Trusting your people allows you to lead from afar, says Mycoskie.<br /><br />Question: How do you juggle your responsibilities as a leader? <br />Blake Mycoskie: In terms of leadership, what I've found is you really do have to wear every hat before you can ask other people to do it. <br />So with TOMS Shoes, even though we've grown really fast, I have kind of worn every single hat along the way. I might've only worn it for a week or two. But at least when I hired that person or brought that person on, I've been able to say, "These are the challenges. These are the opportunities, and go after it." <br />And with that point, one of the things that is a cornerstone of my business philosophy and leadership is really not to micromanage people. Spend a lot of time making that decision on who to hire. But once you hire them, just let them go. <br />And it's very interesting in that I'm only in the office maybe five or six days a month. And there are times when I'm not in the office for two months at a time. So you can imagine a fast growing company of a lot of young people, who don't have a lot of experience, with a boss that's only 31 years old, who's never around. So it really takes a lot of trust in the people that you have. <br />And you also have to be a good leader from afar. You've got to be able to use technology and tools available to lead people. And so that's one thing that I think that I have an advantage being young over a lot of older CEOs is that I really embrace the use of technology, writing a blog, keeping the whole team kind of understanding what I'm doing every day when they don't see me every day. <br /> <br />Recorded on: April 28, 2008 <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /><br />Question: How do you juggle your responsibilities as a leader? <br />Blake Mycoskie: In terms of leadership, what I've found is you really do have to wear every hat before you can ask other people to do it. <br />So with TOMS Shoes, even though we've grown really fast, I have kind of worn every single hat along the way. I might've only worn it for a week or two. But at least when I hired that person or brought that person on, I've been able to say, "These are the challenges. These are the opportunities, and go after it." <br />And with that point, one of the things that is a cornerstone of my business philosophy and leadership is really not to micromanage people. Spend a lot of time making that decision on who to hire. But once you hire them, just let them go. <br />And it's very interesting in that I'm only in the office maybe five or six days a month. And there are times when I'm not in the office for two months at a time. So you can imagine a fast growing company of a lot of young people, who don't have a lot of experience, with a boss that's only 31 years old, who's never around. So it really takes a lot of trust in the people that you have. <br />And you also have to be a good leader from afar. You've got to be able to use technology and tools available to lead people. And so that's one thing that I think that I have an advantage being young over a lot of older CEOs is that I really embrace the use of technology, writing a blog, keeping the whole team kind of understanding what I'm doing every day when they don't see me every day. <br /> <br />Recorded on: April 28, 2008
