Stepping up for leadership, by Jane Smith

Most people think that a leader is the one with a particular title or someone who has at least been anointed by a person with a title.  That may not be true.

This is the biggest dilemma I have always faced in my work life, how to TAKE leadership from the one who HAS leadership because of their position or circumstance, and I hear it from others in the companies with which we work.

This week one of my clients brought up the leadership question. He wanted to talk about what he has been seeing about his team, and then himself. We have been talking about what his team needs to really be a team. And they aren’t a team so much as a group of individuals who get together with concerns of their own, that they need to have and the organization needs them to have.  

And the ones who lead do so only when the issue is in their area. They easily take leadership when they have the most knowledge, not because leadership is needed and wanted.

My client told me about his own leadership journey as he started at his company. At one time, one of his direct reports was his peer, as were others who are now people he leads.  He stepped up and took leadership when it was wanted and needed. And he doesn’t understand why they don’t step up.

One of the things we distinguished was that he stepped up in an absence of leadership. There is no current absence of leadership on his team because he is there. To create the condition called “absence of leadership,” he will need to step back and let it happen. His strong leadership is in the way.