Using Your Power for Good with Ginni Rometty

Meet Ginni

Fifty years ago, Ginni Rometty’s father walked out of her life, leaving behind her mother and her younger siblings to fend for themselves. As Ginni watched her mom slowly move up in the workforce, she learned the difference between access and aptitude - a lesson she has taken with her through her incredible career.

Three years ago, Ginni retired as IBM's president, chairman, and CEO. Today, she co-chairs OneTen, an organization that aims to close the opportunity gap for Black talent and others who do not have a four-year degree. She also recently authored Good Power, which takes the reader through the lessons she learned on her path to becoming one of the world’s most influential business leaders.

In this episode, host Gautam Mukunda speaks with Ginni about what “good power” looks like in action, the power of a good attitude, listening with the intent to learn and the value in finding what you are in service of.

Timestamps

[:30] “Only you define who you are.”

[3:30] “Good Power has to do with loving tension, it has to do with being respectful and it has to do with celebrating progress.”  

[8:00] "Attitude, in other words, is both a powerful predictor of success, and far more within our control, than we often realize.”

[13:40] “That hard work, that always made me more prepared, not only gave me more confidence, but often made me better.”

[17:10] “You can only distribute power if you appeal to peoples’ minds and their hearts at the same time.”

Transcript

Gautam (00:00):

To lead is to exercise power. Leaving a legacy means using that power for good.

Ginni (00:07):

Good power loves tension, runs towards conflict. But in doing so, it should unite people, not separate them.

Speaker 3 (00:17):

World Reimagined with Gautam Mukunda, a leadership podcast for a changing world, an original podcast from Nasdaq.

Ginni (00:29):

My mom taught me, "Don't ever let someone define who you are. Only you define who you are." She would not let my father define who she or our family would be, and I think she also really taught me something that has stayed with me my whole life is that access and aptitude are two different things, meaning my mom wasn't dumb. She was actually quite bright, if I could use those words, but she had no access to anything. And it would be cemented in my mind and turns out there are a lot of people like that, that God spreads talent evenly, but access is not so equal in this world.

Gautam (01:02):

50 years ago, Ginni Rometty's father walked out of her life, leaving behind Ginni's mother and her younger siblings. Three years ago she retired as IBM's President, Chairman and CEO. Today she co-Chairs the 110 Foundation and her work there is shaped by that story. At one point in her life, she was the most powerful person at one of the world's largest companies. At another, she was almost powerless. That life story has made her think deeply about the dynamics in the world around her. She's even written a book about them called Good Power, in which she takes a long hard look at who has clout, who needs it, and perhaps most importantly, how to do the most good with it.

Ginni (01:47):

I have to tell you, there's a reason I ended up writing a book and I saw it really crisply said in something you wrote, or at least you quoted someone and you said that, "90% of people who get power, it's a negative thing," that they become aggressive or maybe they lie or they do things that are defensive and the like. That to me is why I ended up writing a book because I have a really strong belief in the book I called Good Power, ironically, that every one of us can do really hard stuff, but we could do it in a positive way. And I didn't feel it was something like just me, I'm a unicorn case of this. I thought it was what I learned in that others can learn it too, and that a power that grows over time and that therefore don't shy away from wanting to solve big problems. There's a way to do it that is a really positive way. It's a choice you can make. It'll grow, as I said, with time and its potency. And could I share some lessons for how people did that?

(02:46):

So then what about my view about people in this focus on access and aptitude now? It's got a lot to do with that today there's so many examples of bad power out there, you don't have to look very far, that I really felt maybe the time was right to show people that how they did their work could be as important as what they do. And so we often talk about what someone does, and I learned through some hard lessons learned that how is probably the more enduring part and it may be your greatest legacy, not just what you do.

Gautam (03:15):

So let's drill in on that because I find that to be fascinating obviously. So what is power and how do you use it for good instead of for evil? So how do you define good power?

Ginni (03:25):

I define good power as having a couple attributes. To me, good power loves tension, which people don't necessarily think of that. Good power loves tension, runs towards conflict, but in doing so, it should unite people, not separate them. It should do it with respect, not fear. And I think another really important attribute, which sounds simple, is if you would just celebrate some progress and not try for perfection, you might be surprised what you could accomplish. And so that were some of the tenets of good power, what I learned from really great people. There was a pattern of some principles I felt that were there that we could talk about. But in the main arc, good power has to do with loving tension. It has to do with being respectful and it has to do with celebrating progress. And I think what people don't realize is you have power as an individual.

