Leadership Lessons from MC Hammer

As part of the ongoing cultural education of my kids, we play music videos before bed. Most parents read to their kids, but I’m convinced that having rhythm and musical taste is at least 10X more important to one’s life outcomes than literacy skills.

One video we often watch is MC Hammer’s U Can’t Touch This.

Analysis

Beyond the dance moves, Hammer lays out some serious leadership advice. The lines that stand out:

“You talk about the Hammer / When you're talkin 'bout a show / That's hyped and tight”

Here, he lays out the essentials of branding: being known in customers’ minds for something specific and then delivering on that brand promise every time.

“So pass them a wipe or a tape / To learn / What it's gonna take in the 90's to burn”

This is a man who has thought deeply about what the market needs, and is working to meet those needs. And of course, that’s the foundation of good strategy.

“Either work hard or you might as well quit”

As Angela Duckworth notes in her book Grit, biologist Charles Darwin once wrote: “[...] I have always maintained that, excepting fools, men did not differ much in intellect, only in zeal and hard work; and I still think this is an eminently important difference.”

That kind of wisdom is why Hammer was invited to give a talk at the Harvard Business School on branding and marketing. That’s definitely legit. Perhaps even too legit.