Sandi Coryell

Leadership is not now nor will it ever be a nice linear process that you can learn section-by-section and then put into a box and forget about. It's not about theory. It's about what happens in the real world when the heat is on.

It’s messy. And it’s getting messier by the day as business speeds up, multiple generations work together, and employees are asked to be more than one thing at a time – creative and financial, innovator and salesman, marketer and mentor.

The stories in this book detail, mistakes and all, how I developed my leadership approach in the trenches, under pressure, and they provide answers to the questions I’m repeatedly asked by senior executives.   

During my 20 years as president of the entertainment office of a global advertising agency, I worked in highly competitive industries such as movies, theme parks, home entertainment, and television.

In response to the mountains my teams and I faced every day, I developed the strategies and shortcuts I now share with senior executives and entrepreneurs who want to achieve high performance and a competitive edge in high-pressure industries.

Through this book, I want to help you master:

How to get your head in the game despite heavy headwinds
How to influence others to give it their all
How to convince others to support to your ideas
How to build a strong organizational culture that tames the beast of high pressure, heavy competition, and tight deadlines to drive high performance.

It’s also why this book has three acts. Leadership is about your own unique talents, the connection you have to others, and the environment and people around you that combine to drive success.

The First Act focuses on you as the lead. Understanding what makes you tick is the best way to understand why you make the decisions you make, particularly under pressure, and how you can adapt to best meet the situation or person at hand.

The Second Act is all about connection. How well you connect with others and how they perceive you as a leader determines how effective you will be at influencing people to do their best, avoiding conflict and generating collaboration, driving creativity and selling new ideas, and inspiring action.

And finally, in the Third Act, we talk about the ecosystem that surrounds you. Whether you call it environment, or culture, or team – it’s about that air you breathe every day and the people who share it with you who are critical to your own success and that of your organization.

When you put all three acts together you have tapped into a leadership advantage that gives you a competitive edge.  

And to support you in making that Advantage all the more powerful, particularly in high-pressure situations, I share the process I developed as my most potent shortcut to adapting and meeting any situation that comes your way with the most effective strategy possible.
 
I call it The Deviant Advantage – so named because the point where you deviate from average is where you will find your fastest route to success. This point of deviation informs and defines your natural Leadership Style, and once you understand this, you’ll discover how to effectively deviate from your natural Leadership Style to meet new and different situations.

This is how you will elevate your leadership and develop teams that liberate individuals to bring out their own unique advantages.