“The goal of many leaders is to get people to think more highly of the leader. The goal of a great leader is to help people think more highly of themselves.”
– J. Carla Northcutt (1943 – 2013), Atlanta-based seminary professor and pastor
As “Super Tuesday” dawns, and I’m faced realizing that there is no “super” outcome possible on either side of the ballot, my attention is drawn to the concept that many have of what it means to be a leader. I’m gonna need a lot of coffee for the next, oh, generation or so… But back to “Super” leadership…
Many believe that being a leader means “being in the spotlight,” “being on stage,” “being the boss,” those type of me-centric ideals. Watch any of the news channels today and you’ll see at least four or five examples, at least four or five hundred times. “Me! Me! Me! Vote for me! Look at me! __________ is bad and I’m brilliant…” Blech…
I love what Pastor Northcutt does to that perspective. She blows it up.
A good leader I know often said, “the best way to tell if you’re a leader is to turn around and see if anyone is following you.” There’s some truth to that. But great leaders also look ahead, plot a course and then point those who follow toward the destination. Then, great leaders get out of the way and help people feel really good about getting “there.”
Hayden Fry was a legendary college football coach, first at a couple schools here in Texas, then at The University of Iowa for 20-odd years or so. Hayden wouldn’t hire an assistant coach that didn’t aspire to be a head coach. And, once he hired them, he made it his personal quest to grow them in to head coaches. To not only get them to think more highly of themselves but to help them build a base in fact that led to them thinking more highly of themselves. Depending on hirings and firings, there are still, almost 20 years later, more than a dozen head coaches who walked the sideline under Coach Fry. Jack Welch did the same thing with his CEO-producing team at GE. Abraham Lincoln, too, with his “Team of Rivals.”
Too bad none of them are on the ballot today…
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