12 Leaders on Life Lessons

SUSAN LYNE

President and CEO, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Inc. Always leave a little something on the table. It's important advice in any business. A total win for one side in any negotiation is just wrong because it's almost always a pyrrhic victory. You end up with bad partnerships. And we have long careers, and it is very likely you're going to be meeting the same people at some point down the line, so it's important to make sure that nobody feels like they have been either embarrassed or beaten in a negotiation. I think you only get the best out of people or the best partnership if both people feel good about the terms.

I look to hire people who I think have the potential to take my job at some point. I firmly believe that you need to hire people who have leadership qualities and who are ambitious enough to want to soak up and learn everything you can teach them. I always told everybody at ABC who was running a division there that reported to me that I expected them to want my position, to be president of Entertainment at some point, and I wanted them to hire people who wanted their jobs. You can never be afraid that someone's going to outshine you.

I think that being fired from a big job in a very public way puts a lot of the smaller indignities into perspective. I think I cared probably too much about having people like me as opposed to having people respect me. But look, I still want to be liked and I still want to be loved, but in the larger scheme of things, no one is going to love you every moment of every day in your career. And as I said, as long as in the end they feel that I did my job well, I'm OK.

MARIA ELENA LAGOMASINO

Former chairman and CEO, JP Morgan Private Bank I left my job at Morgan in March and I really enjoy figuring out how I reinvent myself. I try to see everything as an opportunity to grow. I'll give you a little example. I hurt myself Labor Day weekend. I'm going to be fine, but for a couple of weeks, I haven't been able to walk. So a friend was nice enough to get a wheelchair and take me out. I was thinking it's terrible I'm in this wheelchair, but hey, I'm seeing the world from the eyes of somebody in a wheelchair, and I'm learning how vulnerable you are. It gave me a new sensitivity.