12 Should I Lead?

Mark was pleased, even proud, that the organization had asked him if he would be willing to serve as its interim leader, with an eye toward potentially taking the permanent helm. Mark had always wanted to try his hand at leadership. He also felt as if he might be able to do at least as well as some of the leaders under whom he had served, although he really didn’t know. And that mystery was part of why Mark wanted to try leadership. He wanted to know if he had the magic ingredient or secret sauce to lead. Yet something didn’t feel right about the offer or about the time and opportunity. Mark had a nagging sense that both he and the organization would regret it if he accepted the offer. He wasn’t sure why, but unless he could figure it out, he felt that he’d better decline the offer.

Leaders

Leaders may or may not have a magic ingredient or secret sauce. Leadership might be like most anything else, where you can learn the basic skills and develop the necessary attributes. But leadership is, on the other hand, also like most anything else, where you may be a good fit or poor fit for leadership at certain times and for certain organizations. You may be right for leadership or not, depending on the moment, organization, offer, terms, conditions, or other factors. Neither you nor the organization that offers you a leadership opportunity may exactly know whether you are well qualified or poorly qualified, ready or not ready, and a good fit or poor fit. A peculiar thing about leadership is that it can be hard to predict who’s truly ready, capable, and fit. One person trained and groomed to succeed in the role may fail, while another who gains leadership by default may succeed. Consider carefully whether you are ready to lead.

Stage

We all go through stages in life. Leadership fits only some, not all, of those stages. Candidates who take on leadership at the wrong stage in life may either hurt themselves and their family or fail the organization they attempt to lead, or both. Leaders generally require maturity, skill, and experience. A candidate who has leadership attributes but is too young and immature to lead, or who hasn’t had the time to gain experience and skills, should better wait for leadership. Leaders also generally need to have the ability to give their full attention to their leadership role or to at least give priority attention when balanced with other personal or family obligations. Circumstances differ for every leadership candidate. But taking a leadership position right out of school or when new to the job, newly married, or just having a house full of young children, or conversely when on the cusp of retirement, may be joining the leadership fray at the wrong stage in life. A better stage might be after gaining work experience and experience with the organization that you’ll lead, when your family circumstances are stable, and when you have the time, focus, and energy. Don’t jump into leadership at the wrong stage in life, simply because you believe it to be your only chance. It may become your only experience if you fail at it because you picked the wrong stage.

Season

We also all go through seasons of life, not just stages of life. Seasons of life lasting a few months or a year or so can bring various disabilities, disruptions, and challenges. Those challenges may make the season a poor time to accept a leadership post. You may, for instance, be enjoying a pregnancy and anticipating a delivery, or facing an illness, surgery, or other medical condition and recovery regimen of your own, for which you’ll need a few weeks or months of recovery. If so, you may not have the energy, attention, and freedom to pursue leadership. You may, on the other hand, have a household family member going through a pregnancy, illness, disability, or recovery, or an elderly parent or other close family member having critical-care needs, in a way that would require your devotion and keep you from attending suitably to leadership. You may, alternatively, be completing graduate schooling or special training in your field, or may be deep in a long-term work project just coming to fruition. Any number of seasonal matters may make a leadership position untenable. Consider not just your stage of life but also your season, when evaluating whether to pursue and accept a leadership post. 

Responsibility

Leadership isn’t just about choosing the right season and stage. The bigger question is bearing responsibility. Organizations are theoretical constructs. They need a leader to embody the characteristics and responsibility of the organization. Someone must be able to answer for the organization, or the entity will be too evanescent and imaginary to function responsibly, accountably. The leader embodies the organization’s responsibility. Responsibility, though, carries a weight that not everyone is able or willing to bear. Indeed, relatively few are capable of carrying and are willing to bear the responsibility and weight of leadership. Leaders in many fields have relatively short average terms. Leaders burn out from the weight and responsibility of leadership. Leadership is often not something to grasp and hold for the long term but instead to carry for a shorter term before passing the weight on to another. Be sure that you are up to the weight and responsibility of leadership. The mental and physical toll can be substantial, even so much as to affect one’s physical health and potentially shorten one’s life span. The weight of leadership can also affect those closest to you. Be sure that you and those closest to you are ready and able to bear up under the weight of responsibility. 

Effectiveness

The question of whether you should lead has not only to do with your ability to carry the responsibility of leadership but also with your effectiveness at leading. You may be able to bear up under the leadership mantle just fine. Yet if you’re not any good at leadership, then you really shouldn’t take a leadership position. Don’t put yourself in the position of rising to the level of your incompetence. Instead, if you are good at what you’re doing in the non-leadership position you currently hold, then consider remaining in that position if an offer of leadership looks to you like an invitation to incompetence. Doing something skillfully that others respect, value, and appreciate carries its own reward, even if it doesn’t include the title, compensation, and standing of leadership. By contrast, leading incompetently may get you a leader’s title, compensation, and standing, but it won’t carry the respect, value, and appreciation that comes with doing a job well. A skilled custodian has more job satisfaction than an incompetent leader. Beware rising to incompetence. Don’t lead unless you can be effective at doing so and thus enjoy its inherent rewards.

