Randall Collins - Napoleon Never Slept: How Great Leaders Leverage Social Energy: Microtechniques of Success From Jesus to Steve Jobs

NAPOLEON NEVER SLEPT

How Great Leaders Leverage Social Energy

by Randall Collins and Maren McConnell

cover design by Jeff Warrington

published as an E-book by MAREN INK, 2016

Copyrigh t 2015 by Maren Ink

http://maren.ink

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without prior permission of Maren Ink.

CONTENTS

Introduction: Success is a Career of High Emotional Energy 8

PART I.

HOW TO GROW WINNING NETWORKS BY EMOTIONAL ENERGY:

STEVE JOBS AND YOU 12

Emotional Energy in Yourself

The EE (Emotional Energy) Thermometer

Steve Jobs Affects Everyone's EE

Careers : A Marathon Coachs Advice about Not Sleeping Before the Race

Emotional Energy in Groups: Collective Effervescence

Warning: Collective Effervescence Has a Short Shelf-life

High Attunement builds EE, Low Attunement lowers EE

People and Situations that Bring You Down

What About People Who Seem Energetic But Don't Get Things Done?

The Fourth Dimension of EE: Rhythm/Sync

EDOM: Emotional Domination

Careers : Caesar Faces Down a Mutiny

Did Steve Jobs ever Hesitate?

Energizing Networks of Allies

Heavyweight and Lightweight Networks

Six Degrees are Useless: What You Need is a Two-link Heavyweight Network

What You Know Is Not Separate from Who You Know

Careers : Not Just Any Mentor

Dangerous Networks: Rivals and Opponents

The Raid on Xerox

Bill Gates as Turncoat Insider

What Money is Good For: Freedom to Build Your Own Networks

How did Steve Jobs Recover from Being Exiled?

Inner and Outer Networks

Inner Circle: Networks of EE

Networks of EDOM: Allies, Deal-Making Networks, Rivals

Outer Ring: Pseudo-networks of Reputation

Time-Line: Steve Jobs' Career and Turning Points

Careers : Insiders in Sports: Winners See It Differently

PART II.

NAPOLEON AS CEO 65

A Career of Emotional Energy

Starting Young in the Adult World

Careers : Building Momentum against Easy Competition:

Sam Walton in Arkansas

Luck is Location at the Cusp of Change

Careers : Networks at the Edge of Danger:

Michael Collins Takes Over the Irish Revolution

Networks That Made Napoleon

Careers : Marrying (and sometimes divorcing) the Boss's Daughter

Napoleon's Winning Style

Always active, never passive

Speed is organization-wide

Morale over material

Mobile firepower

Careers : Caesar is Prepared to Have Trouble

On a Roll

Careers : The Reputation Multiplier: Caesar's famous Fortune

Dilemmas

Overextension

Opponents catching up

Careers : Ulysses S. Grant Deflates the Magic of Robert E. Lee

The creep of formalities

Napoleon's Down Moments

Careers : Re-launching on the Rebound: Building IKEA

9. Endgame: Losing Emotional Energy

Ability, What is It?

Careers : Genius is How You Look at It

PART III.

WHAT MADE ALEXANDER GREAT? 104

Launching from the most Advanced Platform

Careers : If You Can't Inherit It, Join It

Tiger Woods Training

Careers : Avoiding the Bureaucratic Ladder,

Side-stepping the Credential Queue

The Ideal Target for Takeover

Careers : Making a Killing:

Piecing Together the World's Largest Insurance Company

A Growing Resource Beats a Stagnant Resource

The Difference-maker: Logistics-plus-Diplomacy

Alexander's Victory Formula

Cautious Timing, Explosive Action

Observe Weakness and Attack It

Careers : Superior Troops Have Empowered NCOs

Emotional Domination is More Decisive than Trickery

Alexander's Dilemmas

The Impetuous Leader

A Drunken Killing and a Management Dilemma

Careers : The Old and New Management Teams

Two Mutinies

Partying to Death

Why did Alexander Sleep Well, but Napoleon Never Slept?

Careers : Carousers and Workaholics

PART IV.

ELEVEN PRINCIPLES OF WINNING BIG 138

EE: emotional energy

EDOM: emotional domination

Gain EE from successful encounters;

avoid energy-draining encounters

Keep checking micro-social attunement and disattunement

Energizing the group energizes yourself

Details are never boring when they have trajectory;

successful people are never bored

Start early in the adult world:

skip the credential queue and the bureaucratic ladder

Build momentum where its easy-- but with a path to big leagues

The big battle, the big deal: monitor rivals, identify weakness and exert EDOM

Build inner circle and alliance networks by EE,

deal-making networks by EDOM,

and outer reputational networks by collective effervescence

Heavyweight networks are dangerous:

expect volatility

Luck is location at the cusp of change;

launch from the most advanced platform

Ideological rigidness limits success;

other people's rigidness is your opportunity

Knowing What Arena Youre Playing In

War

Business empire-building

Politics and social movements

Scientific, intellectual and artistic worlds

REFERENCES 149

INTRODUCTION

Success is a Career of High Emotional Energy

What all highly successful people throughout history have in common is they were extremely energetic.

Napoleon slept only four hours a night, and that was during quiet times, when France was at peace. When he was with his army on campaign, he napped in snatches of 15 minutes here and there, and was up at all hours, ahead of everyone else, getting the next day's action ready to go.

Winston Churchill, during the Second World War, would take a nap in the afternoon and stay up all night answering dispatches. Beethoven was so engrossed in composing that he didnt even notice his meals-- his cook would find the untouched dishes outside the door next day while Ludwig was still crafting music inside. Steve Jobs would phone key people in the small hours of the morning, or stay up all night at their house making enthusiastic plans.

Where does their energy come from? Eventually most people get tired. How do these historically successful people keep it up, day after day, night after night, year after year? Call it passion if you like, but putting a word on it doesn't really explain it. Why don't big winners in the game of success get burned out, like most other people?

They didn't do it just by repeating slogans to oneself. Always try harder, never give up, believe in yourself. Words like these have been popular for thousands of years, from the time of the ancient Romans to the latest athletic coach. Millions of people have tried to pump themselves up this way, but only a few have been extremely successful. Both losers and winners in football games repeat the same slogans. Exhorting yourself is just a personalized form of advertising hype, if it isn't combined with the real techniques by which people produce success.

There is no evidence that Napoleon, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, or Steve Jobs spent any time repeating such mantras. So what did they do?

The top leaders, the big winners energized other people around them, and got energy from them in return. They were experts at the art of social interaction.

They generated emotional energy in their encounters, whether in full-scale meetings or brief conversations.

What is emotional energy ? (We'll abbreviate it EE.) High EE is feeling pumped up, bodily and mentally. High EE persons are confident and proactive. They are forward moving; they have a path to a goal and they convey it to other people.