we describe them, right? That's like that gut
+feeling, "Oh, they just get it."
+
+The problem is: How do you find the ones that get it before doing business versus the ones who don't get it? So it's
+this here, this little gap that you have to close, as Jeffrey Moore calls it, "Crossing the Chasm" -- because, you see,
+the early majority will not try something until someone else has tried it first. And these guys, the innovators and the
+early adopters, they're comfortable making those gut decisions. They're more comfortable making those intuitive
+decisions that are driven by what they believe about the world and not just what product is available. These are the
+people who stood in line for six hours to buy an iPhone when they first came out, when you could have bought one off the
+shelf the next week. These are the people who spent 40,000 dollars on flat-screen TVs when they first came out, even
+though the technology was substandard. And, by the way, they didn't do it because the technology was so great; they did
+it for themselves. It's because they wanted to be first. People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it and what
+you do simply proves what you believe. In fact, people will do the things that prove what they believe. The reason that
+person bought the iPhone in the first six hours, stood in line for six hours, was because of what they believed about
+the world, and how they wanted everybody to see them: they were first. People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do
+it.
+
+So let me give you a famous example, a famous failure and a famous success of the law of diffusion of innovation. First,
+the famous failure. It's a commercial example. As we said before, the recipe for success is money and the right people
+and the right market conditions. You should have success then. Look at TiVo. From the time TiVo came out about eight or
+nine years ago to this current day, they are the single highest-quality product on the market, hands down, there is no
+dispute. They were extremely well-funded. Market conditions were fantastic. I mean, we use TiVo as verb. I TiVo stuff on
+my piece-of-junk Time Warner DVR all the time.
+
+(Laughter)
+
+But TiVo's a commercial failure. They've never made money. And when they went IPO, their stock was at about 30 or 40
+dollars and then plummeted, and it's never traded above 10. In fact, I don't think it's even traded above six, except
+for a couple of little spikes.
+
+Because you see, when TiVo launched their product, they told us all what they had. They said, "We have a product that
+pauses live TV, skips commercials, rewinds live TV and memorizes your viewing habits without you even asking." And the
+cynical majority said, "We don't believe you. We don't need it. We don't like it. You're scaring us."
+
+What if they had said, "If you're the kind of person who likes to have total control over every aspect of your life,
+boy, do we have a product for you. It pauses live TV, skips commercials, memorizes your viewing habits, etc., etc."
+People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it, and what you do simply serves as the proof of what you believe.
+
+Now let me give you a successful example of the law of diffusion of innovation. In the summer of 1963, 250,000 people
+showed up on the mall in Washington to hear Dr. King speak. They sent out no invitations, and there was no website to
+check the date. How do you do that? Well, Dr. King wasn't the only man in America who was a great orator. He wasn't the
+only man in America who suffered in a pre-civil rights America. In fact, some of his ideas were bad. But he had a gift.
+He didn't go around telling people what needed to change in America. He went around and told people what he believed. "I
+believe, I believe, I believe," he told people. And people who believed what he believed took his cause, and they made
+it their own, and they told people. And some of those people created structures to get the word out to even more people.
+And lo and behold, 250,000 people showed up on the right day at the right time to hear him speak.
+
+How many of them showed up for him? Zero. They showed up for themselves. It's what they believed about America that got
+them to travel in a bus for eight hours to stand in the sun in Washington in the middle of August. It's what they
+believed, and it wasn't about black versus white: 25% of the audience was white.
+
+Dr. King believed that there are two types of laws in this world: those that are made by a higher authority and those
+that are made by men. And not until all the laws that are made by men are consistent with the laws made by the higher
+authority will we live in a just world. It just so happened that the Civil Rights Movement was the perfect thing to help
+him bring his cause to life. We followed, not for him, but for ourselves. By the way, he gave the "I have a dream"
+speech, not the "I have a plan" speech.
+
+(Laughter)
+
+Listen to politicians now, with their comprehensive 12-point plans. They're not inspiring anybody. Because there are
+leaders and there are those who lead. Leaders hold a position of power or authority, but those who lead inspire us.
+Whether they're individuals or organizations, we follow those who lead, not because we have to, but because we want to.
+We follow those who lead, not for them, but for ourselves. And it's those who start with "why" that have the ability to
+inspire those around them or find others who inspire them.
+
+Thank you very much.