(04:18):

I always say my mom had power go to her when she had nothing else. That is what that taught me. My mother had the power to change that situation and she had nothing. And I'm like, wow, if she could do that, a lot of us can do a lot of things.

Gautam (04:31):

So a lot of what you just said to me at the ending is reflective of a man's quest for meaning. This is certainly a remarkable book where he says that the one power that can never be taken away from you is to respond to what's happened to you.

Ginni (04:41):

Yes.

Gautam (04:42):

And so it seems that sounds like what you just said.

Ginni (04:45):

I agree.

Gautam (04:46):

And so I think that is incredibly powerful in two ways. So one is the first is that it grants you a reserve of resilience that probably cannot be found in any other source. But the other is I think it involves a certain level of self-reflection because when you're talking about this power, what I would tell my students is the peril of power is not that you will set out to do the wrong thing. There are people like that, but you're probably not one of them, right? If you aren't here with me. The problem is that you will convince yourself that this thing that you want to do, because it's good for you, is the right thing to do even when it really isn't. And it strikes me that that's the real peril of power. That's what I teach my students is the real peril of power.

(05:29):

And it sounds to me like what you were talking about was that you are both think about for yourself and trying to teach others ways to sort of avoid falling into that trap.

Ginni (05:38):

That's right. In a very pragmatic way. So you mentioned two interesting points. You said the word resilience, right? A lot of these are words that I think can be just bounced around and people have rhetoric around them. But it's funny that there are two chapters in the book that stick out that people think, "Why did she write those?" There is an entire chapter about resilience and an entire chapter on what does it mean to be a responsible steward of something? So to not convince yourself of what you just said a minute ago that something is good that isn't really good, and so how are you? And particularly when it comes to technology, I call it good tech.

(06:11):

So people are like, "What does that have to do with power?" And both of them to me do. And I'll start with the resilience one that you asked about because if you're going to do anything difficult, and I don't care if that's as a parent or as someone working or working in government, whatever it is, to me, the most difficult things, they do take a lot of resilience and they take some time and they are no straight line to heaven here on how things are done.

(06:32):

And you have that choice. I found that there were two things in retrospect that to me were the most positive fuel for that resilience. Again, as you said, there's a choice you make of the circumstances you're dealt right? But there are two things you could control and one is the relationships you build and the other is your own attitude. And so a minute ago you said you can choose how to deal with your circumstances. To me, attitude is a really big thing.

(06:56):

And first, as a result of the adversity I had, and trust me, there's others who've had much worse adversity, but I often say to myself, "Hey, that defined the bar for bad for me. And once I saw that, all these other things don't seem so bad."

Gautam (07:17):

On average, people say between 300 and a 1,000 words to themselves every minute. And that running internal monologue can have massive external effects. In his first book, Barking Up The Wrong Tree, Eric Barker described a study of Navy SEALs who go through a brutal training and selection program called BUDS. At the time of the study, only 25% of candidates made it through. It's easy to imagine how the internal self-talk of a Navy SEAL candidate might not be affirmational by default, but when the Buds candidates were taught to make the words they said to themselves positive, that skillset along with other mental conditioning tools drove their passage rate up to one-third.

(07:58):

Attitude, in other words, is both a powerful predictor of success and far more within our control than we often realize.

Ginni (08:06):

And so this ability to run to conflict is a very important attitude you can pick. And I learned that just by watching a lot of people. Many people hate conflict, they really want to drive away from it. But what I realized was, look, if I could prepare for it and go into it, and I did it the right way, nine times out of 10, I was better off at the end of that than I was at the beginning. Now, I'm not in a perfect world, but nine times out of 10 I was better off and whatever the situation was was better off as a result of it.

(08:33):

And that could vary from dealing with bullies to dealing with issues with a client, to dealing with a government, to a president. It didn't matter what it was. It's one of those things you've got to train yourself. Yes, it's uncomfortable, but I prepared for it. I'm going to do it constructively, and you run to it. And most of it is how you approach it. And it's very interesting. People have said to me often when people say, "Well, you want to do something..." Or asked me to do things in government, I'm like, "Why me?" And they'll go, "Well, you're acceptable to both sides." And I'm like, "Well, why is that? It's not because I'm a middle person, I choose to focus on the issue, but understand it from your perspective, not just my own."

(09:07):

So many people advocate a position from what they believe versus trying to first understand what you believe and what my thing can do towards helping your belief.

