Good leadership cares about the future as much as it does about the present.
This is not just in the sense of legacy building. I'm referring to one ensuring thoughtful, conscientious and deliberate protection of the future, to the extent that one invests in evolving achievable goals and structures, that will help to keep the organization alive and thriving long after one is are gone.
Part of the reason why leaders everywhere, but much more often in Africa, take unbelievable decisions and enact policies that are often highly appalling is because, in many cases, they do not have to live with the consequences of their actions.
Many of them are close to the grave anyway, and those who are not have stolen enough money to make them live like kings in other lands far from the hell they have helped to create. There are many more who lack the will; political, economic or the moral vertitude to do what they should, in most cases tied to the desire for self-preservation.
In many organizations where leadership is tenure based or time bound, leaders often make the mistake of counting the number of years, months, weeks or days they have left on the position instead of the level and quality of impact they have had on the people they have been privileged to work with. At the end of the day, it is the quality of your impact on your subordinates that ensures the growth or demise of the organization.
The assertion that a good name is better than wealth or that the memory of the just is blessed has been proven to be true many times over. Every historical figure we hear about today has a story tied to them, whether good or bad.
You know history can either celebrate you, vindicate you, embarrass you or repudiate you forever.
Ultimately the consequences of your actions will be felt by you or your children. I am sure you can remember a few people whose names evoke negative emotions from you or others around you today. Some of those people died long before you were born.
Let us do a quick exercise:
For a moment, pick a pen and sheet of paper and write down three names each of bad and good leaders at organizational or national levels. Which of these groups would you love to belong?
Most African and Caribbean Nations are being recolonized by China because of wrong economic policies over the many years they have been independent. Jamaica seems to be leading the pack from the Caribbean; South Africa in the southern hemisphere of the continent; Kenya, Nigeria and the list goes on.
In South Africa for example, Mandarin is an official school language now, meanwhile local languages like Zulu, Xhosa and others are not. How absurd!!
And to imagine that the the homeland of Bob Marley and Marcus Garvey will probably be the first Chinese colony is almost unthinkable. With the rate and level African leaders are conceding economic infrastructures to the Chinese, one will not be shocked if they decide to sell their citizens someday. The unfortunate part is, most of the monies they take as loans end in private pockets.
I am not trying to cast aspersion on all leaders, and certainly not on our founding fathers. Most of the men and women who fought for the independence of Africa from the grip of colonialism had good plans for the continent. Unfortunately many of those who came after them did not understand the vision or simply chose to pursue personal ideologies. Consequently, the gains and victory Africa won between the 1950's and 1960's have become Pyrrhic in a sense.
It is this same demon that bedevils our national life that haunts many of our organizations too. Primarily because they all exist in the same space and time. And so it is foolish to complain about how bad or lacking in vision African leaders are when the least of us do worse in other positions albeit a smaller one and with less responsibility.
The degree and import of faults may be different but underlying principles are the same; a fault is a fault irrespective of the person committing it. The name you call taking what does not belong to you may differ across board, but at the end of the day it is "stealing" and you are a thief, that is all that matters.
Successes that do not outlive the leader is not good success. I am not referring to successes that are by design momentary in nature. I am talking about structural and institutional progress that is expected to be handed down to coming generations. What is the use of starting a business, company, school, ministry etc that the next generation would not inherit?
Most businesses in this clime very rarely outlive their founder or owner. If you take a good look at them, they were not designed to live beyond the first generation as there is rarely a well laid out succession plan.
As a leader, take a moment to ask yourself; can I bequeath what I am doing now to the coming generation and expect it to last? If your answer is 'NO' then you need to make some changes.
I will outline five (5) things I believe every great leader must do to ensure continuity and preservation of purpose. This is not an exclusive list so you may add yours as we go along.
1. Express your convictions about your vision for the future
Write the vision and make it plain (understandable) upon tables that he may run that reads it. That was a directive given to the Prophet Habbakuk (2:2), emphasizing the importance of expressing ideas and visions.
What is not expressed cannot be impressed on the mind and impossible to convince others to see or achieve.
The reason why Habbakuk was asked to write the vision plainly on tables is so that people can understand it when they stop to read it. It will be useless if they stop to read yet do not understand what is written.
The practice of figuring out what to do as you go along is not good for any organization. There must be a clearly defined plan; a well-articulated vision and attainable goals for any organization to make progress.
Any organization and leadership that fails to plan has ultimately decided to fail. The vision and mission statement of any organization is so that it gives direction and guidance to efforts and inputs. You cannot afford to waste energy as one beating the air.
