Whenever I hear a graduation speaker exhort a group of students to “go out into the world and be a leader,” I want to stand up and shout, “No!!! Please don’t be a leader, unless you’re doing it for the right reason, and you probably aren’t!” Let me explain.

This is the eleventh or twelfth business book I’ve written, depending on how you count them. If someone were to dive into a stack of my books for the first time, I’d tell them to start with this one.

That’s because the majority of the other books I’ve written focus on how to be a leader: How to run a healthy organization, lead a cohesive team, manage a group of employees. However, over the years I’ve come to the realization that some people won’t embrace the instructions I provide because of why they wanted to become a leader in the first place.

Throughout my childhood, people exhorted me and my peers to be leaders. I accepted their encouragement at face value and sought opportunities to lead people and organizations from the moment I could captain a team or run for student council. But, like so many people, I never stopped to consider why I should be a leader.

As it turns out, the primary motive for most young people, and too many older ones, is the rewards that leadership brings with it. Things like notoriety, status, and power. But people who are motivated by these things won’t embrace the demands of leadership when they see little or no connection between doing their duties and receiving those rewards. They’ll pick and choose how they spend their time and energy based on what they are going to get, rather than what they need to give to the people they’re supposed to be leading. This is as dangerous as it is common. The purpose of The Motive is to make it a little less common.

I hope that this book helps you understand and, perhaps, adjust your leadership motive so that you can fully embrace the difficult and critical nature of leading an organization. Or, perhaps, it will help you come to the peaceful conclusion that you might not want to be a leader at all and allow you to find a better use for your talents and interests in a different role.

Shay Davis knew that it was too soon for him to get fired. Six months was not enough time for even the most aggressive private equity firm to axe a recently promoted CEO. But it wasn’t too soon for them to start thinking about it.

Golden Gate Security wasn’t exactly failing under Shay’s brief period of leadership. The company, headquartered in Emeryville, a mostly commercial town on the eastern shore of the San Francisco Bay, was still growing, albeit more slowly than most other regional security companies in the west. Profit margins were solid, but they looked anemic compared to those of All-American Alarm, the massive and most aggressive national company in the home and small business security market.

Shay figured that the private equity guys would give him another nine months to jump-start Golden Gate, but he wasn’t going to wait that long. After climbing the ladder for more than two decades and finally making it to the top, he wasn’t about to let all those years of hard work go to waste.

So he decided to throw his pride out the window and make a painful phone call.

Lighthouse Partners was a small consulting firm located in Half Moon Bay, California, that had a reputation for working with interesting and successful clients. One of those clients was Del Mar Alarm, a San Diego–based company that was the shining star of the regional 
security arena in California and a small thorn in Shay Davis’s side.

Whether it was a panel discussion at a trade show or an article in a business magazine, Del Mar and its British-born CEO, Liam Alcott, were regularly lauded for their off-the-chart profitability as well as for their ability to fend off national competitors like All-American.

Normally, Shay would never have considered hiring a competitor’s consulting firm, but he was beginning to feel desperate enough to try something new. When he contacted the consultant at Lighthouse who worked with Del Mar, she explained that she’d have to check with her client to see if it would be okay for her to work with another company in the same industry. Shay decided he probably wouldn’t hear back from her. He was right.

But he could never have predicted what would happen next.

It’s hard to hate someone you don’t know, but Shay figured he was getting pretty good at it in regard to Liam Alcott.

Though he had never really met Alcott, aside from a handshake or a perfunctory greeting at an industry event, Shay had heard him speak a few times and read more print interviews than he cared to remember. He had grown to resent the phony affability of the man who seemed to have such an easy time doing what Shay hadn’t yet figured out.

So when Shay’s assistant, Rita, came into his office to announce that someone named Liam was calling for him on line one, Shay figured it was one of his own executives pulling a prank on him. But before he could pick up the phone to play along, he noticed the 619 area code and decided that the caller might just be his nemesis from San Diego.

Taking a deep breath, he dove in. “This is Shay.”

“Hello, Shay. This is Liam Alcott.”

Shay realized immediately that it wasn’t a prank. But he was somehow relieved that he didn’t even like the sound of the man’s voice, notwithstanding the English accent, which he decided was affected. So he decided to be excessively nice.

“Well, what can I do for you, Liam?”

“First, I want to apologize for not reaching out to you last summer to congratulate you on your promotion. I feel like a bum.”

Shay wasn’t at all convinced that the man was genuine. But he wasn’t about to let on. “Don’t be silly. Believe me, if anyone knows how busy you are, it’s me.”

“I suppose that’s true. Anyway, I’m calling because Amy over at Lighthouse told me that you contacted her about working with them.”

Shay felt a rush of shame wash over him, expecting Liam to chastise him for trying to poach his consultants, not to mention his intellectual property. Shay tried to play it cool. “Yeah. I just figured that they know our industry, and that if they didn’t have a problem with—”

Liam interrupted. “Of course. I get it. And I don’t have any problem with it at all. Amy’s a great consultant, and Lighthouse has been very helpful to us down here. You would love working with her.”

More than a little surprised, Shay backed off to preserve some pride. “Well, we’re going to be talking to other firms too, so we’re not ready to commit to anything quite yet.”

Liam didn’t flinch. “That’s smart. In fact, before you hire any consultants, I think there is one big thing that you should do first.”

Shay was bracing himself for some sort of condescending advice. “What’s that?”

“You should let me tell you what we’ve learned from Lighthouse and see if that might be enough for you.”

Shay didn’t know how to respond. Did I hear that correctly?

Before he could think of something to say, Liam continued. “In fact, I’m coming up there next Thursday for a meeting, and then I’m staying the weekend at my sister-in-law’s in Walnut Creek. Why don’t we get together on Friday?”

“I’ll have to check with—”

“I just asked your assistant, Rita. It’s Rita, right?”

“Yeah.”

“She said you’re wide open Friday. You were supposed to do an ops review or something but it got pushed back a few weeks.”

Shay suddenly felt betrayed—by Rita, by the consultants at Lighthouse, by someone. Not ready to accept his enemy’s clearly devious offer, he pushed back.

“Don’t take this wrong, Liam,” he paused, “but don’t you have some reservations about sharing your secrets with a competitor?”

Liam laughed. “Competitor? I don’t think we’re competitors. I mean, I certainly wouldn’t have wanted Lighthouse to work with you if we were. And it’s not like we’re trying to steal one another’s customers, unless you have plans to get into the security business in San Diego. So I don’t see us having any conflict here.”

Shay tried desperately to think of an excuse.

Liam continued. “I’d say that our common enemy is All-American, and I’d rather not see them get another regional foothold in Northern California.” He paused. “Unless you’ve already figured out how to deal with them.”

Though Shay didn’t like the idea of admitting any weakness, he also didn’t want to lose out on any advice that Liam might have for him. “No, we’ve still got work to do there.”

“Okay,” Liam announced enthusiastically, “so that’s one area where I might be able to help you. And I’m sure you’ll have some advice for me.”

Shay responded with a partially false show of humility. “Well, I don’t know about that.” Deciding that he could think of no good reason to refuse Liam’s offer, he relented. “All right then. What time should we meet on Friday?”

When the call ended, Shay decided he’d have a few days to come up with a good reason to be out of town at the end of next week.