Why Do You Lead?

As a leader or leader in the making: Have you ever asked yourself or been asked the question:

Why do you lead?

I sure haven't until a few weeks ago. We were preparing group coaching sessions for multiple groups of developing leaders. When picking the sessions' inquiries, this powerful baby of a question built a nest to settle in my brain.

Do I lead because it's a natural progression of my career in consulting? Sure, there is an element of truth to this. But there's so much more: I genuinely enjoy working with people, coaching them and seeing them grow.

Do I lead teams so that we can achieve specific business goals together? Also true. I get a massive kick out of team successes, whether it's a cheering client during a project closing ceremony or an ample sales win.

Do I lead to execute my influence on where we go and how we work as an organization? True as well. I stacked tons of great experiences over the past years at Capgemini Invent, and there's also room for improvement. As Gen Z enters the workforce and societies demand an accelerated shift towards more sustainable organizations that create a high net positive impact, we must reconsider. There's a massive disruption in how we create economic, societal and environmental value. And damn, would I love to be part of that redesign!

Do I lead for fame? The title and the status weren't my drivers for pursuing leadership. The increased level of autonomy - and even co-design authority - that comes with the title is what attracts me. As identified by Dan Pink in "Drive", Employee Motivation is best built on Purpose, Mastery and... Autonomy. I am no different in that.

Still, that initial question continued building a lovely home between my ears.

Leaders with intrinsic reasons to lead - leaders with a purpose - outperform incentivized or externally motivated leaders.

Before publishing his HBR article in 2014 (see Resource 1), Tom Kolditz and his team tracked 10.000+ leaders throughout their leadership careers in one of the most advanced organizations leadership-wise: the US Army. In 2014, this sample represented 20% of all living graduates of West Point - the Army's Academy every future leader attends. Here's what they found:

First, soldiers with an intrinsic motivation for their service outperformed their peers with external instrumental reasons for their service. So far, so expected.

Second, adding external motivation and incentives reduced the selection to top leadership by 20%! Quote: "[...] external motivations [like bonuses; see Resource 1], even atop strong internal motivations, were leadership poison".

Wait, does that mean tracking and incentivizing leaders' performance - apart from maybe a leadership KPI measuring their intrinsic motivation - could actually harm the organization?

Leaders provide context so that people can grow and follow their purpose as individuals while executing and advancing the organizations' strategy.

Okay, I jumped ahead a few steps. This section title is the best I can come up with after reading up on the goal of leadership and why people lead - considering today's organizational paradigms and setups. I've asked people why they lead. Putting all thoughts, answers, literature, and whatever crossed my way together, this is my best guess as of today.

Before moving on, let's review those steps I skipped.

Hypothesis 1: "The true goal of leadership is to make yourself unnecessary." (see Resource 2)

Sure, a truly empowered team might not require their leader to help them do their jobs. In terms of "running the business", a leader could be unnecessary at that point.

But who helps the team solve conflicts? Who coaches them when they have questions? Who will decide if the team can't decide? A team that is exceptionally high on Psychological Safety and trust could find solutions to all of the above: They find a neutral person from another team to help them solve their conflict. They peer-coach. They go with the best decision available today.

This type of team already exists at Buurtzorg in The Netherlands. Their home care nursing teams have no leader and make every decision on their own: From hiring to firing to which and how many clients they can serve. Their results are mindblowing: Most importantly, their clients are healthier with faster recoveries. More surprisingly, while spending significantly above-average time with their clients, they have 40% lower costs than their competition, caring for the same number of clients. Could leadership positions contribute up to a whopping 40% of non-value-adding costs to organizations?

Admittedly, the care sector works on high emotional investment and connection. The people working in service of patients usually feel a purpose of serving.

Wait, could that indicate that there could be a business case behind building teams with a strong purpose - and even behind cutting leadership roles?

After reading up on this, I firmly believe: there are conditions under which I can see this. I think there are way too many ineffective or inefficient leadership functions in the global economy (incl. the Public Services sector) just because someone needed the title to save their face. Or because someone deserved a promotion while there was no open position, so they created a new function for them. Or because people didn't feel safe enough to speak up about bad or abusive leaders. Or for a thousand different reasons.

Also, I believe that the number of self-managed teams without leaders will only climb as the next generations enter the workforce or build new companies.

But does that mean I will be unnecessary as a leader?

For the short- to mid-term: I don't think so. We need people to lead today's organizations through the transition into whatever future organizations will look like. That change won't happen overnight - and you and I can be the ones to provide the context to connect existing strategies and organizational setups with the power and will for change this new, purpose-driven, more independent workforce comes with.

And I desperately hope I won't be unnecessary anytime soon.

Hypothesis 2: "If you have a desire to see others succeed,?that?is why you lead." (Simon Sinek; see Resource 3)

Care staff has an increased desire to see their patients recover to stay healthy and happy. That's why they go to work every single day. Against all the disrespect, ignorance and underpayment they receive.

Simon Sinek considers true leaders to feel this same feeling when they see the people they lead succeed. Only if we have that desire can we be effective and true leaders.

Is the goal of leadership to see others succeed? A considerable part of it is, I think. Good leaders are "willing to step back from individual achievement, in order to help others move forward." (Warren Berger) If the team succeeds, then their leader succeeds (as they - supposedly - created the conditions for the team's success, at least as long as no one proves the team succeeded despite their leaders' leadership).

I feel this sense of happiness, of greater achievement, whenever my team or someone from my team delivers stunning work. That is a massive part of why I lead, of why I prioritize coaching a team member (if and when they ask) over creating that 247th sales report. The report usually can wait until tomorrow.

