Leadership
4 Steps Making Your Leadership Story Worth Reading
Influential Leaders Earn Followership Through Exemplary Service
Influential leaders earn followership through serving their people, customers, and their organization. Truth told, serving is not that difficult. Many of us have an affinity for it. Others do it because they feel it is the right thing to do.
Service as a commodity
Serving others by itself is not extraordinary. Perhaps service is a commodity and we see companies put a price on it. Most working people earn money by offering service to customers. What employees receive for service, they call a paycheck.
Serving others exists outside the workplace too. We also practice serving our families, friends, and communities outside of the office too. We might do that because we care.
If serving others is important to the exemplary leader, what type of service makes a leader worth following and their story worth reading?
Step 1: Find the tension
It might just come down to a few difficult choices. Some critical decision points may require serving others in ways putting their needs above your best interests. Sacrifice is not a word most of us enjoy saying or practicing. However, it might be the ingredient your story requires to be worth reading.
Sacrifice creates the tension and the drama you need to make your story interesting.
Step 2: Turn hurt into an opportunity
An admired leader of mine Daymond John I think got it wrong when he wrote in a recent tweet, “I have witnessed too many people make the mistake of sacrificing for others and not putting themselves first.”
You can read my question back to him in my tweet here.
I think Daymond got it wrong because most of us admire people that sacrifice for others. Being part of a healthy society requires respecting others, helping, and hopefully aligning our service activities with our core values. If you are looking for some examples, Francine Mends, MD offers a good list of core values here to get you started.
Want to make a bigger impact?
Follow what another respected leader advises. As leaders, we shouldn’t shy away from brokenness. Instead, take it and turn it into your best work.
Like all of us, most of the daring, transformational leaders I’ve worked with have overcome hurtful experiences — from childhood illness and painful family histories to violence and trauma. The difference between leading from hurt and leading from heart is not what you’ve experienced or are currently experiencing, it’s what you do with that pain and hurt. ~ Brene Brown author of Dare to Lead:
What can we do to turn our own hurt into opportunity? While we can’t serve everyone, we can serve someone.
Step 3: Give your gift
Many people claim to have a calling to serve. I’ve met them and I believe them. My perspective on serving others is different. I believe gifts are to be given and everyone has at least one. In fact, I think the best gifts we possess are expressly for the benefit of others. I have met no one in my life who doesn’t have the potential to use their creative ability to bring something valuable into the world.
As we give our gifts, we may find along the way we are actually fulfilling our calling and achieve our own dream along the way. This the service we need today from people like you and me. People that recognize their gifting and fulfill their calling.
It won’t happen without our attention and deliberate practice. I think it is worth it. Our world desperately needs you doing your best work in the area you are gifted!
4) Embrace transformation
The birth of a child, passing of a loved one, or a tragedy often breaks our habit of thinking of only ourselves. When we understand our place in the bigger story, ours transforms into one worth reading.
In this step, you realize and embrace the idea that your best story is the one where you are not the central character.
You will find your best story where you are not the central character.
The best part is you get to decide who it is about. Who will you give your gift to, what hurt did you overcome to do it, and how did it make a difference? That is the heart of the story people are waiting for you to write. And it is one worth reading. Who do you choose to serve?
I don’t know what you will do, but I’m excited to find out!
Last thoughts
Making your leadership story worth reading requires tension. The tension comes from how you live and give your best self to others, especially when it requires sacrifice. Not shying away from hurts to permit transformation to flow provides the avenue of discovering the story others are waiting to read.
Actions To Consider:
- Identify your gift and choose to give it
- Turn a hurt into an opportunity
- Give all of yourself to it
- Share your story
Shepherding is the art of becoming the leader others want to follow.
References:
https://www.runtalents.com/en/leading-from-hurt-versus-leading-from-heart/