What Does It Feel Like to Be Led by You?

There is a question that can change the quality of a leadership conversation:

What does it feel like to be led by you?

Not on your best day, when there is time to listen and the decision is straightforward.

What does it feel like when you are under pressure, when you disagree, when someone makes a mistake or when the room is uncertain?

Most of us have an internal account of who we are. We know our intentions and the pressures we are carrying. Other people encounter something else: our tone, choices, silences, habits and the effects of the authority we hold.

Neither perspective contains the whole truth on its own.

This is one reason feedback can be difficult. It may not resemble the person we believe ourselves to be. Our first response may be to explain the intention, challenge the accuracy or locate the exceptional circumstance.

Sometimes context does matter. Sometimes feedback is incomplete. Sometimes it reflects a pattern we have not been able to see from where we stand.

The task is not to accept every observation as an unquestionable verdict. It is to become curious enough to ask what the feedback may be showing us.

That requires conditions in which honesty and dignity can coexist.

I do not believe leaders need to be humiliated in order to change. Nor do I believe kindness means protecting people from the impact of their behaviour. Meaningful development has to hold both responsibility and possibility.

This understanding is personal for me too. The phrase “Intellect without intimidation. Influence without ego. Challenge without diminishing others” emerged from listening to how other people experienced working with me. Some feedback confirmed strengths. Some invited further development. The value was not in receiving a polished description. It was in being willing to consider the distance between my intention and someone else’s experience.

The 4P Leadership Accelerator asks leaders to undertake that inquiry over time, with support and with opportunities to practise what they learn.

The goal is not a more flattering leadership story.

It is a more honest and useful one.