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THE ONE THING

1. "No Brown M&Ms:” A Genius Leadership Hack for Ensuring Attention to Detail

Van Halen’s contracts with concert promoters included a “No brown M&Ms” clause.*

It was a genius move to ensure safety.

David Lee Roth (the lead singer of Van Halen) insisted on adding a clause that stated that a bowl of M&Ms should be provided in the backstage area but that every single brown M&M should be removed.

The penalty for leaving one in was unforgiving: cancellation of the show and full payment to the band.

The reason for that clause was to make sure that people read the contract carefully.

Van Halen’s productions were massive, and they included very complex requirements that could easily lead to technical and often catastrophic errors.

For example, applying the wrong specs to the girders could lead to the stage falling apart.

Finding a brown M&M meant that the band was guaranteed to run into a production problem and had to recheck everything in detail.

The takeaway

This is a smart lesson on writing business contracts in general, but it also applies to communicating anything sensitive.

As a leader, use your version of a “No Brown M&Ms” clause when you want to make sure that people read an instruction carefully.

For example, if you’re writing an important email, add a weird question or an incorrect date that would prove to you that the recipient read the whole message.

*This is an anecdote from Atul Gawande's book, The Checklist Manifesto, about the importance of using checklists to get things right

INSIGHTFUL THOUGHTS

2. The Broken Shelf Approach: A Leader’s Quick Fix for Big Impact

Here’s a tweet I read recently from Shaan Puri (I pasted the text below to make it easier to read):

The takeaway

I’m not sure the Broken Shelf Approach is the optimal way of kickstarting things on day 1 as a leader (and there are some drawbacks to this approach).

However, I do like the shock therapy aspect and the hyper-focus on customer issues. I think that incorporating some version of this exercise (e.g., once a quarter or two) can help you gain the benefits of getting quick results without being too disruptive.

You can even make events out of them (call them something like “Customer-Focused Hackathons”).

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MEMES I LIKE

4. The Difference Between a Boss & a Leader

THE 80/20

5. An 80/20 Tip You Can Apply Today

Here’s a low-effort, high-impact tip you can use with your team today:

• What: Assign tasks to specific individuals (and not to groups)

• Why: This helps avoid the bystander effect (where everyone’s responsibility is no one’s responsibility).

• Example: “Mila will be responsible for completing this task, and both Jessica and Steve will help her out,” is more effective than “Mila, Jessica, and Steve will be responsible for completing this task.”