Leadershift – That’s what I call the move from ordinariness to Leadership. Leadershift is about climbing up a short flight of steps to become the true leader.
But what is a leader? There is a simple definition – A Leader has Willing Followers. If your followers are not willing, then you are simply a manager. Something else is making them follow you.
The Leader is defined by their followers. If your followers are a troublesome lot, but follow orders, you may simply be a gang leader. Indeed, there are many kinds of leaders. You can be a leader for a day or you can be a leader for a lifetime. You can be a leader in your field of expertise, or you may lead a team of experts from differing backgrounds to form a business or a government or an army.
Leaders are shaped by their environment. If you come from a downtrodden background, you may become a revolutionary leader, you could be a Che Guevara or a Mahatma Gandhi. Middle classes tend towards business leadership or politics.
The learning in that environment is critical. You may become an accidental leader if your environment is not supportive of your learning. Most of the revolutionary leaders travelled that difficult path. But somewhere in the background there was a hero, a mentor, a coach. There was one particular person who shone out as their role model. If they were lucky, it was a close and interactive relationship and the learning was quick.
Leadership competence takes a long time to build. A short course will achieve nothing. If the course is successful, your participants were already leaders. All the course achieved was to pull the last remaining pieces of the jigsaw together and provide the confidence to break out of their shell.
The quality of the leader is a product of their environment. In business, that environment is the workplace, and in particular the existing leadership or management. In politics it is the political environment, in the community or in the home, it is their social and family environment.
A leader is a complex animal. They have a great many facets. A true leader, though, has grown beyond their environment. They stand above those around them and see a bigger picture. What they do with that picture is shaped by their learning in getting there. If they have seen corruption or brutality, they may well be moulded by it and use it in their leadership style. We may see the arrival of a dictatorial leader. Not a true leader.
Leadershift is about this pathway. It is travelling along a much sought after path, a search for the holy grail. But that journey defines the leader. What they experience on that pathway sets up a particular facet of the leader. What they learn and how they learn and who they learn from and with sets the scene for their future as a leader.
In my next post I’ll explore these many facets and we will see how they define the leader for good or bad.
Tags: coach, development, Engagement, hero, Leadershift, learning, mentor, Partner, pathway, Success
