Leading Leaders

It is easy to stand in front of a group of your colleagues and provide opinions on their performance.  Waxing poetic on a myriad of subjects takes a talent for speech and presentation and perhaps even an ability to be engaging, but this is not what leaders are made of, nor is it how we inspire or teach others to become leaders.   In our social and organizational environments we have no shortage of opportunities to show others what we are made of, but I wonder, how often are we willing to live the lives we profess to commitment to?

As managers, parents, brothers, and sisters we are tasked with the mentorship of those that come along behind us.  We promise them leadership and guidance, we assure them that their input is valuable and their thoughts - worth developing.  We ask them for their trust and their loyalty and in return we are to deliver back to them the benefit of our experience.  We pledge to the world our strength, morality, and the deliverance of just behavior. 

I can't help but sit back and wonder, after examining my own life (and if I am being honest, being a bit overly judgmental of others, too), how often are we able to put action behind our words?  Leadership is not a theory, nor is it a concept.  Leadership is a way of life. Leaders are not afraid of pissing off the pack. They understand that often, the pack is wrong.  How do we teach this to others?  How do we take a trait such as fearlessness and pass it down to the next generation?

In our promises to mentor others we commit ourselves to providing them with advice, guidance, and a helping hand on their path toward success.  We promise them our time and our honesty.  There are a number of mandated mentor / mentee relationships within corporate cultures, but if I am correct, there are few that provide actual benefit.  I receive emails from disappointed workers complaining that they have had only one or two meetings with their mentors within the last twelve months. On the flip side, mentors tell me that their organizations regulate the entire relationship -  making any of their efforts seem forced, scripted, and ultimately fruitless.

Organizations that wish to truly inspire change rather than merely pay lip service to it must find ways to allow for the creation of leaders.  Mentorship, in its true form, allows those blessed with leadership skills to teach those that are interested in learning.  For the follower, there is value in having learned management skills from one who is not afraid to teach the lessons.