By Phil Liebman, CEO ALPSLeadership
What comes to mind when you think about leadership?
People who dream of one day ascending to a leadership role often think about power and the privilege of being looked up to. Others, generally more accurately see responsibility and service. But regardless of the source of your drive, if you believe that leadership is destination you work your way up towards – you will most likely be disappointed.
Leadership is a journey that is measured by what you make of it. If you savor the ups and downs and welcome the challenges, you might find real satisfaction in every step you take. There are moments of overwhelming joy in the accomplishments that move you forward.But these are balanced with the sacrifices, disappointment and failure encountered along the way.
If you only look at the journey as a means to an end, you will probably find little joy in the pursuit. More likely you will discover that where you end up bears little resemblance to what you imagined you might fund.
Leadership is not a prize for endurance and tenacity. It is a responsibility we take on in service to a cause that is greater than our own personal interests or needs.
It is not about you – it is about the cause. And the great leaders in history are products of their courage, sacrifice and noble service to others.
The source of much of the confusion around leadership may simply be that there are plenty of leaders who fail to demonstrate any capacity for leadership.
Some people are born into their stations in life while others find themselves catapulted into positions they are fully unprepared to occupy. For these people, the “title” was a destination; one that many arrive at entirely incompetent and unable to perform what their role demands.
Whether you arrive by accident or through aspiration and hard work, you must still arrive prepared to be the leader you must be – not to merely fill a seat. You must know what it is you are called upon to accomplish – and then actually accomplish it: this is the definition of competence.
When we look at leadership as a target or the top rung of some hierarchical ladder we lose sight of the basic competencies that are the foundation for all effective leaders. Leadership is a journey that is determined by your circumstances and your personal make-up.
The leaders’ journey is a deeply personal dive into understanding who you are and what you must make yourself capable of accomplishing.
You must connect to the purpose that fuels your curiosity and ultimately the trajectory of your growth. Being successful on this journey requires developing those competencies you need to make you fully competent in your role.
This likely means adjusting your habits to rid yourself of those that serve as obstacles or simply distractions, and developing new habits of thinking that support you focus on what matters most. It is learning what to do and what not to do – and who you need to be in order to determine this – and understanding that ultimately what you do is determined by who you are in the moments of your decisions. In other words, leadership is who you are – not what you do.
Leadership is who you are – not what you do.
The problem with believing that leadership as a “thing” you can “do” by going through the motions – or a position or title we occupy, is that both these views externalize what is really a fully-internalized condition of being. We are only a true leader when we make ourselves competent at being a leader. No one can do that for us.
You can take guidance from others, but you must internalize what you read and observe and practice in order to perform in a way that accomplishes what you must do in your role, regardless of whether you were elected, designated, self-appointed or born into your position.
You might prefer to think of leadership as something you can do – but you would be mistaken. You cannot wield power or claim authority and have people follow you and risk their comfort – at least not willingly. And the role of the leader is about getting others to act and to perform at levels we need them to. It is as Dwight D. Eisenhower said, “Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.”
You can be someone’s boss and tell them you are their leader – but people will only see you for who you are.
If you are tyrant, that is what they will see, and if you are a true leader, they will see that. People follow leaders that they trust and because they believe in the purpose behind why and where they are being led.
A true leader, meaning one who is exceptionally effective in their role, is someone who performs in in measurably consequential ways. A competent leader changes the course of things and can transform people’s lives and with a noble purpose, leadership changes things for the good of others. A competent leader that is driven by a great and worthy cause is among the rare breed of humankind who take it upon themselves to selflessly change the course of destiny in pursuit of noble ideals and the belief that a better tomorrow is a matter of necessity.
Peter Drucker’s quip that all one needs to have in order to be a leader is just one willing follower has some merit. But while it is true that you must be recognized as a leader by those you lead, you cannot control how people perceive you. The only thing you can (and must) control is how you perform and what you might accomplish by your performance. Whether you find a willing follower or not may have nothing to do with whether or not you are prepared to lead them. Leadership is always conditional – and usually impermanent.
Regardless of what you might want or wish for, it is the quality of your performance that will ultimately inform how people of how they experience you. Unless you perform to the level dictated by the needs of the role you serve in – no amount of pretending, intimidation or manipulation – or even even spell-binding illusion will make you into a leader you are not. Leadership leaves behind clear evidence of its impact.
The only way to become the leader you must be – is to understand that the process is a journey without an endpoint.
Capable, fully competent leaders are always evolving. They are never fully satisfied and never feel that their curiosity is ever satiated. Even when we die, the spirit of the leader lives on in the hearts and minds of those who have been touched by the meaningful and significant accomplishments that ride in the wake of every capable leaders. Or by those inspired by the presence of such leadership and leaders who are exemplars of what is possible when we make it necessary and prepare ourselves to serve in absolute duty to some noble cause.
Competent leadership demonstrates who we are, or more accurately who we have made ourselves to be and that our internal drive, above all else, remains focused on the contributions we make to the cause that guides our duty to our purpose.
As Dr. Lee Thayer, in “Leadership: Thinking, Being, Doing” describes, a Great Worthy Cause as the connection to an external force that has us in its grasp. When we hold onto something – we are always free to let it go, but a great cause holds us captive; seducing us to serve the needs of this cause with an unwavering sense of duty. Yet it is who we have molded ourselves into that allows us to operate at this level of devotion. It is the first and most fundamental task of leadership.
The leader’s journey extends beyond making ourselves into who we might become in service to this cause. We must imagine, attract and build whatever organization we need to accomplish our aims – at whatever scale is needed. And we must inspire people who might be seduced to joining us in this service to become competent in what it is that they must do to support the cause along with us. And finally we must provide and explain the sense of purpose, the meaning that makes sense of our individual and collective performance and the sacrifices required to make the journey.
All four of these tasks are fully dynamic. We must keep learning and evolving as leaders in order to keep up with ever-changing demands. The organizations we build must continue to adapt to unpredictably changing conditions. Every person we lead poses new opportunities for understanding how unique every living being is – despite all the things that make us similar and how we must continue to inspire their learning and growth. And finally – managing the meaning of things a derivative of relativity. As Marcus Aurelius wisely observed, “Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.” We must find and offer clarity through the fog of a volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity (a VUCA world) that is swirling in the winds of constant change.
It is on the leadership journey that we might develop the necessary competencies and find a path towards virtuosity in our performance.
This requires persistently avoiding the Sirens that lure us into our own comfort-zone. Virtuosity requires that we are sufficiently dissatisfied to constantly seek to improve. Each step of this journey is a move towards or away from competence, from accomplishing what you must. Aiming for virtuosity often means, as Eleanor Roosevelt suggests, that “you must do the thing you think you cannot do.” You must face fear and embrace the challenge of leaning in and overcoming it.
Finally, those who foolishly subscribe to the idea that leadership can be safely attained by following anyone else’s steps soon learns that it is more often in where we stumble and where our strength, our integrity, our temerity and our wits are challenged that we find ourselves accelerating towards the future we believe we must create.
It is on this deeply personal journey that we take –and by our own determination that we find the things along the way that mold us into the kind of leader we need to be. No book, no class, no workshop – or even any article such as this one – can help you find your way. Leadership begins and ends with leading yourself. How you choose to lead your life will determine what you discover and what you accomplish – and ultimately whether yours is a life well-lived.
