Leadership topic - Van Halen

When Eddie Van Halen died, like many I was stunned… and posted something about it to LinkedIn – you know the professional site for “work”… and it got 1000 views and loads of comments.  Similarly, just about every place I went I found people just in a state of shock, surprise, and a number of hard rockers crying… before busting out laughing with stories about Eddie. My favorite station on Sirius has been playing Van Halen 24 X 7… so, like all good leaders, I adapted… Van Halen it was… and probably the most fun and impactful series I have written, and actually, has me building my own FrankenStrat, but that is for another blog site 😉

… and for those of you who don’t like straight-up hard rock, don’t tune this out. I promise to mix in some rare songs that are softer, some jazz that he actually studied, and some great stories from his life that I think are worth knowing – not just for leadership but because they say a lot about the human condition.  I have recently become close friends with a woman from the Netherlands, and her first comment on my post was about where Eddie was born… and like most ugly Americans, I had never really thought about it.  He is the younger brother, both being born in Amsterdam to a mixed-race couple in the ’50s.  She awakened me to the ugly history of the Dutch/Indonesian wars that were AFTER World War II.

Van Halen – all incarnations of the band, had Guts. That down deep quality that every Leader needs to get s*** done. And they also made Opportunity be there when they needed it.  Not perfect, and many side stories of sadness, disappointment, and now tragedy accompany the storyline.  But the music, and the virtuosity of all of it is without question.  Van Halen – a study of Guts and Opportunity.