Part 2: From Peer to Leader – Lessons from the Global Leadership Summit 2025

Written by: Michael Huff

In part one of this series, we began to answer the question: “What’s the best way to lead a team of former peers?” Part one focused on showing up, being present, and showing tremendous care for everyone on your team. In Part 2, we continue to build on the lessons from this year’s Global Leadership Summit and the teachings from speakers like Nick Saban, Craig Groeschel, and Stephanie Chung. While none of these talks or topics were meant to answer this question, I kept finding pieces of the answer tucked inside their stories.

Ask Questions to Gain Alignment

When you step into leadership, especially with former peers, one of the biggest risks is misalignment. Chung points out, “Misalignment is very expensive.” She challenged the audience to ask their teams these three questions:

“What business are we in?”
“How does the business make money?”
“What do you do that contributes to helping the business win?”

If your team members don’t know the answers or respond in different ways, it’s a sign they aren’t clear on the basics. Your team may believe they’re rowing in the same direction, but in reality, each person has a different understanding of the goal, the process, or their role in achieving it.

Alignment isn’t just about understanding the team’s and the business’s goals; it’s also about knowing yourself and your goals. Saban echoed a similar truth with players at Alabama, starting with simple but direct questions:

“What do you want to accomplish here?”
“Do you know what that entails?”
“Do you have the discipline to execute it every day?”

Chung starts at the organizational level to build a connection between the daily work and the bigger mission. Saban drills down to the individual level to drive ownership. Together, they paint a complete picture of alignment: employees need to understand where the organization is going, and they also need to know what they must do every day to contribute to that bigger win.

From Alignment to Execution

Asking questions is a great starting point, but real alignment requires leaders to understand today’s workplace and act on what they hear. “Right now, we have six generations working under one roof,” says Chung. “Each generation has a different expectation, a different perspective, and that changes the dynamics in the workplace.” Despite these differences, “One thing we all have in common is we all expect to be seen, and heard, and led well,” adds Chung. She introduced two frameworks:

For additional leadership advice, check out Stephanie Chung’s website and her book Ally Leadership: How to Lead People Who Are Not Like You.

Nick Saban’s Leadership Framework on Discipline and Self-Assessment

Once you’ve gained alignment at the organizational and individual levels, the next challenge is turning that clarity into consistent action. Nick Saban’s approach with his players offers a framework that leaders can apply to themselves and to their teams.

Nick Saban’s approach reminds us that alignment is meaningless without execution. For leaders of former peers, that means modeling the discipline you expect. Set routines but stay flexible enough to adapt. Define clear processes so no one is guessing what success looks like.

Build in moments for self-assessment, asking not just what got done but why results turned out the way they did. Show your team that discipline is about choices, not feelings, and keep everyone focused on controllable factors instead of distractions. When leaders model these habits, they provide the team with both clarity and confidence to follow.

Be a Boring Leader

Craig Groeschel flips the script on what people think makes a great leader. It’s not charisma, fame, or quick wins; it’s consistency, faithfulness, and small daily disciplines. As he put it: “Great leadership isn’t flashy… great leadership is actually boring. Boring beats brilliant every time.”

He frames it as an equation: Consistency + Faithfulness × Time = Lasting Impact.

Groeschel warns that too many leaders chase the highlight reel, the viral speech, the flashy initiative, but skip the routines that actually build trust and culture. “Boring isn’t the enemy of greatness. Boring is the pathway to greatness.”

Groeschel points to Keystone Habits, a concept made famous in Charles Duhigg’s book, The Power of Habit. Keystone habits are small, consistent actions that create a ripple effect across every area of leadership.

For example:

Writing one note of appreciation a day.
Blocking time for three true priorities, not thirty.
Showing up early, staying late, keeping your word.

It’s the “things no one sees,” the quiet disciplines, the follow-through, the faithfulness, that lead to the results everyone wants to see. Or as Groeschel put it with a metaphor leaders won’t forget: “Everybody sees the boiling water, but no one sees the heat.”

Ask Questions, Gain Clarity, and Bring the Heat

Leading former peers isn’t easy, but as we’ve seen from Stephanie Chung, Nick Saban, and Craig Groeschel, it’s far from impossible. Alignment gives clarity, discipline builds consistency, and “boring” leadership creates the workplace trust that teams thrive on.

The Global Leadership Summit remains one of the best spaces for leaders to sharpen these skills. I’m grateful for the chance to learn from it again this year, and even more grateful to pass along what I’ve learned.

Stay tuned for Part 3 of this series, where we’ll explore what it means to leave a leadership legacy, drawing on insights from Jon Acuff, John Maxwell, and Christine Caine.

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This piece is part of a growing collection of leadership insights from Double E.

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