#92: Dawn Sweeney, Former National Restaurant Association President & CEO— Speaking Up When Something Can Be Better
How Leaders Lead with David Novak
David Novak Leadership
4.8 • 596 Ratings
🗓️ 21 July 2022
⏱️ 43 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to How Leaders Lead where every week you get to listen in while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world. |
| 0:09.4 | I break down the key learning so that by the end of the episode, you'll have something simple that you can apply as you develop into a better leader. |
| 0:17.6 | That's what this podcast is all about. |
| 0:20.0 | Today's guest is Don Swweeney, the former president |
| 0:23.4 | and CEO of the National Restaurant Association. Now, Steve Jobs, the late CEO of Apple, |
| 0:30.8 | used to say, excellence is the price of admission. What he meant by that was that excellence was |
| 0:37.2 | standard operating procedure at |
| 0:39.4 | Apple. It's what he expected. It's what was expected by everybody in the company. In an environment |
| 0:46.5 | like this, colleagues push each other to make things better. They push the boundary of what's |
| 0:51.5 | possible. And if someone feels like a project or an idea can be better, |
| 0:56.1 | they speak up. |
| 0:57.7 | Don Sweeney and the great leaders I know |
| 1:00.1 | do this very same thing. |
| 1:02.1 | They speak up when something can be better. |
| 1:04.7 | They don't accept the status quo, |
| 1:06.7 | but instead have the courage to push to make everything |
| 1:09.9 | the best it can be. |
| 1:11.7 | This, my friends, is what it looks like to strive for excellence. |
| 1:16.1 | And doing things with excellence is the mark of a great leader, and it's the mark of a great company. |
| 1:22.1 | So let's not wait any longer. |
| 1:23.7 | Here's my conversation with my good friend and soon to be yours, Don Sweeney. |
| 1:35.4 | Don, I always like to start out at the beginning. Can you tell us about your upbringing? So I started |
... |
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