The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership: Follow Them and People Will Follow You

Leadership is the ability to influence others—that is the Law of Influence. It has nothing to do with someone’s job title or their assigned position; it is measured through an individual’s ability to inspire others and move them in a specific direction.

Maxwell lists five myths about leadership:

1. The Management myth dictates that leading and managing are two different tasks. Leaders can change people’s behaviors and move them in a new direction, whereas managers only help optimize systems and processes.
2. The Entrepreneur myth similarly argues that leaders and entrepreneurs are not the same. Whereas entrepreneurs go after opportunities, they might not be able to deal with people as leaders do.
3. The Knowledge myth states that people who know more are not necessarily good leaders—some researchers, for example, are brilliant yet have no major influence on people’s behaviors.
4. The Pioneer myth posits that being the first to do something is not necessarily leading. It can only be called leading if people follow their lead and act on their vision.
5. The Position myth dictates that being in a position of power can bring influence, but it is not equivalent to leadership, as that position can be filled by someone else. For example, when entrepreneur Maurice Saatchi was dismissed from his own advertising company, several of his partners also left with him, and the company’s stock plummeted. Proof of leadership is therefore not on someone’s resume or title, but in the amount of followers they have.

In the final half of the chapter, Maxwell briefly discusses the seven key factors that determine someone’s leadership ability. These include the character of the leader, the relationships they can establish, the knowledge they possess, their capacity for intuition, their experience, their past triumphs, and their ability to lead people to success. Readers who want to measure their influence can try their hand at leading a volunteer organization. People who are capable of leading volunteers are true leaders, as they cannot rely on their position or rank to force people to act—they must rely on their influence.

Although some people are born with a natural ability to be influential, Maxwell believes that almost all leadership skills can be learned. This is the Law of Process. However, people cannot build leadership skills overnight. True leaders think of growth as a continual process. The chapter begins with an anecdote to illustrate this point: Anne Scheiber, a middle-aged woman, turned her $5,000 savings into $22 million in her lifetime by continuously reinvesting her earnings in stocks. Rather than being content with her first big success and pulling out, she continued to persevere, accumulating a larger and larger dividend.

Leaders must continuously hone their skills—especially the intangible skills, such as gathering momentum and timing—in this same way. To truly engage people in the long term, leaders must actively seek to improve their skills and “stick with it” (45). Maxwell summarizes this with an old saying—“champions don’t become champions in the ring—they are merely recognized there” (49). It is their daily routine that forges their skills, and without dedication, they would not be able to succeed when the time comes.

The chapter uses former American president Theodore Roosevelt as an example of the Law of Process in action. Born sickly and weak, Roosevelt heeded his father’s advice and began training his body. He admired men with will and the ability to influence and relentlessly sought to become like them. When he became president, he delivered hundreds of speeches and personally oversaw numerous international events, including the negotiation of a peace treaty between Russia and Japan, which earned him a Nobel Peace Prize. Even on his death bed, he was reading to improve his mind. In other words, leaders must take self-improvement seriously.

There is a specific process to become a leader. People must first recognize the importance and the nature of true leadership. Learning only starts when individuals recognize a leader as an influencer and attempt to motivate others. They grow when they realize they need to build their own leading skills. Using himself as an example, Maxwell urges leaders to attend conferences, read books, listen to tapes, and invest in speaking with top leaders in their field to gain additional insight. In this way, people can develop great instincts and lead with confidence and relative ease. 

Maxwell begins Chapter 4 with an anecdote. Two 20th-century explorers, Road Amundsen and Robert Falcon Scott, led separate expeditions where they aimed to be the first person to reach the South Pole. Both were capable of assembling a team and preparing for the journey. However, only Amundsen was a true leader, as he took the time to research how to travel the region and equip his team with the best gear. For example, he used sled dogs and made sure to ration enough food for his men. In contrast, Scott had courage but not enough knowledge to truly lead: He brought ponies and motorized sledges, both incapable of withstanding the cold and which forced his men to walk most of the way; he rationed enough food for four yet brought in a fifth member at the last minute; and he forced his men to carry geological rocks on their way back, despite them suffering from frostbite and dehydration. In the end, his entire team, including himself, perished on the trip.

The Law of Navigation illustrates the key difference between Amundsen and Scott. While Amundsen “chart[ed] the course” of a trip, Scott could only “steer the ship” (58). Maxwell argues that true leaders should be capable of not only bringing others in the right direction, but chart the entire trip prior to departure; they can do this both in life-and-death situations and in everyday life. In other words, they have a vision of their desired destination, are capable of planning—including foresight when it comes to unforeseen obstacles—and have the ability to help people reach their goal. Thus, leaders can see better, father, and earlier than their peers.

Good leaders navigate the world by drawing on their past experiences and looking inward. They examine the conditions in the outside world prior to making decisions, listen to others to diversify their ideas, and decide based both on faith and fact. Without faith, they lack the confidence to lead; without fact, they cannot always make sound decisions.

Maxwell admits that he is not a good navigator and relies on instincts too much. This is why he hired others to help him out later in his career. When he was young, however, he wrote an acrostic (a poem or work where the first letters of each line spell out a word or phrase) to remind himself of the importance of the Law of Navigation:

Predetermine a course of action.

Lay out your goals.

Adjust your priorities.

Notify key personnel.

Allow time for acceptance.

Head into action.

Expect problems.

Always point to the successes.

Daily review your plan (63).

Based on his own experience remodeling a church, Maxwell concludes the chapter by highlighting the importance of preparation. With better preparation comes more confidence and trust. Without preparation, leaders are more likely to encounter problems and oppositions.

In this chapter, Maxwell seeks to answer a question about leadership: What is the leader’s responsibility? While the people Maxwell has taught over the years have given him differing answers, he personally believes that leaders create additional value by serving and adding value to the lives of the people they lead—they are not simply the people who sit at the top of the social ladder and reap the benefits of other people’s work. In other words, The Greatest Leaders Add Value to Others.

Maxwell opens Chapter 5 with an anecdote about Jim Sinegal, Costco’s CEO at the time of Maxwell’s writing. Contrary to other leaders of large companies, his annual salary is only $350,000, not a few hundred times that of his employees. Sinegal also offers employees a competitive wage and good benefit packages. He travels every year to visit all Costco stores and greet the people that work for him. He focuses on balancing the interests of his shareholders, employees, customers, and managers, rather than favoring one over another. He firmly believes that as a leader, he must generate value for his employees in order to retain their loyalty and respect. Although Wall Street criticizes him for being too nice, he argues that he is not acting altruistically, but in accordance with good business practice. Maxwell adds that Sinegal exercises good leadership as well.

Maxwell summarizes the Law of Addition with one question: “Are you making things better for the people who follow you?” (73). Leaders who are incapable of answering with a resounding yes and providing evidence are subtractors, or people who take away from others and have a negative impact on them. Leaders who subtract from others—most of whom do so unintentionally, Maxwell argues—will not see their influence last long.

Most leaders who seek to add to the lives of others do so intentionally: Nobel prize winners do not set out to become one; they simply have a vision to help others in need. In other words, leaders do not always need to hold top positions; they inhabit spaces where they can best exert their influence in service of others.

Maxwell offers four tips to help leaders add value to the people they serve. The first three are based on the Law of the Addition and the fourth is based on his personal faith, which people can skip. His first tip is to truly value others and respect them. The second is to find ways to make oneself useful to others. The third is to relate to others by learning and respecting what they value. The final tip is to do things that God values, such as treating others with respect.