Leap Academy with Ilana Golan
Former Medtronic CEO: Leadership Secrets for Achieving Success Beyond Profits | Bill George | E71
Thu, 16 Jan 2025
After losing seven elections in college, Bill George realized that leadership is about building relationships and helping others grow. Personal losses, including the deaths of his mother and fiancée, taught him resilience and the value of purpose. Though on track to become CEO at Honeywell, Bill chose a more fulfilling path at Medtronic, focusing on the company’s mission to restore lives. In this episode, Bill takes Ilana through his leadership philosophies and shares lessons on building relationships, leading with values, and prioritizing purpose over profits, which were pivotal in driving Medtronic's success. Bill George is a renowned thought leader, educator, and bestselling author, best known for his transformative leadership as CEO of Medtronic. A strong advocate for values-driven leadership, Bill emphasizes leading with purpose, values, relationships, and heart. In this episode, Ilana and Bill will discuss: (00:00) Introduction (04:30) Learning Leadership Lessons Through Early Failures (06:50) Losing His Mother and Fiancée Suddenly (09:22) Turning Tough Moments Into Learning Opportunities (11:37) The Value of Building Relationships (13:16) Choosing Purpose Over the CEO Path at Honeywell (16:18) Measuring Impact by Lives Restored at Medtronic (21:42) Mentoring Across Different Generations for Free (24:20) Making a Risky Move to Challenge the FDA (26:47) Leadership Beyond Just Making Profits (33:18) Using Data and Intuition to Make Bold Decisions (35:48) Remarkable Leaders Who Followed Their ‘True North’ (44:21) Balancing Leadership, Family, and Self-Care (48:56) Bill's Advice for Emerging Leaders Bill George is a renowned thought leader, educator, and bestselling author, best known for his transformative leadership as CEO of Medtronic. A strong advocate for values-driven leadership, Bill emphasizes leading with purpose, values, relationships, and heart. Earlier in his career, he held senior executive roles at Honeywell and Litton Industries. He is the author of True North and serves as an Executive Fellow at Harvard Business School, where he taught for nearly 20 years, shaping the next generation of leaders Connect with Bill: Bill’s Website: http://www.billgeorge.org/ Bill’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/williamwgeorge/ Resources Mentioned: Bill’s Book, True North: Discover Your Authentic Leadership: https://www.amazon.com/True-North-Discover-Authentic-Leadership/dp/0787987514 Bill’s Book, True North, Emerging Leader Edition: Leading Authentically in Today's Workplace: https://www.amazon.com/True-North-Emerging-Leader-Authentically-ebook/dp/B0BBSWCVT4 Leap Academy: Ready to make the LEAP in your career? There is a NEW way for professionals to Advance Their Careers & Make 5-6 figures of EXTRA INCOME in Record Time. Check out our free training today at leapacademy.com/training
Chapter 1: What leadership lessons did Bill learn from early failures?
You made a massive leap to a different industry. You zoom up the ladder. How did you make that transition?
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Chapter 2: How did personal losses shape Bill's leadership philosophy?
Bill George, former chairman and CEO of Medtronics, currently an executive fellow at Harvard Business School, author, served on countless boards from Golden Sacks and ExxonMobil and Novartis and Target and more. Bill, I'm so glad to talk to you today because you had a pivotal moment at a young age where your father sparked an idea. Can you take us back in time?
Well, my father, I thought was a good consultant. He worked for Booz Allen. He pulled me aside when I was 10 and said, son, I feel like I failed to be a leader. I should have been. And I want you to become the leader I never became. And not only that, son, I'd like you to be head of a major corporation. Now, I've held stock in this company in Atlanta, Georgia, since 1937.
It's called the Coca-Cola Company. You could be head of that company, son. Or if that's not enough, maybe there's a company in Cincinnati, Procter & Gamble, great company. There's an emerging computer company out on the East Coast called IBM. Wouldn't it be great to do that? Well, I can tell you, my mother was the source of my values.
And I was kind of pushing my father away with one hand and taking it in subliminally with the other. But somehow, I go into junior high, join lots of organizations, high school. I'm never selected to lead anything. I'm not chosen to be elected to the student council. I'm not head of any organization. I'm a good enough tennis player to play some Division I college tennis.
