Are You in the Arena?

As a leader, how much you choose to be in the action will help define you.

Too much involvement will draw you towards the tactical—customers will see it as a lack of confidence in your people and your people will see it as interfering.

Too little involvement will put you out of touch with your customers and will demoralize your people.

Being high on the hill—to lead strategically—needs to be judiciously combined with rolling your sleeves up. Truly, it’s a difficult balance to attain.   

So, you may be interested in this as a template:

US president Theodore Roosevelt (he preferred “TR”, not “Teddy”) was a great advocate of rolling your sleeves up. 

Later, he was to coin "the man in the arena" as someone who is heavily involved in a situation that requires courage, skill, or tenacity—as opposed to someone who sits on the sidelines and watches. (If he was around today, I’m sure that he would include women in his metaphor.)

During a seminal speech in Paris on 23 April 1910, Roosevelt said:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

Born in 1858, TR was a sickly child but overcame asthma with a strenuous lifestyle. He was home-schooled and made it into Harvard; he wrote a naval strategy book and became active in reform of the Republican Party. After he lost his first wife and his mother in quick succession, he went cattle ranching in the Dakotas. 

Returning to politics, and soon after being appointed Assistant Secretary of the Navy, he led a volunteer cavalry called the Rough Riders in the Spanish-American War. He returned as a hero and was elected Governor of New York State, where he went on the beat with his police officers.

Down in the valley.

After nomination as Vice-President, TR became the 26th President of the United States on 14 September 1901 when President William McKinley was assassinated.  TR won by a landslide a further four-years as President in 1904 and stood down at the end of his term on 4 March, 1909.  (His fifth cousin, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, was President from 1933 to 1945.)

As Governor of New York and as President, TR championed the public responsibility of large corporations, protection of the less fortunate in society, mediation of the conflict between capital and labor and the conservation of natural resources (although he did participate in a massive collection of African wildlife to stock US museums). 

He was also a scholar. His bibliography runs to 47 books, about as many articles and tens of thousands of letters. He was said to have read 3-4 books a day and by his own estimates he read tens of thousands in his lifetime. Not bad for someone who lived only 60 years.

TR was deeply involved in the domestic issues, but he also strategised USA’s place in international affairs, setting the nation up for the world leadership that would come in the decades ahead. 

High on the hill.

Never short of bravado, he was also credited with saying:

“Speak softly and carry a big stick, you will go far.”

Different times, different behaviours and an extraordinary output, but his example still resonates today. 

Our leadership can be well served by a conscious, ongoing consideration of where we stand—particularly among our customers and our staff.

First of all, are you in the arena?

Next week: Listen Like a Leader

About the Author

Jeff Bell is Principal of executive consultancy ResultsWise in Perth, Western Australia. 

To boost your leadership, ask Jeff about consulting, coaching, strategy facilitation, his Band of Leaders Australia (BoLA) group or Advanced Leadership Course: [email protected]; mobile 0439 988 662

Jeff’s podcasts: https://www.audible.com.au/pd/As-a-Leader-Audiobook/