Trigger Question #96:
Leadership does not always live up to its meaning. Or maybe it’s just me, the way I interpret “lead.” If you’re a leader, where do you lead from? From the front or from behind?
Picture me, if you can, leading an ass. I walk in front, the ass behind. I lead and the ass follows. It is the nature of the beast, for I have yet to have an ass lead me. (I’m sorry. I could not resist that, even though it’s not true. We have all, at one stage or another, been led by the nose by an ass.)
My point, if I can lead myself back to it, is that sometimes I lead from the front. But not always.
Now picture me, if you can, out for a walk with Mungo, one of our rescued German Shepherds. Mungo is skittish. He pull-walks ahead of me, then to the side, then behind, zig-zagging. I follow, holding tight onto the lead. (You know which lead I mean. The one attached to his collar. The one also called a leash. Not the lead in leadership.) Now, is he the leader and I the ass? Even though I hold the lead? (Geez. English is confusing.)
Clearly, defining a leader simply as “one who leads” can be so, dare I say it, misleading. Because if you watch Mungo and me, our complete walk, not just a part of our patrol, then you’ll agree that as long as I hold the lead, I can lead. Even from behind.
In both instances, leading an ass and leading a dog, I am the leader. Even though my relative position, to the ass and to the dog being led, is different.
A much better definition of a leader is “one who points the way.” Yes, you can point from the front or from the rear. But that is not what makes this a better definition. What makes this a better definition is that it comes with a catch. A huge catch…
Which is… You must have a point. You cannot point if you don’t know your point!
Does your leadership have a point? If your purpose is unclear, if your intentions are ambiguous, then what is the point of your leadership? What are you doing with the lead? Where do you plan to go? What do you hope to achieve?
Without purpose and intent, you can point for all you are worth, but your lead will still be pointless. And not even asses and dogs will take you seriously.
Welcome to my side of the nonsense divide.
. . .