Gautam (09:18):

So can I focus in on the conflict for a second?

Ginni (09:20):

Sure.

Gautam (09:21):

So before the Battle of Trafalgar, Admiral Nelson said to his captains, "If you cannot see my signals and you don't know what my commands are," I think it what was, "No captain can do very wrong who sets his ship alongside that of the enemy." And so when I hear you say run towards conflict, what I'm thinking is, do you mean I see two people fighting and I run towards it to resolve the issue? Or do you mean when you are a leader, it's your job to run towards trouble?

Ginni (09:44):

Yeah, run towards trouble because I really believe there are many things. How many times have you seen in an organization a real disagreement on something? And I always say, you can't delegate complexity or an issue like that. I watched many leaders not want to solve something because they're like, "I don't want to get in the middle of that. Push it down." Okay, there are things that should not happen with because what only you can do. And so I mean run towards.

(10:07):

So let's just say a very mundane thing, or not mundane, but let's say a client who's upset about something. I've witnessed people who say, "Let me, here, I'll go deal with it." Others who are like, "I don't want to get in the middle of that." But if you go toward it, you'll be surprised both what you'll learn and the way you do it, and you'll probably, if you really understand it, because all conflicts are never what they appear on the surface that you'll be able to progress it. So that's what I mean by don't shy away from things that are either conflict, a problem, two different points of view, go towards them in whatever you're working on. It will advance it more than you think it will.

Gautam (10:43):

So then the second half of what I heard you say that I thought was extraordinarily powerful was the sense of some ability to speak from the other person's perspective.

Ginni (10:51):

Sometimes when I talk about it, I think people think, "Oh, so basic," but so much of what I think good leadership and good power is, it does go back to doing the basics in a very deliberate way. And one of the most fundamental things is that ability to listen to learn, versus listen to sell your point of view or listen for the entry to make your point. Those are very different and people can understand. And I always say one of the greatest skills I watched and learned to build relationships was asking questions. And when people say, "Oh, you got to have a mentor, you got to have a sponsor," I'm like, yeah, I feel like I have like a 1,000 because anyone who I took an interest in, asked questions, was willing to learn from, they were willing to be your, "Sponsor, mentor." It's almost, I could guarantee you that's true.

(11:35):

And so this idea of can people and you can learn, it's this idea of can I listen with an intent to learn? I guarantee you people know when you're doing that. Have you ever been to a cocktail party or a party party and you're talking to someone and can't you tell? They're talking to you, but they're looking over your shoulder if someone more interesting is coming along and you're kind of a waystation. To me, it's the prime example of what I mean by no, no, no. Or if you've gone to meet a client and you sit down and how many people are just waiting for their entry to then push what they have to sell to someone? Not to solve their problem they're pushing, versus, "No, no, no, I am going to listen with a real intent to learn." And I think it came really early to me because of this being a woman in engineering and the only woman I was always fearful of failing and being, if I said something wrong, I'd be noticed.

(12:23):

So I was constantly preparing and I constantly wanted to learn how things worked. It's very deeply rooted. Again, I didn't realize all this. I wrote a book and I had to think so deeply about my life, about this, but I can see where the roots of it come from of this constantly wanting to understand how things worked and ask questions about it because that knowledge would then give me confidence. It would first be a shield and then it would become confidence.

Gautam (12:47):

So I should say by the way that this is sort of personally relevant. My mother's a nuclear physicist and she once told me in her entire career from the first day to the day she retired, she was never in a meeting where there was any other woman who was not a secretary.

Ginni (13:00):

Yeah, I have great empathy and respect for your mom for doing that, right? Because she would probably be maybe a touch older than me. So even harder in the decade she was in.

Gautam (13:10):

She was aerospace, she consulted for an asset for her whole career. [inaudible 00:13:13].

Ginni (13:14):

Yes.

Gautam (13:15):

But I've heard her say this, "You have to learn." She got her PhD when she was 22. She was definitely smarter than all the other people in this room, but that wasn't the right pose for her to take.

Ginni (13:23):

You could react to that a couple of different ways, and people often ask me that because I would be the only person, and sometimes people would say, "Is that really fair? And did you feel like, well, you felt like you had to work harder because of that because you didn't want to be wrong?" And I say, "Yes, I could react that way. And you're right about that. It shouldn't be that way. However, that hard work that always made me more prepared not only gave me more confidence, but often made me better because of that." You could choose how you want to look at a glass half full of this or glass half empty on this topic, and I would be more of a glass half full on it.

