Monday, April 3, 2017

No If, But, or So

By Stuart Mennigke, Leadership Development Manager

There are almost as many views on what good leadership is as there are leaders themselves. Our world in 2017 is spilling over with strong examples and responses to this question, and almost monthly, a new book or popular theory of how to be a successful leader is published somewhere.

I regularly ask participants in workshops on leadership education to describe an example of a leader who has impacted their life and work development in a positive way. I’ve noticed that generally people list the qualities of their best leadership examples from the person’s being—that is, they describe the qualities of the core self, before mentioning things like success, position, power, achievement, or academic ability.

Here’s a story of the leader who most influenced my attitude to leadership, and helped imprint new narratives on my experience.

I was promoted into a senior leadership position when I was far too young. In hindsight, I didn’t know myself well enough to properly influence the other leaders on my team—let alone the number of people for whom I was responsible! My youthful enthusiasm thought it knew precisely what to do to influence growth, and why others before me got this and that wrong.

One day, I made a decision about a situation that clearly lacked good judgement and experience, and which, of course, I strongly defended. Some weeks later, we were in a large team meeting of colleagues, with our supervisor in the chair. He was the senior person in the national organization.

The issue of my decision came up—the outcome of which was now clearly visible as a bad judgement. I listened with embarrassment to people’s comments, some for, but most against, my decision.

My supervisor watched the exchange and allowed the discussion to go on for a while, and, I noticed, watched me and my responses. Once everyone had said their piece, they obviously looked to him and waited for comment or judgement on the matter.

He kept silent for a while, looked around at everyone, and said, “I asked him to do it, so in fact the decision was mine, as are the consequences. I apologize to you all!”

There was silence in the room. But no silence as strong as mine.

My supervisor had never suggested I make the decision as I made it, but had taken the responsibility for my action. Nothing more needed to be said, and he never brought it up again.

Obviously ashamed, a while later I asked him why he did what he did. He said, “When I say I trust you to lead, then I trust you.”

There was no moralizing. No “If . . .,” “But . . .,” or “So . . ..”

I learned the biggest leadership lesson I would ever learn, and it came from who he was, which flowed into what he did.

No If, But, or So

You might be interested in