You must lead yourself well, first September 25, 2022 by Belinda EganLeaders: are your duckies falling into the sewer? Recently I was listening to a sermon from my home church, Hosanna, and the pastor Ryan Alexander told a story about a family of ducks that took roost near his home. He said that one day when he was leaving for work, he saw a mama duck leading her baby ducks out into the world. Mama Duck didn’t realize it, but at some point, she walked directly over a wide-slatted drainage grate leading to the sewers. And her babies, of course, followed her over the grate. And one by one, the babies start to fall into the sewer grate. Mama Duck watched in horror but couldn’t do anything to stop it. She lost all but a few of her babies in a split second, and there was no way for her to get them back. Ryan explained that in the same way, leaders send their teams down ‘metaphorical’ sewage grates every day without even realizing that there’s no return trip. And as with Mama Duck and her babies, you probably won’t realize your team has fallen until it’s too late. The #1 way that leaders send their teams into trouble Mama Duck was just doing what was in her nature – leading her babies through the world. She instinctively knows what looks like danger, so she can avoid it: predators, humans, cars, and bad berries. But Mama Duck doesn’t have a complex understanding of the danger of sewage grates for her tiny babies because, ideally, ducks don’t raise their young in cities. So when her large flippers can easily walk over the slats in the grate, she assumes that her babies can do the same. As a developing leader, you know the imminent signs of danger at work: budget strains, project bottlenecks, client complaints, and tension between coworkers. So what’s your sewer grate? What’s the one thing that could cause your team to fail in a big way, but you’re probably not even aware of it? YOU. You are. The best way to lead others effectively is to lead yourself Many of us have suffered from a lack of high-quality examples of leadership in our lives. Because of that, we don’t really know what good leadership looks like – until we experience it, at which point we never forget. But if we do get lucky enough to experience really great leadership, we rarely get the chance to sit down with that leader and ask them how they turned out so great. So I’ll share the secret with you: Really great leaders have often failed and been humbled, and they’ve turned that failure into character-building lessons and growth. Take heart, budding leader – even if you don’t feel like you’ve “failed greatly”, you can still build your character while growing your leadership potential. You will have plenty of time and opportunity to fail as a leader. You should look forward to it. It’s how you’ll become a truly life-changing leader. In the meantime, the best way to build your character as a leader right now is to “lead yourself”; that is, take really good care of yourself: Put yourself in therapy to deal with traumas and triggers. Develop your networking and social skills by engaging with new groups of people consistently, especially people really different from yourself Enrich your personal life by focusing on the high-quality, high-stakes relationships in your life Create a vision for yourself as a leader. Think about this: if you had to write a ‘leadership obituary’ for yourself at the end of your career, what would you like it to say? How can you live out the words in your obituary starting today? Leaders who focus on taking good care of themselves have the energy, vitality, and mental capacity to care greatly for their team members. People are enthusiastic about following leaders like that. On the flip side, leaders who focus only on success, outcomes, power, and privilege are distracted, easily corrupted, often deceitful and mistrusting, and constantly looking for ways to get ahead instead of their team. People are ruined by leaders like that. Ready to step up and lead yourself well so that you can be a transformative leader for your team? Start here – > download your free copy of Unlocking the Power of Courageous Leadership. Consider it your ‘starter manual’ for leadership greatness. Inside you’ll find snappy but powerful lessons, and insightful writing prompts to help you envision your future as a transformative leader. Here’s your free copy of Unlocking The Power of Courageous Leadership