But I wouldn't even co-captain a high school tennis team. So finally, my senior year, I said, I'm going to throw my hat in the ring and I'm going to run for president senior class. I was running against one other person, nice person, but I clearly thought I was a lot better qualified than he was. So when the votes came in, I lost by a margin of two to one.
So you can see I wasn't much of a leader because I really hadn't figured it out. But like a glutton for punishment, I went off to Georgia Tech to study engineering. I ran for office six more times. Lost all six. So now I'm 0 for 7 and feeling like a real loser.
One of the best things that ever happened to me is a group of seniors pulled me aside and said, Bill, no one's ever going to want to work with you, much less be led by you, because you're moving so fast to get ahead, you don't take time for other people. And that was like a blow to the solar plexus. But you know, they were right. And I had a lot to learn.
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Chapter 3: What does it mean to prioritize purpose over profits?
I had to learn that leadership is really about relationships, about relationship with people. And I really worked hard on that, came back, led a lot of organizations at Georgia Tech, and then went off to Harvard Business School and led some organizations there as well.
So first of all, what made you try again and again and again? Because again, most people would not try six times. They got a rejection the first time and they'll say, well, it's not for me. Leadership is not it. I will just do whatever, something else. What made you continue?
Well, two things. One good, one maybe not so good, depending on your point of view. One, I'm very persistent and not easily defeated. And so I keep coming back. That's the one. The other one, maybe you think it's not so good, but I have a lot of confidence in my abilities. And there are a few things in terms of leadership that I thought I couldn't do. And so I've never felt like there's a ceiling.
I can't go beyond this. At least we're talking business leadership or nonprofit leadership. So yeah, I just felt like I had a lot to learn. And maybe the best way to learn is by doing it, not by reading about it, not by studying books on leadership. You can't really learn leadership in the classroom, but you can actually get into the arena and learn.
That's incredible because you're absolutely right. And I love that you're saying to get into the arena. And I think also John Maxwell always says that your success will be capped by your leadership lead. And I think that just, it's exactly what you're saying. So you're getting this feedback of you're moving too fast. People can't catch on.
What are the things that shift for you to suddenly start taking more leadership roles, you think?
Well, I had to learn about how to build relationships with people. I'm an only child. I spent a lot of time with my parents who were older.
By the way, me too. How rare is that? Anyway, that's so cool. Okay.
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Chapter 4: How can mentoring across generations impact leadership?
That's why you have two sons. But anyway, I feel like I just wanted to really learn more about relationships and I really worked hard to learn about that in college. And it was a great lesson. I spent my whole sophomore year learning about that and finally was ready my junior year to take on a lot of leadership roles plus my senior year.
But it was a learning process and building relationships and talking to a lot of older people. I had some wonderful mentors. They weren't that much older, two, three years older, and I really learned a lot from them. I'm very sensitive. People used to criticize me and one of my older mentors said, Bill, consider the source. Why are they saying that?
But you learn lessons as you go and you learn how to handle difficult situations and you build some confidence in that. And I built lifelong relationships. I was just back with a group of guys I knew in college. And we had 12 of us got to dinner with our spouses. And yeah, some of the guys had passed away.
Chapter 5: What bold decisions did Bill make to challenge the FDA?
But it was great to renew those relationships now at an older age that I struggled to make in college, but eventually became good friends.
That's incredible, Bill. And I think a lot of that adaptability and learning fast and making those connections is just so fundamental. But I want to take you maybe to a harder time in your life, if that's okay. You lose two very impactful people in your life, your mom and your fiance. Can you take us there for a second and what those strategies shaped your thinking?
Chapter 6: How did Bill measure success at Medtronic?
First of all, I was very close to my mother, as I said earlier. My father traveled all the time, so my mother and I would drive from Michigan to Florida for spring vacation. We were just very close, spent a lot of time together, go to church together. My father's out playing golf. And she died suddenly. And it was a great loss to me. And she'd had cancer and she died of a heart attack.
