A leader … is like a shepherd. He stays behind the flock, letting the most nimble go out ahead, whereupon the others follow, not realizing that all along they are being directed from behind.
Nelson Mandela
The world seems to be too full of advice about what leaders are. Frankly, as a leadership coach, mentor, and all around expounder, I too am too full of advice about what great leaders are. For instance, check out my piece on my leadership maxim: “Leaders Relate.”
This time, though, I am going to declaim on what leaders are not, particularly when they have the title of boss.
Too often leaders who are bosses fall into the boss trap. This may sound like some sort of snare set by a venal, perfidious, and pernicious world to capture all the wonderful bosses and keep them from doing good, but I can assure you that the world is not the primary culprit here. Nor are rivals. Nor are employees. The boss trap does not spontaneously generate, either. Indeed, the boss trap is conceived, designed, assembled, set, baited, and sprung by the very bosses it ensnares. The boss trap is self-ordained and, therefore, utterly avoidable.
Let’s start with a clarifying premise:
If you are a leader, you are not all that. In other words, being a leader, a true and effective leader, is not a badge to wear or a trophy to display. Quite the opposite actually. A true and effective leader is a study in humility, for the best leaders seek always to improve themselves and those they serve. That’s right. Serve. Those who enthusiastically follow great leaders do so not out of reverence for some dear leader whom they love and fear. They follow because their leader serves them by enabling them to put their values and the values of the institution to work. This is even more true when you are a leader who happens to be a boss. Understanding and acting on that basic fact will help you avoid or, if your are already snagged, immediately free you from any boss trap that — I reiterate — you yourself will have set.
To help you evade the boss trap, let’s consider some truths that will render you impervious to its lure.
Bosses Are Not the Organization
Whatever the organization — a business, a nonprofit, a university, an agency, a club, a group — whoever runs it had best get it into their head that they and the institution they lead are entirely separate, discrete, independent, unconnected, divergent, and distinct entities. In short, if you lead an organization, learn this mantra:
I am not the organization, and the organization is not me. Recite it aloud to yourself slowly. Rinse. Repeat.
Think of it this way. Imagine you suddenly disappeared from the organization tomorrow. Say you were abducted by aliens or crushed by a falling piano or won big in the lottery, would your organization cease to exist? Perhaps if you are its founder and it is the product of your labor of love. But even then, would it disappear really? If so, why is it so fragile? What purpose does it serve if it is so conjoined with an individual? Too many bosses equate themselves with the organization they lead. From there, it is a simple hop to the idea that what is good for you is good for the organization and vice-versa. That sort of thinking is debased and produces an ethos of corruption — intellectual and otherwise.
Bosses Are Not the Mission
Similarly, too many bosses think that, through some mysterious process of transfiguration, they are a manifestation of the mission of their organization. The mechanism by which they come to this conclusion is irrelevant. All that matters is the result. Here is the logic:
The mission is all about doing good. The mission and I are one. Therefore, all I do is good.
Just as with leaders who think they and the organization are one and the same, with some distance and candor, you can see how this sort of thinking will lead you pretty steadily along the path to perdition.
Bosses Are Not the Best at Everything
Wow. If I had a nickel ... At one college where I worked, the president corralled herself within a small circle of lieutenants. Several times, when we were faced with a decision that was beyond the competence of the people in the room, I would suggest we reach out to someone on campus who actually had the expertise. It’s a funny thing to work at a college where you employ all these highly educated experts, called faculty, and then never consult them in their areas of specialization. It’s common, actually. Some college leaders are overly fond of hiring outside consultants to offer advice on what they pay some faculty members to literally teach. The president of this particular college fell into the other trap where she thought that a single group of people was a braintrust that could lick any problem because they had lofty titles, which she of course had conferred on them. In response to my suggestions that we consult faculty expertise, she would sniff, “We are all smart people here. We can figure it out.” The sweeping arrogance combined with the abundant stupidity and naked contempt packed into this one statement always bowled me over and explained much.
No, bosses, you do not know it all and cannot do it all. In fact, the best leaders — the ones with sense — will regularly follow the lead of even the least among their charges, cultivating them and counting on them to bring their own perspectives and genius to bear on a problem all while driving them forward.
Bosses Are Not the Only Competent Ones
Even worse than the arrogant stance I describe above is the belief among some bosses that they are the only ones who are competent in an organization. They micromanage their people and constantly and minutely critique and correct their work. After a short while, their people catch on and just stop producing anything but first drafts, which, of course, only confirms to their brainiac leader that the employees are all incompetent. Mission accomplished!
If you are a boss and think you are the only truly competent one in your organization, answer me this. How competent is someone who continuously hires and retains nothing but incompetents?
I can keep going like this, how bosses are not the sole bulwark against chaos or how they don’t have perfect perception or how they are not the one true manifestation of all that is good in the universe. If you are a boss and think your title confers anything close to these statuses on you, you are deeply out of touch, and everyone knows it, particularly your closest and most sycophantic followers, who use that knowledge to manipulate you every single day.
Great bosses are great leaders, and great leaders are lesser than.
Great leaders understand that they are only human — perfectly imperfect and barely adequate. They toil constantly to be better, to be the best, but they acknowledge that they always fall short, always. As great leaders though, they also understand that any fall is just an opportunity to stand up and stand taller. They don’t tell themselves fairy tales about how wonderful they are because they know they are not. Such tales are but a trap that leaders set for themselves. And who better to know what bait will lure you to your own trap?
Great bosses — being great leaders — serve. Great leaders know they are lesser than, a status they embrace because that very knowledge is what makes them great.
Are you a leader or emerging leader who wants to escape the leadership/boss trap? Do you want to better understand how to serve first in order to make your organization successful?
You can put your values to work to eliminate the boss trap forever, and I can help. Click below for your free consultation.
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Avoiding the Boss Trap