Leadership Threshold

Some people are natural leaders and do it all the time. The rest of us have some resistance to leading. Leadership means taking a risk and exposing myself. Perhaps people won’t follow. Sometimes I have the vision of leading the troops to battle, yelling “Charge!” and running out onto the field in a glorious, heroic way—only to find myself all alone out there, my troops just staring blankly at me.

And yet I often put myself in this situation. Leading seminars and corporate renewal experiences, I have to yell “Charge!” and trust that people will follow.

To do this, I always have to overcome my resistance and fear to exposing myself in this way. It is true for all of you, too: It is much easier to choose not to lead and to allow the system or culture to run itself. But, as we all know, over time the status quo starts to degenerate, and effectiveness declines when there is a lack of leadership and accountability. Then, for many of us, there is a level of dysfunction that calls us out of our complacency. Often with frustration or anger, we express our dissatisfaction and overcome our resistance. Only then do we begin to lead again.

I call this the Threshold for Leadership. We all have it. How bad do things have to get before we overcome our reluctance to lead?

Take a look at yourself. What is your Threshold for Leadership? What does it take for you to step up and lead?

To be more effective, it is critical that we lower our Threshold for Leadership. Ultimately, we want to be leading all of the time, whether it is in innovation, growth, inquiry management, vision, tracking critical monitors of success, or maybe most importantly, creating accountability. As leaders, it is important that we lead because the moment we stop, the entropy, the decline, begins. In any area we don’t want to lead, we must create leaders and lead them. There is no way around it: In the vacuum of leadership (movement and momentum), there is a natural slowing down and degeneration.

Quit looking for the end of leadership. Instead, remove your obstacles and resistances to leading.