But how does this interpretation of leadership work under the assumption that teams in the future may not need leaders (as exemplified by Buurtzorg)?

At this point, Co-Active Leadership crossed my mind. In Co-Active Leadership, everyone is a leader - independent of their rank, title, status, position, role, whatever. Everyone is a leader for themselves (how I prioritize, e.g. my time, my health; called Leader Within) and their colleagues (Leader Beside, Leader in the Field, Leader Behind, Leader in Front). Meaning: There are five different leadership roles (not functions, not titles or positions) we all switch between in different situations or contexts.

With that frame of mind: If I desire to see others succeed - just as Simon Sinek says about what makes a true leader - I step into the leadership role the team needs me to fill in any situation to succeed. Then, I am a leader for them. And as I did it to see the team succeed, according to Sinek, that makes me a true leader.

Does that mean we just have to leave the status-driven ego that feeds on titles, power and money at the door, step into a "leader among equals" mindset, and be good?

Hypothesis 3: There is no one goal of leadership - we must consider multiple perspectives for leadership, e.g. Profit, People, Service, Greater Good. (see Resource 4)

The biggest question this hypothesis raised for me is: is there some hierarchy among those perspectives? Say, if we make a profit, make connections with people, and serve other people, but do this disconnected from the Greater Good: what reason for being would there be for such an organization?

Is it so that its employees earn enough money to feed their families? Or is it to create a feeling of achievement to make its employees happy - whatever the achievement is?

The term "Greater Good" triggered another thought: Let's say there were companies that privatized access to water in regions where existing poverty could lead to people not being able to hydrate (I am not saying there are). How does this contribute to a Greater Good? Would that mean that someone involved in suchlike operations could in no case be a leader?

Similarly: Let's say there were political structures that favoured fossil-powered energy - knowing of its damage to the environment and the global climate crisis. Let's say that one of the biggest reasons for their continuous profitability (at least in some regions of the world) would be governmental subsidies. Meaning: as taxpayers, we pay elected public servants (our government) to incentivize energy companies to speed up the climate crisis significantly (risking Earth to become inhabitable within - compared to its existence - less than the blink of an eye). How does this contribute to a Greater Good? Would that mean that someone involved in suchlike operations could in no case be a leader?

Turning tables: What about the likes of Dr. Martin Luther King? Would Dr. King agree that leaders provide context so that employees can grow as individuals while executing the organizations' strategy - in his case: marching for the?right to vote,?desegregation,?labour rights, and other civil rights for people of colour?

What about his emotional sway? His vision? His perseverance? Did he act within a different context of leadership, or is leadership something else?

I'd say the vision Dr. King painted is the reason for being; the organization's purpose. It is why the organization exists. At best, everyone within the organization buys into this reason for being at an intense emotional level. That was the case. And that was the context he gave everyone who supported the civil rights movement. From there, the context would narrow as we go deeper into the organization. Today, that context could begin as broad as "how Marketing contributes to our strategy", then narrowed into, e.g. "how Content Marketing contributes to our Marketing strategy", or "how Influencer Marketing contributes to our Marketing strategy", etc.

For now, I feel happy with where I am with that understanding of the goal of leadership. We provide context. We lead to achieve a Greater Good we believe in, whatever that may be for us and our organization. That is part of the context we provide. And we desire to see others succeed. To see others succeed, we step into the leadership role the team requires us to fill in any given situation. The team executes our strategy - and they use what they learn to challenge, update, and advance our strategy.

We may even provide context to a self-managing team and give up our formal leadership function once and for all. Still, we give context. Every person on that self-managing team can grow and follow their purpose. And they do that in harmony with our strategy as defined by the context we've provided.

That calms me down. I may not be unnecessary any time too soon after all.

With Teal Organizations, Holacracy and alike organizational paradigms receiving growing attention: What kind of leaders - and how many of them - do organizations need in the future?

I don't know. Can teams self-provide the context they work under? Who will then translate the organizations' strategy into contexts for multiple teams so that the teams don't interfere or have to align too much? If they round-robin the responsibility to align with other teams, would that implicitly make this person their "leader among equals"?

Anyway.

Why does the next generation of workforce, who are so more driven by a purpose to create societal and environmental impact, need you to be a leader for them?

When considering promoting someone into a leadership position today, organizations may consider asking the candidate this question. That also means organizations must describe what kind of leadership purpose they want in their future leaders - and what they don't want.

And we might be well-advised to continuously measure our leaders' intrinsic motivation to lead without adding external motivators like bonuses. Remember, they are "leadership poison".

One More Thing.

"If you aspire to lead in business or society, first ask yourself, "Why do I want to be a leader?" The answer to that question, as it turns out, will make a significant difference in how well you lead." (Tom Kolditz; see Resource 1)

ps: During the 6 group coaching sessions where we've asked the question, we were amazed by the breadth, depth, creativity and uniqueness of responses. Especially our future leaders blew us away with how reflected, prepared and empathetic they are! That gives me hope: there is a fantastic bunch of people waiting to put their mark on whatever they get their hands on.

Resources

1. Why You Lead Determines How Well You Lead; Tom Kolditz; Harvard Business Review; 2014
2. The True Goal of Leadership; Geoffrey James; Inc.com; 2013
3. Why Lead?; Lance Salyers; Forbes; 2016
4. What Is The Ultimate Goal of Leadership?; Linda Fisher Thornton; Leading In Context; 2014