---
title: "The window and the mirror"
description: "How Level 5 leaders apportion credit and blame."
canonical: https://tomsharman.com/bookshelf/good-to-great/the-window-and-the-mirror/
updated: 2026-11-03
---

# The window and the mirror

> How Level 5 leaders apportion credit and blame.

Jim Collins's framework, from Good to Great, pp. 24 to 48.

Framework 2 of 15 from [Good to Great](https://tomsharman.com/bookshelf/good-to-great/index.md) by Jim Collins. Category: Leadership.

## The steps

1. **Look out of the window.** When things go well, credit other people and factors outside yourself, and credit good luck if you find no one to name.
2. **Look in the mirror.** When things go badly, take the responsibility and never blame bad luck.

## Where it comes from

From chapter: Chapter 2 - Level 5 Leadership, pp. 24–48

Level 5 leaders blend extreme personal humility with intense professional will, and every good-to-great company had one at the pivotal time. Darwin Smith of Kimberly-Clark sold the mills and bet the company on consumer paper. Level 5s credit luck and others when things go well and blame themselves when they go badly, set up successors to do even better, and are workmanlike plow horses. The comparison companies often had gargantuan egos and weak successors. Collins cannot give a ten-step list to become Level 5, but he suggests practising the other disciplines.

## The animation

24 seconds, 4:5, no sound.

- MP4: https://tomsharman-downloads-006143767029.s3.eu-north-1.amazonaws.com/downloads/bookshelf/good-to-great/the-window-and-the-mirror.mp4
- MP4, dark: https://tomsharman-downloads-006143767029.s3.eu-north-1.amazonaws.com/downloads/bookshelf/good-to-great/the-window-and-the-mirror-dark.mp4
- Still: https://tomsharman-downloads-006143767029.s3.eu-north-1.amazonaws.com/downloads/bookshelf/good-to-great/the-window-and-the-mirror.png
- Still, dark: https://tomsharman-downloads-006143767029.s3.eu-north-1.amazonaws.com/downloads/bookshelf/good-to-great/the-window-and-the-mirror-dark.png