Leadership As A Living System

In my second entry of this blog I wrote of the ecology of leadership. Ecology refers to the relationships of organisms among themselves and to the environment. Leadership may be viewed as an ecological system involving the interaction of humans with each other and the environment. If leadership is an ecosystem, it will then adhere to the principles of living systems.

Living systems are the natural order of life. Living beings link together. Connections lead to patterns of behavior. The relationships that emerge form the environment in which the life forms interact. The environment formed likewise shapes the relationships between the organisms. It is a cyclical rather than a linear process.

To illustrate the difference between a cyclical and linear perspective, let us consider the food chain. A simple linear model would have plants eaten by herbivores, herbivores eaten by carnivores. Smaller animals are eaten by larger, stronger, or smarter animals. In a linear or hierarchical model, we would put ourselves at the top of the food chain.

But what if we look at the feeding process cyclically? Animals eat plants. Animals die and become fertilizer for plants. Plants give us oxygen, we give them carbon dioxide. Are plants here to serve us or do we exist to serve plants? We consider ourselves as superior. When we die, however, our bodies become food for insects, microbes, and plants.

The linear and hierarchical models are usually applied when we consider leadership. We think of the leader as being out front with followers bringing up the rear or the leader occupying the summit of a pyramid with followers down below. A cyclical view of leadership gives us a much different perspective. Leader and follower become defined by each other. One is a leader because someone else chooses to follow. Being a follower implies someone else is leading. There is no leader without a follower. There is no follower unless someone is leading. The distinction between leader and follower becomes even fuzzier when we consider that we occupy both roles simultaneously. As a leader I take my lead from the followers. If I get too far out ahead of the followers or become disconnected with their motivations, they will choose not to follow and I am no longer a leader. As a follower, I lead by choosing who to follow. I can change who leads by choosing someone different to follow. Who I choose to follow determines the direction the group shall take. For leadership to be successful, it must be exercised by both leader and follower. As with any living system, remove any part of the system and you kill it.

Where Are The Leaders?

After nearly a century of leadership studies, we continue to lament the dearth of leadership in our organizations. The secret to developing leadership continues to elude us in spite of the flood of advice given by academicians, speakers, consultants, and even recognized leaders. With all the books, videos, and seminars devoted to leadership development, we should be blessed with an abundance of outstanding leaders. Yet the cry goes out throughout all sectors of society asking, “Where have all the heroes gone? Where are the leaders we deserve?” Without realizing it, those leaders we have been searching for have always been with us. They have even been us. Our problem has not been an absence of leadership but an inability to recognize leadership as it has occurred.

The root of the problem is in how we define leadership. There tends to be a common assumption in most definitions of leadership; a focus on the leader. Attempts to define leadership typically speak of what leaders do. What is actually being defined is leader not leadership. If leadership is considered to reside in an individual, then we will look for individual leaders. Our efforts to develop leadership will concentrate on training designated leaders. This limited view of leadership is at the root of failed leadership development initiatives.

The key to solving the failure of leadership development efforts is to view leadership systemically. The result is a new definition of leadership:

Leadership is a dynamic, systemic relationship between leader, followers, and context.

Any successful leadership development intervention will need to take into account the relationships among the three components of leader, followers, and the larger environment. To focus solely on the leader is like trying to train someone to play tennis in a classroom without ever letting the trainee get on a tennis court to play a partner.

Leadership resides in the group. Leadership development must therefore involve the entire group. If we want better leadership, we must look to ourselves and each other rather than to a hero to rescue us.

The Hero's Journey

The developmental process of becoming a leader may be described in terms of the hero’s journey. The hero’s journey begins with separation from the known and common. The hero ventures forth, encounters adventures, is endowed with new powers, and returns to the community to share what s/he has learned while on the journey. What is to be learned? I find four lines from James Autry’s book Life And Work helpful in answering this question. Autry--a business executive, writer, and poet--identifies “Four Important Things in Life and Work:”

Find your people.
Find your place.
Tell your story.
Listen.

These lines capture the essence of the hero’s journey. Find your people. Who is your community? Who are the people you are called to serve? Who is in need of what you have to offer? Find your place. What is your role within your community? How do you fit into the larger whole? Tell your story. What is the message you bring to your community? What is the gift you have to offer your people? How can you best share that gift? Listen. What is the response to your message? Are you having the impact you intended? How are your people’s needs changing? How must you grow so that you may continue to serve your community? The search for answers to these questions is what constitutes the hero’s journey. The answers to these questions are the boon you are to bring back to those you are called to lead.