In today’s episode of Lessons in Leadership, Dave Anderson, leadership expert and founder of LearnToLead, tackles one of the most overlooked threats to long-term success: complacency. Drawing from his book Up Your Business, Anderson unpacks the first of six common “temptations” that cause organizations to unravel after achieving strong performance. His key message: if leaders stop working on themselves, they eventually get outgrown.
“As prosperity rises, urgency falls."
“It’s hard to survive success,” says Anderson, who notes that many organizations begin to unravel when success causes urgency to fade. The first temptation he explores is when leaders stop working on themselves, assuming past success will sustain future results. He calls this mindset “intelligence arrogance,” a term popularized by Zig Ziglar, that ultimately turns into “disabling ignorance.”
Anderson urges leaders to prioritize intentional growth and cautions against confusing hard work with self-development. “Now you’re probably working hard on your job or you wouldn’t be there. That’s not what I’m talking about,” he says. “We just stop working on ourselves.” He highlights how easy it is to slip into routine, referencing managers who haven’t actively learned anything new in decades. “A lot of people, they stop learning something 30 years ago. They’ve been in the business 31.”
To combat this stagnation, Anderson recommends setting quarterly growth objectives for every leader on the team. These objectives should include a clear skill to improve—such as interviewing, accountability, or meeting facilitation—paired with specific learning tools like books, podcasts, or courses.
“Just because you show up doesn’t mean you grow up,” he adds. “If you want to grow people, you’ve got to keep growing. You can’t take them on journeys you haven’t been on.”
The lesson concludes with a call for leaders to look inward before pointing fingers. “Let’s look in the mirror before we look out the window too much,” he says, encouraging teams to examine where they’ve allowed success to breed complacency.
Anderson will continue the series with five more “temptations” in future episodes, all aimed at helping dealers and their teams stay sharp in an ever-changing market.