And in reality, it was a blessing, but still it was a great loss. And I still think of her like that little bird on my shoulder every day. And every time I make a decision, is that what my mother would want me to do? And she always said, son, I don't care if you get A's or C's. I just want you to be true to your values. And here I am all these years later still trying to do that.
But I recovered from my mother's death and fell in love with a woman who had lived about three blocks from us. They're both working in Washington. She was originally from Georgia. We got engaged to be married. Very happy. Things are going really well. I felt I had a great job. Still mourning my mother some, but, you know, ready to get married, take on the new world.
And all of a sudden she'd started having some headaches and And I'd even taken her to the doctor, and they said there's nothing wrong with her. She may be emotionally disturbed and doesn't want to get married. So she'd gone back home to prepare for the wedding.
I remember talking to her on a Saturday night and trying to make final plans for the wedding, but a little traumatized by these headaches, she was happening. Well, the next morning, I got a call from her parents telling me she died during the night of a malignant brain tumor. And the call actually came in on our roommates, who in turn relayed it to me.
And man, I was devastated because I'm a person of faith. But when your parent dies, you mourn them. But it's the natural order of things. When a 25-year-old who's doing great work in Appalachia dies, I have no faith explanation. I have no explanation, period. Plus, the two women I was closest to in my life are gone. And I'd gone to a bunch of men's schools and so and live with a bunch of guys.
So it was very traumatic. And my father really wasn't there for me. He didn't have the emotional openness to do that, emotional intelligence. And so I was really alone. Fortunately, I had my friends around me. But, you know, in life, I would say this. There's a lesson you learn. First of all, you never understand why someone passes away, why this happens or why that happens.
But you have to be open to what comes. And I've learned the hard way that sometimes one door closes in life and another one opens. And if the first door hadn't closed, you wouldn't see the door that was open. That later happened in my career. But more significantly, a few months later, I was at a dinner party, actually, for me and my fiancee, former fiancee with some friends.
And there was another woman there. And she would loan to Harvard, take her home. And it turned out that we fell in love. And a year later, got married. That's my wife, Penny. So we've been together. This had our 55th wedding anniversary. So I feel blessed. And we've had a great life. We have two sons, four grandchildren. Life is good. But I can't explain any of this.
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Chapter 7: What advice does Bill have for emerging leaders?
Chapter 8: How can leaders effectively build relationships?
So you can see I wasn't much of a leader because I really hadn't figured it out. But like a glutton for punishment, I went off to Georgia Tech to study engineering. I ran for office six more times. Lost all six. So now I'm 0 for 7 and feeling like a real loser.
One of the best things that ever happened to me is a group of seniors pulled me aside and said, Bill, no one's ever going to want to work with you, much less be led by you, because you're moving so fast to get ahead, you don't take time for other people. And that was like a blow to the solar plexus. But you know, they were right. And I had a lot to learn.
I had to learn that leadership is really about relationships, about relationship with people. And I really worked hard on that, came back, led a lot of organizations at Georgia Tech, and then went off to Harvard Business School and led some organizations there as well.
So first of all, what made you try again and again and again? Because again, most people would not try six times. They got a rejection the first time and they'll say, well, it's not for me. Leadership is not it. I will just do whatever, something else. What made you continue?
Well, two things. One good, one maybe not so good, depending on your point of view. One, I'm very persistent and not easily defeated. And so I keep coming back. That's the one. The other one, maybe you think it's not so good, but I have a lot of confidence in my abilities. And there are a few things in terms of leadership that I thought I couldn't do. And so I've never felt like there's a ceiling.
I can't go beyond this. At least we're talking business leadership or nonprofit leadership. So yeah, I just felt like I had a lot to learn. And maybe the best way to learn is by doing it, not by reading about it, not by studying books on leadership. You can't really learn leadership in the classroom, but you can actually get into the arena and learn.
That's incredible because you're absolutely right. And I love that you're saying to get into the arena. And I think also John Maxwell always says that your success will be capped by your leadership lead. And I think that just, it's exactly what you're saying. So you're getting this feedback of you're moving too fast. People can't catch on.
What are the things that shift for you to suddenly start taking more leadership roles, you think?
Well, I had to learn about how to build relationships with people. I'm an only child. I spent a lot of time with my parents who were older.
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