Remember who you are and where you came from! Does it really require having a strong hunger of power to be a top leader nowadays? Does this hunger of power so important in our business environment that we tend to forget about humbleness in leadership and service of others?
Humbleness in leadership means
- empowering others to lead
- having a curious mind
- always open and ready to learn, no matter how far you’ve got
- learning from criticism and admitting mistakes
- acts of courage, such as taking personal risks for the greater good
- to accept failure as part of business and leadership
- to celebrate failure for greater learning for self and others
- not taking anything for granted
- creating space for others to contribute
- to embrace uncertainty: when leaders humbly admit that they don’t have all the answers, they create space for others to step forward and offer solutions
- to suspend own agenda and belief in order to engage in fruitful dialogues
- being open to follow others’ agenda
- being transparent, no fear of disclosing self-vulnerability
As a leader you are on a journey. No one was born as a leader. You have become a leader because you were chosen to lead. Therefore, you should always remember where you came from, as most journeys end. Also when you remember where you came from, you will always appreciate how far you got. How hard you worked to get to the place where you are now. You will also think of those who helped you along the way on your journey. And above all you’ve got to remember too that the position does not define who you are.
True leadership is about service. “The measure of a leader is not the number of people who serve him but the number of people he serves.” John C. Maxwell
Ask yourself everyday:
- How did I demonstrate humbleness in my leadership today?
- How did I serve the people, the community, the society whom I responsible for today?
You will notice that the first week you will find extremely hard to answer these questions. You may either have no answers or give cliché answers to these questions. But after a time you will start looking behind your own mask, your own learnt leadership vocabulary. And then, only then real answers will start coming.