Some Thoughts on Leadership
Opinion of
Lloenflys
(12/23/2019 - Malashaan Office of the Speaker of the Senate) - Leadership has always been a subject of fascination. Supposed “greats” in their field like Caesar and Napoleon have had their actions and approaches analyzed in minutiae to try to glean the secrets of how they convinced people to follow them. In more recent times the “Cult of Leadership” has become so strong that you can even get degrees in it (and more than one kind – there are Undergraduate, Graduate, and Professional degrees that all have as a focus the teaching of Leadership in some capacity). Clearly people believe that there is something worth studying here, something beyond mere charisma, something that can be distilled, taught, and replicated. My goal with this article is to lay out some of those principles and to provide some personal insights in why they are important. Hopefully by the end of the article everyone will have taken something of value from my ramblings, even though I personally think most of these things are both straightforward and somewhat obvious.
RULE 1: Your example is more powerful than your title
By the time you’ve made it to your second or third job, you’ve almost inevitably encountered a boss or other leader who acts as if their title comes with a grant of automatic respect. In a sense it does – unless you want to get written up for insubordination, you probably are going to respect orders that are given to you by your boss, and you’re probably going to make at least some sort of an effort not to tell them how stupid you think they are when they do stupid things.That deference, however, doesn’t have anything to do with leadership – and it’s a dramatic mistake as a leader to rely on this “power difference” to lead for you.
It’s far more powerful to demonstrate the traits that you want those working for and with you to adopt and to practice what you preach. If you want people to show up every day on time and ready to work? You better do the same. If you want people to keep their nose to the grindstone when they aren’t on breaks? You better do the same. If you get up every 30 minutes and go for a chat with the receptionist, they’re going to do the same thing. Model the behaviors that you want to get out of your team, and you’re much more likely to have success in getting them to demonstrate those behaviors. Fail to model those behaviors, and unless you rule with some sort of an iron-fist (which I recommend against), you’ve got no chance.
RULE 2: Be clear and consistent with your expectations
There is nothing worse than thinking that you are on top of things and finding out well after the fact that, really, you’re way behind the curve. It’s bad enough if this happens because you weren’t following instructions, but it is much worse if you didn’t even have a chance to get things correct because your leader failed to adequately convey expectations. Ultimately, a leader’s primary responsibility is to lead, after all – the leader is usually the only person who is getting information from multiple sources and is able to see a complete picture of where a team needs to go, and that is why that person is the one making decisions – they’re the only one with all of the information necessary to direct traffic correctly. If you’re going to lead effectively, therefore, don’t beat around the bush – be very clear with what you need from the people on your team and be consistent with that message. If you’re going to change the expectations, don’t hide that change under meaningless mushy words to try to make the message seem more appealing. Say what you need, and do so clearly, and you’ll give your team members the best possible chance to meet your – and their – expectations.
RULE 3: Set clear boundaries
This advice applies more to a workplace situation than to something like NationStates simply because of the nature of the activity, although to an extent it does apply here as well … you just are likely to make a different calculation about how important the underlying request is. I’m speaking in circles a bit so let me clarify and rephrase slightly: you cannot be a friend and a leader at the same time. Unfortunately this is a result of human nature – if your friend requests something of you, there isn’t much recourse if something isn’t finished. Your response in a “friend” situation is going to generally be to suck it up and accept an apology. Perhaps that’s appropriate the first time it happens in a work context (or in a situation where you are in charge of a ministry in Nationstates, for instance). However, ultimately in those contexts there is an expectation that work gets done and simply forgiving failure to perform is a recipe for disaster. As a result, you need to retain the moral authority to provide direction and corrective action when someone fails to perform.
If you are very careful and very clear, you may be able to maintain this leader vs. friend distinction just during work hours – but in reality it is usually too difficult for everyone involved to compartmentalize that way, and this is why there are often anti-fraternization provisions in organizations that are especially dependent on the maintenance of discipline between ranks. As a subordinate, this means recognizing that if someone doesn’t act like your best friend it’s probably because they feel it is necessary to maintain some professional distance. And as the leader in such a situation, it’s best to remember that your ability to do your job as a leader may depend on the person on the other side of the desk not just seeing you as “Fun Lloen who gets drunk singing Madonna karaoke every Friday night,” but as the person who has the final say on how a project or task needs to proceed, or on whether something was done within acceptable parameters.