(13:54):

I give that a lot of credit to having been the only one really pushed into my head this idea that preparation and knowledge gave you confidence and you no longer felt like an imposter when you are the only person in these rooms, you would often be more prepared than everyone that was in there. And I would find that to be true as time would go on with CEOs, with presidents of countries, no matter where, that preparation is what gave you confidence.

Gautam (14:18):

So I'm really struck by the philosophical approach you took, right? Maybe that's because I am an academic, but I think philosophy is very practical, because what I would think the experience you're describing and sort of as you said, where you didn't have institutional power at first and you had to gain it. There are essentially two ways to respond to that, right? Some people would respond to that by trying to hoard power, and some people would say like, "No, no, what I need to do is distribute power to make sure that it's in the right hands." And this obviously ties to your idea about good power. So I wonder if you could talk to us a little bit about how you see this idea of distributing power out so that it's in people who should have it?

Ginni (14:52):

Yeah, that is a very interesting question. I don't always think of it that way as you described it, like you said philosophically like that because to me, it probably originates from a different view. It's because I worked in such large companies that you would learn that if only you held that power, you couldn't accomplish enough, that you had to find a way that that scale was your advantage, and therefore you use the word distribute. And I only learned two ways to do that. Over time I would learn the first way was it had to be based on, you said philosophical, I'm a little philosophical in this, a principle of being in service of something which is very different than serving something. Getting people to understand if you're going to distribute power, the fundamental reason why they do something. In many ways, I would've called it like the real spirit, the soul of this.

(15:38):

And so fundamentally, why do you do something you are to be in service of? And I think this is really important for any person or organization to know before they push on with doing something hard because it's what grounds you. And I try to explain to people in very much a pragmatic way. I say, you go in a restaurant, waiter delivers food to you. Okay, they're serving you. That's not what I'm talking about. You can tell the difference when the person says they want me to have a good evening. So it isn't just about bringing my food. They're tending to many other little signals that make this a positive evening for me.

(16:13):

And by the way, they're doing that not knowing I've guaranteed them a tip. So it's not transactional. It's a bit of, "I'm trusting if I make this a good evening, you'll do something good in return for me." I see this in spades with things like the medical profession. The doctor who says it, does surgery and goes, "Well, I know you don't feel good still, but I've looked at the X-rays and the MRI, you looks fine to me." And you're like, "Yeah, but I can't walk still." And I've experienced both types of doctors who are like, "Okay, you're right. That all looks good, but my job is to be sure you walk again." Right?

(16:41):

And so it's fundamental, whether it was IBM or whatever part I did, to have clarity in my mind what I was in service of. I would learn it very early it would be clients, to be in service of a client meant I had to bring them value. And it wasn't transactional. I had to try to trust if I did it, I'd eventually get my goal met at the end.

(16:58):

So to your point, I think that distribution of power starts with you better be sure what you're in service of, not what you're serving. And the second part of it is probably the biggest thing I learned by watching some great leaders was it's really important to build belief that you can only distribute power if you appeal to people's minds and their hearts at the same time. This is not an intellectual exercise because I'm trying to convince you to do something that's an alternate reality to what you believe in, and therefore I've got to convince you to want to change. And therefore, I can speak to not only the analytical answer, which is what I found with my book, by the way, which I started analytical, but I had to speak from the heart to actually get people to say, "Oh, I see what this means."

(17:39):

And so to me, to distribute power doing those two things, some of the phrases I use on building belief for something is, you got to paint reality and give hope. You're appealing to my head and my heart at the same time to do that.

Gautam (17:54):

In his book, Give and Take, Adam Grant argues that there are three types of personalities in the workplace, takers who were always looking out for number one, matchers who adopt a quid pro quo attitude, and givers. Givers are generous with their time and expertise, and interestingly, often make up a disproportionate fraction of high achievers at an organization, as long as they learn to set boundaries and protect themselves. Generosity, tempered by wisdom, in other words, is a sure path to success than cutthroat self-interest.

(18:29):

This idea of giving leaders finishing first might run counter to our more traditional and more cynical alpha dog narrative. But it's another proof of concept for good power, because effective leadership doesn't necessitate scorekeeping. Instead, it thrives in service of a greater good. And that means the truly great leaders are generous not only with their time and expertise, but with the power they give to others.

Speaker 3 (18:59):

World Reimagined with Gautam Mukunda, a leadership podcast for a changing world, an original podcast from Nasdaq.