Jocko Willink
Co-founder & CEO, Echelon Front · 1 appearance on the record.
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Jocko Willink is a retired U.S. Navy SEAL commander who co-founded the leadership consulting firm Echelon Front. He is the co-author of the bestselling book Extreme Ownership and the host of the Jocko Podcast.
16statements → 1claims → 0claims resolved → 4.06/5average certainty → 2.44/5average debate potential → 2said about them ↓
1 not checkable as stated how the 1 claim stands · each chip opens the sources
1 assertion · 2 opinions · 13 insights · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertion are the 1 claim: statements the public record can support or contradict. 0 are resolved, and 1 names no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.
Everything Jocko Willink said on the Y Combinator Startup Podcast that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →
Jocko Willink: Every single problem a company faces is a leadership problem
“Every single problem that companies face, every single problem that companies face is a leadership problem. And if you can come up with an example, if someone wants to text me or hit me up on Twitter with an example that's not a leadership problem, like, oh, w…”
Jocko Willink: Teams excel with two solid leaders regardless of formal rank
“If you had two good leaders in a SEAL platoon, the SEAL platoon was going to do awesome. And it didn't matter where they were. If they happen to be the platoon commander, great. If it happened to be the platoon chief, great. If it happened to be the leading pe…”
Jocko Willink: A weak manager provides an opportunity to operate with autonomy
“People ask me, what do you do when you have a weak leader? I'm like, I'm happy. If my leader's weak, I'm stoked. I'm going, hey boss, you know, I got this. Hey, thanks for your support. We're going to keep over. We're going to be over here doing what we do. I'…”
Jocko Willink: Leadership is much harder to teach than technical skills
“It's much harder to train someone to be a leader than it is to train someone about some technical aspect of a job, or even the background of a job. It's, it takes much more time. It takes years. It takes dozens of years”
Jocko Willink: Military service is the best preparation for civilian leadership
“There's no better way we could prepare people for leadership in the civilian sector than have them Serve in the military, and being leadership positions”
Jocko Willink: Navy SEALs have a performance bell curve including low performers
“There's a lot of great guys in the SEAL teams, and there's some spectacular individuals in the SEAL teams, and there's also guys, there's a bunch of people in the middle that do their job, and they do a great job, and then there's people on the low end of the …”
Jocko Willink: Military personnel and Navy SEALs are not unquestioning robots
“One of the myths about the military is, oh, everyone in the military is just they're like robots, and they'll just listen to what everyone says. Well, the fact of the matter is, that's not true. And even in, even, even inside the SEAL teams, everyone thinks, o…”
Jocko Willink: Companies should test all job candidates as 90-day contractors
“The only way to figure out who's going to make it through is to put them through it. That's the only way. Now, so what I recommend to companies all the time is when you know, yes, you want to do a thorough interview. Yes, you want to give them scenarios. Yes, …”
Jocko Willink: Leadership dichotomies are difficult because both opposing extremes are right
“So there's all these dichotomies that you as a leader have to balance, and it's the hardest thing to do as a leader, because you, but because, the reason is because both answers are right.”
Jocko Willink: A manager's span of control depends on their team's competence
“If you're running a team, and everyone on the team is A players, guess what, you can control more of them, because you don't have to give them as much direction. If you have a bunch of substandard players on your team, and guess what, they're gonna need more d…”
Jocko Willink: Frontline operators out-decision distant commanders 99.9% of the time
“If Mike's in the field with his platoon, and I'm back in the,
Forward operating base somewhere and he needs to make a decision.
Who knows to make a better decision?
Is it me or is it him?
It's him.
99.9% of the time.”
Jocko Willink: A leader's ego is the biggest hindrance to decentralized command
“The biggest hindrance to decentralized command is ego, is me going, you shut up, Mike, and do what I tell you to do, you don't know what you're doing, you're junior to me, you haven't been as long as me, you haven't been as long as me, you need to listen to me…”
Jocko Willink: Controlling CEOs cannot scale micromanagement from ten to 100 people
“Well, if you've got a CEO that's a good, solid leader, and he likes to control things, with 10 people he can pull it off.
For sure.
With 10 people he can pull it off.
He's a workaholic, he's working 22 hours a day, 20 hours a day, 18 hours a day, he's on, he's…”
Jocko Willink: Writing daily preserves context and eliminates re-reading previous work
“If you write every day, you don't have to go back and read what you wrote the previous day, because you still remember it. For me, if I take two days, so if I write today, and then I don't write tomorrow, and then I go to write again, I gotta go back and read.…”
Jocko Willink: Workplace anger and frustration usually stem from a wounded ego
“When you're looking at a situation, and you're feeling the anger, the frustration, things aren't going the way they're supposed to go, much of the time, you need to step back, and you need to look at yourself, and figure out why you are getting emotional, and …”
Jocko Willink: One-week transition programs cannot prepare career veterans for civilian life
“So you take a guy like myself that's been indoctrinated and then lived and breathed and eaten and slept nothing but military for 20 years, and then you go, okay, look, we're gonna send you this program for a week and that'll get you ready. It, you know, it's k…”
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Appearances (1)
| Episode | Date | Speaking time |
|---|---|---|
| Jocko Willink and Mike Sarraille - Helping Veterans Transition into the Private Sector · Y | Jul 20, 2018 | 44m |