An Approach to Leadership

Across the globe the issue of leadership is being approached from every angle. In America the leadership contest between Trump and Harris has the potential to divide the nation and lapse into violence; closer to home, the Labour Party is learning how complex it is to lead while in power rather than in opposition, concurrently, the Conservative Party are setting about trying to find yet another new leader.

In schools across the land, Heads, Senior Leadership Teams and newly appointed School Prefects are attempting to lead subtle and complex institutions. Many years ago, a young man from Nazareth offered a distinctive approach to leadership that merits consideration whatever your convictions on religion.

Jesus led a school with a difference. He limited it to twelve pupils, and ran it for only three years, and then he told his pupils to go out into the world with hope in their hearts and get on with it. And look at the result; he ended up with the largest, richest, most influential and successful Former Pupils’ Association the world has ever witnessed.

If we look at Jesus’ school, we find an overwhelming emphasis on the quality and personality of the individual. It did not matter who you were – fisherman, farmer, or financier – to receive an education in that school. And, certainly, academic quality was blessedly low in the order of priorities. What mattered was not who you were, but what you were. The quality of your inner self, your personal life.

We find, secondly, that there was much laughter and joy to the teaching. You had a Head with a great sense of humour, always ready to deflate the pompous and the arrogant, not above teasing or even insulting the privileged and the great. Then there was great companionship, teacher and those taught respected each other.

It was also a school of total trust – and when that trust was abused, more in sorrow than in anger, Jesus offered a second chance, and told the pupils that forgiveness was a fundamental principle of community life.

Finally, delegation: responsibility; a job to do, and an opportunity for pupils to rise to the challenge long before they felt ready to face it, coupled with a promise of reliable managerial support from the Senior Leadership Team.

And it all worked so well. Those Former Pupils ranged the known world with a dedication and independence beyond all human expectation. They died with hymns on their lips, and prayers for their enemies in their hearts. They left homes, and security, and friends, and all they held most dear for an unknown destiny in the lands of far away. They showed independence, determination, confidence, courage, initiative and hope – qualities that all good schools strive to deliver.

It was a masterpiece of trust and delegation – it stands as the ultimate monument to distributed leadership. Here is a leader who seeks fulfilment in his followers; a leader who makes all the preparations and then leaves his followers to complete the mission, who seeks neither glory nor reward for himself, but declares that he finds it in his subordinates.

Leadership is a sacred responsibility; it is never wholly about what you do yourself, but what you inspire others to achieve.