The 3 leadership pillars: Captain, Player and Coach

Leadership is one of the most valuable and desirable skills of the 21st century. However, understanding leadership is anything but that: whether you are novice or an already established leader, you are bound to be stumped with the volume of literature on the subject (A Google search produces millions of results on leadership). In fact, there seem to be as many definitions of leadership as the number of people who desire to be leaders. The attributes associated with leadership too seem diverse and sometimes mythical: so much so that some people think of leaders as some special creatures with unusual talents and skills. The constant comparison between management and leadership takes the confusion to an altogether different plane.

Leadership need not be that complicated to understand. In this article, I wanted to discuss the simple but important perspective on leadership. A leader is one who effectively plays the role of a captain, player and coach - and knows when and how to effortlessly shift roles.

Captain: The traditional definition of leadership fits here. A leader, by definition, is expected to lead – initiatives, people, teams and organizations. Like the captain of a ship, a leader is expected to lead from the front and make decisions while keeping the best interests of the team in perspective. As in sports, effective captains aren’t necessarily the best at every skill or faculty, but knows how to create circumstances that bring out the best in their team members – in good and adverse times. 

I would encourage readers not to get lost in the leader vs manager debate. To keep it simple, the roles played by Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg at Facebook are textbook examples of leader and manager respectively. While Zuckerberg lays the vision and challenges status quo, Sandberg executes and brings that vision to reality. Here is a simple explanation of the roles: 

Unfortunately, popular press has presented the role of a leader as a notch higher or more desirable than that of a manager. This is totally untrue: how likely would you be to think of Sandberg’s role at Facebook as less desirable or respected? If anything, she converted a cool idea (Facebook) into a viable proposition. Secondly, manager and leader are purely situational roles. While Mark and Sheryl are leader and manager in the grand scheme of things, it is very likely that they alternate roles based on the situation at hand. To put is simply, leading and managing are complementary and equally important parts played by a captain.

Captainship starts at the most basic level: assuming leadership of self and owning responsibility for one’s own actions. Self-leadership (not job titles) helps gain true respect of followers.

Player: The second vital role of a leader is that of a team player under the guidance of another captain. This is the least understood of a leader’s role – Isn’t it counter-intuitive for a leader to play the role of a player? It isn’t - a good leader is first and foremost a good follower.

Being a player is about realizing that even the best leaders can’t successfully lead every single initiative that shows up in their lives. This emboldens them to seek out others on the team – or from outside – to lead as they slip into the role of a player. 

Being a player isn’t about becoming a passive listless team member or a rabble-rouser; instead it involves taking active charge to support the captain. Secondly, a player understands the challenges of the team better by being one of them and helps bring out the best in others.

Playing the role of a player is hugely beneficial to a leader – it helps build humility and emotional intelligence. Associating with other players on the team improves relatability, builds empathy and helps leaders understand the importance of organization culture – all vital attributes of leadership. Serving team members helps players cultivate a servant-leader mindset. Lastly, player role exposes leaders to alternate perspectives and develops a healthy respect and acceptance of contrarian views.

Among popular leaders, Bill Gates exemplifies this role shift: he ceded the captain role to Steve Ballmer and moved to the player role of chief architect at Microsoft. Bill Gates’ leadership didn’t suffer because of this shift; on the contrary, he became a more respected leader. Another example is that of British Premier David Cameroon who realized he wasn’t geared up to handle the Brexit situation and stepped down from captain (Prime Minister) to a player role.

Coach: A third vital role of any leader is that of a coach. Being a coach is about realizing that

1.      The job of a leader is to create more leaders, not followers.

2.      Leaders are both born and made: coaches make leaders

Effective leaders recognize that while they can personally be very effective in their initiatives, their true measure of success is the legacy of other leaders they leave behind. 

Coaching is an ongoing exercise and leaders have to alternate between the role of coach and captain or player . Coaching isn’t about telling coachees what to do or solving the challenges, but about helping them develop a self-realization and creating circumstances to solve challenges. 

Aside of growing other potential leaders, coaching has several vital benefits to a leader– the most important of which is self-growth. Developing others by working on their challenges provides leaders a unique chance to self-introspect and learn. Just as the best way of learning is by teaching, the best way of leading is by coaching.  

Jack Welch at General Electric played a vital role in coaching the next crop of leaders who continue to lead GE. 

A quiet player and a helping coach are necessary for an effective captain to succeed: these are the three pillars of leadership. Not sure where to start? Become an effective player and overtime, you will graduate to captain and coach roles.

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Raja Jamalamadaka is a TEDx and corporate speaker, entrepreneur, mentor to startup founders, "Marshall Goldsmith award for coaching excellence" award winning top 100 coach to senior industry executives and a board director. He also serves on several CEO search panels. His primary area of research is neurosciences - functioning of the brain and its links to leadership attributes like productivity, confidence, positivity, decision making and organization culture. If you liked this article, you might like some of his earlier articles here:

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