To be a Better Leader, Be a Rock

I do not know where these thoughts come from sometimes. So the other day I am riding on a boda-boda headed home from a legal clinic for startups at the Hive Colab, Kampala. Suddenly, while I am intoxicated to ecstasy by the calm night breeze and the beautiful Kampala nightlights, the following thought hits me so strongly that the first thing I do when I get home is to record the idea so that I can later transcribe it. Below is a summarized, edited transcript of what was revealed to me from the depths of my intuition in a moment of mindful alertness.

Anyone who wants to be a leader must be a rock. Immovable. Unshakeable. Steady. Steadfast. You have to offer the people you lead a solid foundation on which to build their dreams. Because the moment they get behind you, they are implicitly or explicitly hoping that somehow, by following you for however long, you will get them closer to their dreams even as they push you closer to yours.

Now, I am not alluding to a rock that does not feel pain or cry or get frustrated under pressure. I am speaking of a rock that holds its ground despite all this and never ever crumbles. And if it is a rock in motion, then the kind of rock that levels and overcomes all obstacles and challenges until it gets to where it is going. In a word, your people need to trust that you will stick to the strategy and that the end goal, the bottom line, will be achieved no matter what stands in your way.

When your people believe these things about you, then when they see you waver or tergiversate, they know a very strong force must have moved you and they are more willing to understand your reasons for changing the course of action. And oftentimes you will find them trying to help you in getting you back on course.

Conversely, if you change your opinions and consequently the direction of your team every few minutes, what happens is that your team disengages. A team that suspects or fears you are gonna reverse your word the next minute will not act on your word until the next minute. Because it is more prudent for them to wait and see if you will say the same thing or not. Now, the longer the planning cycles of an unsteadfast leader, the longer the team procrastinates.

The reason for the above is simple. No one wants to do something this month only to be told next month that the boss changed his mind and the work was unnecessary. When this festers into a team culture, what you get is a team that does the bare minimum. This is a sweet spot designed to ensure that any work that is done is just enough to not get fired and that one won’t feel like he/she completely wasted his/her time if it turns out to be useless.

In short, people will only do their best, most passionate work if they are confident, in the very least, that it will be used for the purposes it was commissioned. But if they fear that their leader’s mercurial temperament might make their input, their creations, and their work end up in the trash can today or in future, they will hold back their best work and only do what is needed to get by. The only remedy is for the leader to always be a solid rock, hopefully, long before procrastination and bare minimum contribution have become the norm.