Closing Keynote Steve Farber Brings Love, Energy, Audacity and Proof

You have to get excited about a speaker who named his company Extreme Leadership, Inc., and starts off his remarks about what’s going through the mind of a skeleton-sledder (a Winter X-Games event that in Farber’s words, “involves sliding face-first down an ice-slicked course on a roasting pan.”) But that willingness of face-first leap off an icy mountain is exactly what Farber sees as the best characteristic in real leaders. He called that realization that you’re doing something unnatural as the “OSM,” for “Oh [redacted] Moment,” and said it’s usually the first indication that you’re doing something extraordinary. Farber focused on four primary things extreme leaders will do – radical stands they will take daily at their companies: Cultivate Love: “This is about making the customer, the clients, the community love what you’re doing. And you have to love it, too.” Create Energy: “Ask what’s the higher purpose in our work. You can’t make other people think it’s important unless you can describe it in a way that energized people to be a part of it. Show you’re a part of something great.” Inspire Audacity: “This isn’t just a blatant disregard for normal constraints. It’s asking, ‘how are we going to change the world of our customers, employees, or company?” It’s stepping up to the challenge.” Provide Proof: “Basically, it’s Do What You Say You Will Do. As a leader, people are watching everything you do and comparing it to what you say.” Farber is the president of Extreme Leadership, Incorporated, an organization devoted to the cultivation and development of Extreme Leaders in the business community. His latest book, Greater Than Yourself: The Ultimate Lesson In Leadership, was a Wall Street Journal® and USA Today® bestseller. His second book, The Radical Edge: Stoke Your Business, Amp Your Life, and Change the World, was hailed as “a playbook for harnessing the power of the human spirit.”  And his first book, The Radical Leap: A Personal Lesson in Extreme Leadership, is received Fast Company magazine’s Readers’ Choice Award and was recently named one of the 100 Best Business Books of All Time.