The Five Temptations of a CEO
Summary
Lencioni's first book is a short business fable in which a struggling chief executive meets a stranger on a train who identifies five temptations that cause executives to fail.
The five are presented as a chain. Choosing status over results, meaning valuing the position itself over what it produces, which is the root temptation because it removes any reason to risk the position. Choosing popularity over accountability, meaning wanting to be liked by direct reports and therefore not holding them to commitments. Choosing certainty over clarity, meaning delaying decisions until the information is complete and thereby leaving the organisation without direction, when a clear decision that turns out wrong is more useful than no decision. Choosing harmony over productive conflict, meaning suppressing disagreement in meetings so that the objections are raised afterwards in corridors and the decision is never actually owned. And choosing invulnerability over trust, meaning refusing to admit uncertainty or error, which prevents anyone else from doing so.
The chain runs upward: invulnerability prevents conflict, the absence of conflict prevents clarity, unclear direction prevents accountability, and failed accountability prevents results.
The book takes an hour to read. It has no evidence base, the fable format is thin, and the material is developed further in his later books. Its value is compression: the five temptations are memorable and the causal chain between them is a usable diagnostic for why an executive team is not producing results.
Key takeaways 7
- Valuing the position itself over what it produces is the root failure, because it removes any reason to risk the position on a difficult decision.
- Wanting to be liked by direct reports prevents holding them to commitments, which is the mechanism by which accountability disappears.
- A clear decision that turns out wrong is more useful than no decision, because the organisation can act and correct.
- Waiting for certainty before deciding leaves the organisation without direction for the entire waiting period, which is a cost that is never counted.
- Suppressing disagreement in meetings means the objections are raised afterwards and the decision is never actually owned by anyone.
- A leader who refuses to admit uncertainty or error prevents everyone below them from doing so, which removes the information the organisation runs on.
- The five failures form a causal chain, so an accountability problem is usually a conflict problem and a conflict problem is usually a vulnerability problem.
Who should read it
Chief executives and senior leaders who want a short memorable diagnostic for why their team is not producing results.
About Patrick Lencioni
American management consultant and founder of The Table Group; writes business fables about executive teams and organisational health.
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team names a sequence - absence of trust, fear of conflict, lack of commitment, avoidance of accountability, inattention to results - and gives managers a diagnostic order for working through them. The Advantage sets out organisational health as a measurable executive discipline covering clarity, meeting design and internal communication.
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