Familiarity

Leaders benefit from being familiar with the field in which they lead, the organization that they lead, and the team members whom they lead. Stepping into a new field and organization in which you have no experience and familiarity, to take over leadership, can expose you to all kinds of errors and stress. Trying to get up to speed on the field’s peculiarities, the organization’s history and operations, and the team’s skills and characteristics can all take substantial time. Until then, the unfamiliar leader will lack the field context, organizational history and knowledge, and team insight to effectively lead. Leading without familiarity is like leading in the dark. Beware jumping into a fray with which you are unfamiliar. When others whom you are trying to lead know what you don’t know, they may not respect and follow your decisions, especially when your decisions err for your lack of field and organizational knowledge. Familiarize yourself with the field and organization first. Then jump into the leadership fray. 

Resilience

Leaders should also have the resilience to lead. Resilience may be your greatest need. No matter how acute your judgment is, you’ll still face leadership challenges. You can’t so perfectly navigate your way through the leadership storms, as to never suffer any setbacks. Leadership may instead feel a bit like getting knocked down multiple times in an ongoing fight, only to have to quickly pop back up and get back into the fight. Leadership can inundate you with constant demands and batter you with frequent blows. No matter how thoughtful, sensitive, and adept you are, you will find yourself facing significant challenges, not just organizationally but specifically to your leadership. After those blows, you must be able to recover quickly, get back on your leadership horse, and ride boldly forward leading the charge. Call that resilience having a thick skin, or call it whatever else you wish, but you must be able to bounce back from each setback and to withstand the body blows. Leadership isn’t for the faint of heart. If you want to really know whether leadership is for you, then be sure that you’re ready to see your mettle tested right down to the bones. 

Culture

Because leaders bear the responsibility and thus effectively embody the organization, they also heavily influence or outright determine the organization’s culture. Candidates for leadership should consider whether their own character would make for suitable organizational culture. A leader’s eccentricity, for instance, will tend to permeate the organization, permitting and facilitating the quirkiness of other members of the organization and even making for anomalies and deviations from the standard in the organization’s operations and programs. A leader’s loyalty, for another example, will tend to make for a loyal organization, building morale and collegiality. The same could be true for a leader’s kindness or cruelty, honesty or dishonesty, decisiveness or ambiguity, industry or indolence, and other positive or negative characteristics. Organizational culture is important to an organization’s success. Some candidates may have strong leadership skills but inappropriate character for influencing and establishing the organization’s culture. Consider what the culture of your organization would look like if that culture matched your own character and conduct, and seek leadership only if the culture would be healthy and conducive to achieving the organization’s mission. 

Match

A leader should also match the organization’s present needs. Organizations go through stages of growth, decline, consolidation, merger, acquisition, and reinvention. Leaders have different skill sets and character. Some leaders are great at growing organizations but not so good at maintaining them. Other leaders are great at rescuing organizations but not so good at keeping them steadily on the right path. Some leaders are good at acquisitions, while other leaders are better at consolidation. Organizations tend to choose their leaders based on their present needs. A premier organization that simply needs a steady hand at the lead shouldn’t recruit and retain a bold and visionary leader with a plan for dramatic change. The match of leader to organization can be just as important as the leader’s attributes and skills. You may be a great leader for your organization at one time but not another. Before you pursue a leadership position and accept a leadership offer, be sure that you are a good match for the organization and time. 

Empathy

A leader must feel something for the organization and its members or personnel. A self-involved, narcissistic leader generally lacks the emotional intelligence to connect with an organization’s members and constituents, and may even lack the ability to identify with the organization. A sound leader is generally other-centered to at least some degree, able to place the organization’s interests and the interests of its members ahead of the leader’s own interests. An effective leader must take to heart those organizational and member interests as if they were the leader’s own interests, empathizing with the pain and desiring to meet the needs of others, while promoting and celebrating others’ successes. If your primary interest in pursuing leadership is your own interest rather than the interest in helping your organization or its members, then think again about whether you should lead. Lead only if you are able to empathize deeply with the organization’s plight and the concerns of its members.

Reflection

Are you at the right stage in life, neither too early nor too late, to lead? Would your leadership be more committed and effective by waiting for your next stage in life? Are you in the right season for leadership, or do you instead have personal, family, or other issues to address before taking on leadership? Can you carry the weight and responsibility of leadership while maintaining your mental and physical health, and retaining your poise and equanimity? Is your competence in leadership or in another field? Are you familiar with the organization that you have the opportunity to lead? Do you know your organization’s history and personnel? Do you have the resilience to lead? Can you get back up and move forward after receiving a severe blow to your confidence? What would your organization look like if its culture took on your character? Would that culture be conducive to the organization’s success? Are you a good match right now for the organization you have the opportunity to lead, or does the organization instead need a leader with other qualities? Are you sufficiently empathetic, to identify deeply with the organization and its members? 

Key Points

• Whether a candidate should lead depends on the individual’s fitness.

• Some candidates for leadership aren’t at the right stage in life to lead.

• Other candidates for leadership aren’t in the right season to lead.

• Others can’t carry the weight and responsibility of leadership.

• Others may be incompetent rather than effective in leadership.

• Leaders generally need familiarity with the field and organization.

• Leaders must be resilient to lead, able to recover from serious blows.

• A leader should have the character to influence organizational culture.

• A leader should be a good match for the organization’s present needs.

• A leader should have empathy to connect with and support the team.

Read Chapter 13.