RULE 4: Sometimes you have to be the bad guy
This is really a corollary of the above rules, but it’s important enough to be stated by itself. As the person in charge of a given situation, it is your responsibility to deliver bad news when it comes. You can’t hide from it, and you aren’t doing anyone any good by avoiding it. Let’s say you are being asked to give someone a performance evaluation, which is a regular task of a leader. All leaders should be providing feedback to their team members so people know how they are doing (it’s part of laying down those clear expectations that I mentioned earlier). Sometimes this is uncomfortable – especially if someone isn’t performing up to the level that they need to in order to do the job effectively. You aren’t doing anyone any favors by hiding the ball and not letting them know they are deficient in their performance, however, whether you’re discussing a deputy minister's performance with them on Discord or are in a real world scenario where you’re giving an annual performance evaluation. Also, there certainly won’t be any improvement in performance if the person doesn’t know they aren’t performing up to requirements in the first place. Everyone is hurt by a failure to do your job and honestly evaluate performance, so don’t make that mistake.
RULE 5: Help people see the “Big Picture”
Most of us have heard about the concept of “Need to Know.” A lot of organizations operate on this principle, and in some senses it makes sense – people are told no more than they “need to know” in order to do their job because communicating more than that is seen as inefficient, and of course in situations where the information is sensitive, the more people who know it the more likely it is to spread beyond where it should. I am not advocating giving up protections that are in place to ensure confidentiality, nor am I suggesting that every employee/participant should be briefed on absolutely every detail of an organization’s workings. That would be incredibly inefficient and unnecessary.
However, I do think there is an argument that what someone “needs to know” to do their job effectively should be viewed somewhat expansively. At my job, for instance, the people who are effectively the “production line” get very little insight into what’s happening with the client. They don’t really see how their work product is being used, or whether it is having any kind of impact. They don’t necessarily know what I’m doing with the data they’re gathering, even. Now, in a narrow sense they don’t need to know that to do their job. All they need is a set of earphones, some recordings, and a scoresheet. However, if that’s all they know it blunts their ability to do their best job. If they know the purpose, they can listen purposefully and give guidance that is more clearly focused on the data’s eventual use. They also are more likely to be on the lookout for unexpected things that could be relevant to the task’s needs that I might not have thought to directly instruct them on. Further, they are more likely to feel a sense of buy-in for the project overall if they can understand how they fit into it overall. Having that sense of ownership is essential for keeping people satisfied with and invested in the work they are doing.
CONCLUSION
I could keep going for much longer if I wanted to – rules like “Don’t take credit for the work of your subordinates” and “Promote opportunities for learning and improvement” for instance are easy additions to this list that deserve not to be completely ignored – but this article needs to stop eventually, and so I’ll end it here.
Remember, leadership is a skill, and as a result it can be worked on and improved. As with any other field of human endeavor, there are people who are naturally skilled at it – savants whose charisma and understanding of human nature is such that they can almost effortlessly get people to follow them. Just because this might not describe you doesn’t mean that you lack the capacity to lead, however. Study the subject, have faith in your ability, and most importantly practice by taking on leadership roles when the opportunity arises. Learn where you struggle. Ask fellow leaders how you can improve. Don’t be afraid to have people who are working for you evaluate you to tell you how you can better lead them. With time and practice, we might not all become Winston Churchill rallying the British to fight Hitler in World War II, but we can all at least learn how to lead those around us effectively in work or volunteer tasks without engendering fear, resentment, or confusion (and without breaking down in tears from too much stress!). And remember, you’re never too advanced as a leader that you can’t learn more tricks, tools, and strategies. Stay a student for life, and you’ll never find your skills becoming obsolete!
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