The Invisible Leader

“A leader is best when people barely know he exists…they will say: we did it ourselves.” – Lao Tzu

I ran across a quote the other day and I wished I had saved it (as I’m now unable to find it). It went something along the lines of “a high functioning team is one where outsiders cannot tell who the leader is.” It was definitely thought provoking for me as I reflected on the times where I thought I was part of or leading a high functioning team. In all of those teams, the leader did not put himself first; he instead put the team first. To an outsider, they would have seen the leader being actively involved in the day to day activities of the team to the point that outsiders may not even identify him as the leader.

Some advice I received from one of my early leadership mentors was that I should never ask one of my team members to do something I was not also willing to do. In a way, it’s the golden rule of treating others as you want to be treated but reworded for a specific topic. It is fairly easy to put this advice into practice. For example, I shouldn’t ask my team member to work 20 hours of overtime this week unless I too was willing to work those 20 hours of overtime. Now that doesn’t mean I have to actually work the hours, but I have to be willing to in order to ask the team member to do it. Nelson Mandela has another famous quote discussing the importance of what I would call an Invisible Leader.

“Lead from the back and let others believe they are in front.” – Nelson Mandela

To me, leading should be about doing the right thing. Values that are today considered nostalgic or antiquated are what leadership is all about. These values include things like leading with honor, being: humble, courteous, and trustworthy, and holding your team accountable. 

I truly believe that leaders should take the blame and give the credit. 

• If your team fails, take the blame. You lead them, you let your team fail, even if the reason was outside of your control. Protect your team members and TAKE THE BLAME! 
• If your team succeeds, give them the credit. Call them out by name when presenting your team’s success to top management or anyone else that will listen. While you did indeed lead them to this success, you could not have done it without them. GIVE THE CREDIT!

As you continue on your leadership journey, make sure you understand that you being an invisible leader only applies to outsiders. Your team needs you to be very visible and “down in the trenches” with them at times. Be one of them instead of in charge of them. Ask them to do things only if you would be willing to do those things. Treat them as you would want to be treated!