It’s all about you.
If you want to be an effective leader you have to be smart. You have to be charismatic and confident. You have to be organised.
If you have these qualities, you’ll be a good leader, right?
Wrong.
Elliot Newman believes that how you relate to others lies at the core of true leadership.
As we chat over Skype on a wintry Thursday night, my study lit by his cheerful grin, he explains that being a great leader isn’t about being in charge, it’s about understanding who you’re leading and “appreciating the diversity that exists in people: different backgrounds, personalities, experiences.”
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Leadership in action: Elliot doesn’t just talk the talk when it comes to being a leader. Well, in this photo he is talking, but you get what I mean.
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Elliot is studying Law at Monash University in Prato, Italy, which means I’m awake at midnight to catch him in his mid-afternoon break. Despite the grainy picture and tinny audio, I can sense his positive energy, his passion and drive.
I’d assumed that presenting to high school students for Elevate Education and volunteering as a mentor to underprivileged youth with the Reach Foundation would have given him insight into what it takes to be an effective leader, but I wasn’t prepared for his take on leadership: being a great leader doesn’t depend on the individual, but how they relate to their followers on a personal level.
What does it mean to relate on a personal level? And how exactly does that make someone a ‘leader’?
We all have relationships; friends, family, acquaintances, that one guy on Facebook who we don’t even remember meeting but always invites us to play Farmville (seriously, who even plays Farmville anymore??). We know how to relate to people (sometimes), but does that mean we’re all leaders?
Economist Otto Scharmer believes that lack of listening lies at the heart of leadership failure. Scharmer’s listening isn’t just about sound waves though.
He says that the deepest level of listening is about connecting to the emerging future self of the person you’re listening to (pretty intense, but bear with me here).
This entire video is great, but if you're short on time the most important stuff is from 6:36 onward. For the full course that this lecture is drawn from, click here.
That video was full-on, so I’m going ignore the rules and give you the Joke of the Post early this time!
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| This Joke of the Post brought to you by Elliot Newman and OtakuDC3K1 |
Now back to the serious stuff...
So it turns out great leaders don’t only see you in terms of your past, but in terms of your highest future possibility. Sounds great, but how do we aspiring leaders learn to see the latent potential in those around us?
“ At 11, I didn’t really value myself,” Elliot tells me. “I didn’t think there was much I could accomplish. Mr Hannon, my grade six teacher, completely changed my outlook. He made everyone in the class feel special.” His family supported him, but Mr Hannon was the first person who connected him to his potential; to the remarkable person he could become.
Elliot describes the enthusiasm he felt when speaking to Mr Hannon, like the energy boost Otto Scharmer identifies: “You’re just happy that he’s there to talk to you”.
As Elliot redirects the conversation to ask me about what I’m doing at Uni, I can sense that he has something of Mr Hannon’s almost magical ability to uncover another person’s greatest self. Without realising it, he’s absorbed this skill, and reflected it back, moving one step closer to the version of himself Mr Hannon sensed in him more than ten years ago.
Heifetz, Grashow & Linsky write in The Practice of Adaptive Leadership that connecting with others on a deep, personal level is an essential tool for successful leadership. Maybe when we’re talking about a person, the “song beneath the words” (2009) is the highest possible self buried within.
“Being a leader is being able to foster leadership in others and making them feel comfortable and confident in what they’re doing. ”When you engage someone by connecting them to their emerging future self, you’re boosting their confidence and unlocking their vast untapped potential.
Elliot knows that in leadership, like in life, “there’s no better value than the relationships you create.” True leadership stems from our connection to others. When you listen at the deepest level and uncover another person’s best possible self, “leadership shifts from ‘me’ to ‘we’... leadership is about more than just one person, leadership is also about the future.” (Shankman and Allen 2013)
Just before we end the call, Elliot tells me that he’s sure I’ll write a fantastic blog post.
I don’t doubt him for a second.
References:
Heifetz, R, Grashow, A & Linsky, M 2009, The practice of adaptive leadership. Tools and tactics for changing your organization and the world, Harvard Business Review Press, Boston
Shankman, ML & Allen, SJ 2008, Emotionally intelligent leadership: a guide for college students, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco
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