Simon Sinek distinguishes leadership from authority. Real leadership means helping others rise through care and trust, not rank. Organizations rarely train people in these skills when promoting them, even though leadership is a distinct skill set from doing the work itself.
Chapters
So I think leadership is one of the most misunderstood subjects in business, quite frankly. Very often when we talk about leaders, we're talking about rank or hierarchy. But you and I both know many people throughout our careers who, at very high levels of companies who are not leaders. We do as they tell us because they have authority over us, but we would never trust them or choose to follow them. And you and I both know people and at low levels of organizations who have no formal rank or authority, and yet they've made the choice to look after the person to the left of them and to look after the person to the right of them. And we trust them and would follow them anywhere. Leadership fundamentally is the responsibility to see those around us rise. And we hope that you obey and exhibit the qualities of good leadership when you have a position of leadership. But you can obey and pursue good leadership at any rank. Leadership has nothing to do with the rank or position. It's the responsibility to see those around us rise. That's what makes someone a leader. One of the big mistakes is to think that it's all about you.
Human beings are social animals. If we could do everything by ourselves, we wouldn't need friends and we wouldn't need a team, we wouldn't need coworkers. We could just do everything ourselves. And at the end of the day, we can't do everything ourselves. And so it's understanding that you're a part of a machine, and the more you help keep that machine well oiled, which means open and clear communication, setting clear guidelines and expectations, being able to resolve conflict in a healthy manner. Things like this help keep the machine working and that the people who support you will be there for you because they know that you would be there for them. And so what great leaders do is they work to be there for their team members or those.
In their care.
Remember, when we're junior in our companies, when we first join the company, the company will give us tons and tons of training so that we'll be good at our jobs. Right? And some people get advanced degrees. Engineers and the like will get advanced degrees so that they'll be good at their job. And if you're really good at your job, eventually you'll get promoted to a position where you're now responsible for the people who do the job you used to do. But we very rarely give any kind of training or.
Sort of apprenticeship on how to be a leader. And just because somebody was good at their job doesn't mean they're good at leading other people. Being that good at that job. You know, a good salesperson doesn't necessarily make a good sales manager, for example. There are different skill sets. And so one of the things we have to remember when we occupy a position of leadership is we now have the responsibility to see those in our team, to see those on our team do well, to help them work to their natural best. It's not just about us and how good we are or how good we were when we used to do the job they used to. It's a different skill set and a different mindset.
