America has an ample number of leaders, in the workplace and in
politics.
But unfortunately, what many of these leaders are actually
doing is "leadIng."
You'll note the capital "I." That's not a typo.
We have politicians who don't so much govern as self-promote,
grandstanding for future fundraisers with little thought of making the
world a better place.
And we have bosses and managers leading as a means
to get ahead, ignoring the importance of the people they purport to
lead.
LeadIng is quite different from leading. For more on that,
let's turn to a new high-profile leader who is making the "i" in leading
nearly invisible.
When Jorge Mario Bergoglio was chosen as the 266th pope of the
Catholic Church in March — taking the name Francis, after St. Francis of
Assisi — he immediately showed the world his leadership style would be
different from that of his predecessors.
He said no to the fancy red loafers favored by Pope Benedict XVI,
opting for simple black shoes. He declined the papal limo for a bus
ride. For living quarters, he chose the Vatican guesthouse over an
apartment in the Apostolic Palace.
Author Chris Lowney has observed the behavior of the first Jesuit
pope and used him as a case study in effective leadership.
In his new
book, "Pope Francis: Why He Leads the Way He Leads," Lowney writes of
Bergoglio's first days as pope: "We were not watching someone trying to
act like a pope. We were watching a person unafraid to be who he was."
And from that, Lowney draws this spot-on conclusion: "Be comfortable
in your own skin. Know who you are, the good and the bad. And find the
courage not just to be yourself, but to be the best version of yourself.
These are the foundations of self-leadership, and all leadership starts
with self-leadership because you can't lead the rest of us if you can't
lead yourself."
I asked Lowney about the artifice that often masquerades as leadership.
"I'd say we're kind of plagued with managers who feel like fakes a
lot of the time," he said.
"You think, 'This guy is putting on an act
here and trying to lead us.' And you feel like this person doesn't have
his own thing figured out. Or you feel like this person is in it for
themselves. Powerful leadership is where you get the impression that
this person knows who he or she is, they've thought deeply about it, and
this person is willing to sacrifice for some project or mission."
If you look at various surveys about how much we trust our leaders —
both in business and in politics — the results are abysmal. Part of the
problem, Lowney posits, is that we're victims of a "leadership industry"
in which people believe workshops and advice books are all it takes to
excel at managing.
"The culture is such that everything has to be digestible in five
easy tricks," Lowney said.
"We can encapsulate important ideas in a very
simple way, but I think getting to be that person requires hard work.
To imply that I'm going to take an airplane ride and digest a few tricks
and be a better leader is just absurd."
A former Jesuit seminarian who went on to a long career in corporate
America, Lowney highlights the Jesuits' yearslong training, much of
which revolves around self-examination and working among the people they
seek to lead.
It's "dirty-footed leadership" with a focus on
understanding other people and their circumstances and putting their
needs ahead of one's own.
Of course an aspiring manager isn't going to follow the path of a
Jesuit priest.
But there's something to be borrowed from this approach, a
way of focusing people on the greater good earlier in their careers so
they might embrace that attitude.
"We never think about investing in anything like this," Lowney said.
"Our perception is, 'We're going to equip you with technical skills, and
then boom, you do your job.' Only when people were well down the road
and starting to come into very senior positions, might we say, 'Well, we
need to give this person a coach.' The things they should have figured
out about themselves when they were younger and more malleable, we never
thought to tell them about."
Again, the issue here is not one of religion or faith, but of
encouraging people to look outside themselves. I would argue that's the
right thing to do on a moral basis, but in the workplace, it's also the
right thing to do pragmatically.
You will be a more effective leader if you place your own
self-interests aside. People will work harder for you. Loyalty will
increase. You don't need an academic study to prove that — just think of
the bosses, coaches, even parents, who have led you and helped you
reach a better place.
In the book, Lowney distills Pope Francis' leadership principles like
this: "Commit to yourself deeply, including your frailties, and come to
some peaceful acceptance of yourself and your calling to lead. Then,
commit to 'get over yourself' to serve a purpose greater than self."
He recognizes these might be lofty expectations for those of us who aren't the pope.
"My unrealistic hope would be that this — or something, or anything,
or maybe this pope — might help to catalyze a much wider conversation
about what good leadership looks like. That maybe we'd be more willing
to call out politicians and businesspeople who are self-absorbed in ways
that we just see are not helping us meet our broader goals."
Amen.