The 5% Rule of Leadership: Using Lean Decision-Making to Drive Trust, Ownership, and Team Productivity
Anil K. Singhal
Wiley (September 2024)

How to build a great, enduring, and admirable enterprise

According to my accumulation of notes (sources unknown), Lean was born out of manufacturing practices but more recently has also transformed the world of knowledge work and management. It encourages the practice of continuous improvement and is based on the fundamental idea of “less is often more as well as  better.” James Womack and Daniel Jones defined the five principles of Lean manufacturing in their book The Machine That Changed the World. The five principles are considered a recipe for improving workplace efficiency and include defining value, mapping the value stream, creating flow, using a pull system, and pursuing perfection.

The five Lean principles provide a framework for creating an efficient and effective organization. Lean allows managers to discover inefficiencies in their organization and deliver better value to customers. The principles encourage creating better flow in work processes and developing a continuous improvement culture. By practicing all five principles, an organization can remain competitive, increase the value delivered to the customers, decrease the cost of doing business, and increase their profitability.

In The 5% Rule of Leadership, Anil Singhal exlains HOW he and a co-founder built NetScout, “using lean decision-making to drive trust, ownership, and team productivity.”

These are among the passages of greatest interest and value to me:

o Foreword (Pages xix-xxiv)
o Introduction (xxv-xxxi)
o Create a Strong Foundation (1-4)
o The 5% Rule in Business and Life (5-8)
o Employees as shareholders (26-29)

o The Decisive Factor (31-37)
o Building Trust The Tie That Binds (40-41)
o The Tie That Binds (46-47)
o Learning Curve (51-58)
o The HA [Hierarchy of Purpose] Map in Action (63-66)

o Implementing the 5% Rule (67-70)
o Know What You Want Going In (71-73)
o Trust and Transparency (77-78)
o The Risks of Skipping the First 5% (81-82)
o The Value of Predictability (88-89)

o Disruption as Freedom (111-112)
o Counting What You Do Not Have (142-143)
o Know When to Stop (148-150)
o Double Lives (162-163)
o The Next Dimension (166-168)

o Create the Next Generation of Leaders (171-173)
o Preserve the Asset of Experience (175-181)
o Company-Wide Succession (192-196)
o ThevKeys to a Great and Enduring Company (197-203)
o Trust and the 5% Rule (201-203)
o Epilogue (205-206)

Obviously, no brief commentary such as mine can possibly do full justice to the value of the information, insights and counsel that Anil  Singhal provides in abundance. However, I hope I have at least indicated why I think so highly of his work and especially of this brilliant book. Here in a single source is just about all you need to know about HOW to use lean decision-making skills to drive trust, gain a sense of ownership , and increase team productivity throughout almost any enterprise.

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Here are two suggestions while you are reading The 5% Rule of Leadership. First, highlight key passages. Also,  perhaps in a notebook kept near-at-hand (e.g. Apica Premium C.D. Notebook A5), record your comments, questions, and action steps (preferably with deadlines).

These two simple tactics — highlighting and documenting — will expedite frequent reviews of key material later.