So I’m sitting at my desk. Lower Hutt CIB. First day in the job. In my early/mid-20s.
My Detective Sergeant walks over and drops a piece of paper in front of me.
“Read this at the crime meeting this morning.”
100+ staff.
I look down.
It’s the legal definitions of male and female genitalia under the Crimes Act.
I’m thinking: You’ve got to be kidding me.
In that moment, I had a choice.
Do it. Or question it.
I read it.
Straight down the barrel.
It was never about the content.
It was a test of ego.
Could you submit to leadership – without requiring an explanation – without an attitude?
More than that: Were you leadable?
That question was being decided in real time. By a team who didn’t know me yet.
Frontline policing doesn’t negotiate with feelings.
No pause for a committee. No tolerance for ego.
Someone leads. Someone executes. Which explains the ruthlessness of the test.
The best high performance cultures work the same way.
Maybe not as extreme. But not without the tests.
Where High Performance Culture Is Actually Built
Some will call that approach old school.
Maybe.
But I’ve never seen a better filter.
Pressure doesn’t care about theory. It exposes what’s underneath.
And what’s underneath isn’t built in comfort – it’s built in the moments you didn’t choose, the instructions you didn’t like, the standards you were forced to meet.
That’s where high performance culture is actually built.
Not in the vision statements. Not in the values on the wall.
In the tests you didn’t see coming.
Jocko Willink says it best – discipline equals freedom. You earn the right to lead by learning to follow.
Everyone wants the title.
Very few want the weight.
The Leaders Who Actually Earn Respect
The most respected leaders I worked under weren’t always the most qualified on paper.
They’d done the hard yards. Taken the pressure. Made the calls when it counted.
They hadn’t been handed anything. They’d risen through the ranks – thoroughly tested at every level before they were ever trusted with more.
They didn’t demand respect. They had it.
Because they’d proven – repeatedly – they could be led before they ever led.
Simon Sinek captured it in Leaders Eat Last – the best leaders sacrifice for their people. The worst sacrifice their people for themselves.
Compare that to the untested leader. Often academic.
Trained in theory. Credentialed on paper. Comfortable in the classroom.
But reality doesn’t look like a case study.
When the pressure comes – and it always comes – theory doesn’t hold the room. Experience does.
Promotion that looked good on paper but hadn’t been tested in the field.
A title without substance.
In a real high performance culture, that gets exposed. Every time.
The Lesson That Stayed With Me
You might think I resented that DS.
Quite the opposite.
He understood what it takes to rise – better than I did.
Those early tests? Nothing was on the line.
But they decided who could be trusted when everything was.
That’s the bedrock of every high performance culture worth being part of.
If I couldn’t be tested, I couldn’t be trusted.
He made sure I was.
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Discover more from Richie Lewis | REINZ Manager of the Year
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