Leadership2

This is the promised second post containing the two quotations from classical authors about leadership: Lao Tse and Quevado. I believe that together they reveal what is often not said when talking about leadership. These two authors have something more in common, with Machiavelli and Gracián in that they were both exiled for their unorthodox opinions. [Never heard of Gracián? Read him in Spanish or English)

But first we begin with the traditional view of the leader of a company. Here, the leader of a team is the boss who gives instructions, controls the game, because his formal position legitimizes the higher value of his opinion in addition to justifying a series of privileges. Logically, everyone else stops thinking for themselves and does what he says. The leader is quite obviously "superior".

This view should not be the view we have now because in opposition to it we have the first quotation, from the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tse in Chapter 66 of Page 68:   So it is that the sage (ruler), wishing to be above men, puts himself by his words below them, and, wishing to be before them, places his person behind them.

This idea of the leader as a servant that was put forward about 2300 years ago is not the same as the idea of the leader as a "facilitator". The former implies personal values while the latter suggests access to resources or information that have to be managed properly.

The idea of the "servant leader" has remained alive, even though it is not often generally practiced. Jesus said to his disciples said, "You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and that their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave", Mat 20:25-28 (NIV).

Another interesting quotation from Lao Tse which gives us another feature of his view of the authentic servant leader: "A leader is best When people barely know he exists, When his work is done, his aim fulfilled, They will say: We did it ourselves."

The "servant leader" according to Lao Tse is not one that trumpets what the team has done (a typical piece of advice in leadership manuals to motivate by small rewards), but rather tries to melt away. He does not look for applause but to get the best of every one of the team. It is the disinterestedness that gives him legitimacy.

This idea of a servant leader is beginning to revive and there is some mention of it in management literature. Perhaps this is an ethical reaction against the scandals of recent years.

Another way of interpreting the idea is that the leader is here because he satisfies some of the needs of his followers. This is most clearly seen in politics. This type of leader provides a service, but in exchange serves himself from the public purse. He might be satisfied with being acknowledged by a significant proportion of the people. Being a manipulator or flatterer. Hitler, for example, "served" his people like this. Bad luck for those who followed him. In the same way, the leader of a gang is the one who performs the worst actions, the leader of a team is the best player.

Clearly, the concept of "servant leader" fits in with many individuals that we have all met and in whose presence we have felt a strong but discrete leadership force. It also fits in with the success and recognition obtained by some great men in business or in history who have given everything for what they believed. But there are not many such examples that can be classified as being totally ingenuous and disinterested. For this reason I believe that the above quotation needs its counterpoint, and I believe that I have found a perfect example.

Within the "Obras Festivas" of Quevedo is the Book of All Things and much else besides ( “Libro de todas las cosas y otras muchas más”), which includes "amazing and powerful secrets, proven, so certain and obvious that they can never fail" (secretos espantosos y formidables, experimentados, tan ciertos y tan evidentes que no pueden faltar jamás), the following infallible counsel:
1. If you want all beautiful women to follow you; or if you are a women and want all rich and elegant men to follow you, go before them.

If the route proposed by Lao Tse was to serve and be disinterested, Quevedo proposes that we push our own interests forward. Apart from being amusing, this quotation introduces the "rotten side" that is missing from so many books on leadership: one way of being a leader is to put yourself forward, to act as if you were or to use the strategies of "the rat" so that you simply appear first without the need to awaken any emotions in your followers. The desire for naked power put into practice.

You put yourself forward in order to take advantage of the beauty of your followers or the riches of your followers. So this contrasts with the other tendency that speaks of leadership in abstract terms, sometimes even poetical, but which at its base hides practical techniques to manipulate more effectively and obtain economic value from your subordinates.

Of course, this is not the only interpretation that can be applied to the quotation from Quevedo. In reality it covers a key point about leadership that is missing from the quotation by Lao Tse: the leader is the one that walks in front. It is the leader who has a vision of the future, the leader anticipates and points out a way to follow. In order to justify himself he must be a teller of stories, a good communicator of a theory about reality and how to change oneself into someone better. He is not only a benefactor, but also a reference. And it is he who involves himself personally in his vision. As José Manuel said in his comment on my earlier post, the leader is not the one who says, "Advance!" but "Follow me!"

The quotation from Quevedo is a good counterweight and complement to the quotation from Lao Tse, a sort of "Yang to the Ying". It offers the rotten side to the posture of self denial, and the dynamic side to the static. Between the two of them they cover the service and opportunism that is an essential part of all leadership. For this reason it seemed to me a good idea to put them together in this post. I have no other aim; deliver me, Oh Lord, from coming up with a theory of my own to make the sum total of them an infinite number + 1.