The leader must be able to communicate his convictions about the vision of the organization unambiguously. He cannot afford to leave people in doubt as to where he stands as far the future of the organization is concerned. The targets, trainings, business direction must align with the vision of the organization. A Petroleum exploration company would not be purchasing land for the farming of cassava as a core business area; neither will an electrical engineering firm send her engineers to a snail farming training when they have both not decided to diversify business operations. That would amount to waste of resources and misplaced priorities, and worst of all it leaves people in doubt as to the direction of the organization.
2. The leader must walk the talk.
Every message is believable so long as the carrier acts it out. It is said that, no matter how loud your message, it is your example that will be followed.
Most leaders fail to understand that beyond their lofty words, people watch their actions more, and as soon as your actions is not in sync with your words people will desert you some day, it is just a matter of time.
Immediately after graduating secondary school, I took a job in 1999 in a Print and Arts studio. My salary was Four Hundred Naira only back then.
My boss was acclaimed the best Lithographer in Benue State at the time and was very popular. He laid his rules and regulations before I and my colleague, and shared with us his grand plans for the company. He was high on integrity and commitment to duty. The unfortunate thing was; he was hardly ever available, largely because he was always running away from people who gave him jobs but he could not deliver owing to the fact that he had spent their monies on things other than the job they paid for. He owed me salary for the first three months of my working with him, so I resigned.
The company folded up eventually. He didn’t walk the talk.
3. A good leader is relevant and in tune with the time and season.
One of the banes of leadership in many organizations today is the stubborn refusal to step up, update thought patterns and modes of operation. The old ways may be good but for heaven's sake if the new ways have proven to be better, why not adopt them? What harm can such change possibly do? It has rather proven to be better and keeps you abreast with novel developments and more efficient ways of getting things done.
I once had a secretary in my old Department who was employed as a pool typist many years before I got there as a youth corps member. When computers replaced the typing machine he was converted to a secretary. Unfortunately, he did not improve his skills to match the times.
Though he was an excellent typist, he was a very poor computer operator, and he was almost irrelevant as far as the many other aspects of his position were concerned. No matter how skillful you are, if you cannot solve the current problems in your organization, you are a burden and not an asset, and no organization wants a liability in its flanks.
In the wake of the Corona virus pandemic, many organizations have resorted to e-documentation and tele-conferencing platforms and apps for exchange of information and meetings in order to avoid community transmission of the virus. It is surprising that in this 21st century, there are senior officers in some government parastatals who cannot use the Microsoft teams or the zoom app. These kinds of people will not last in more robust and business driven environments. Imagine someone like that managing a group of hot headed and passionate millennials. That would be a mix multitude and most likely an immiscible one.
One thing is sure; the leader may never earn the respect of his or her subordinates, consequently no control.
4. Good leaders delegate Authority.
This is one place that distinguishes between good and bad leaders. Delegation of authority does not only entail the transferring of responsibility for a task but also the distribution or release of authority or the amount of authority needed to effectively carry out the delegated task.
In other words, when a President delegates his vice or an Ambassador to represent anywhere in the world and for whatever purpose, the representative is allowed to exercise the authority necessary for the task at hand.
A good leader understands the import and power of delegation. He or she knows it offers him the opportunity to increase influence and build prodigies and committed followership.
Delegation is a good platform for training and correction. How else do you monitor the effectiveness of your training if you do not give your subordinates the opportunity to showcase what you have been teaching them? This is where delegation comes in.
Delegation is also a good opportunity to see what kind of leader you are and kind of leadership you have been providing. Your subordinates in most cases will display what they have learnt from you when they are given the opportunity to lead or act in your stead, with a dash of their personal styles of course. Sitting back and watching them gives you an idea as to whether you are doing well or not; It is a good chance at self-appraisal.
The multiplier effect of delegation cannot be over emphasized. In the Holy Book, after Jesus Christ was sure he had trained His disciples enough to send them forth; He commissioned them in twos and sent them to the world around them. Their testimonies when they returned showed they did what they had learnt from Him and did what would have taken him many weeks and a lot of travel time to do. One can chase a thousand, two will chase ten thousand. That is how far reaching the impact of delegation can go.
Leaders, who are afraid of delegation never grow beyond their immediate sphere and will eventually die small.
One downside to such failure is that it breeds disgruntled subordinates and eventual fall outs. Leaders must learn to delegate real power and not just responsibility.
5. A good leader must learn to service loyalty and celebrate others.
Leaders must understand that "Loyalty is a consequence of good leadership, and leadership is a touchdown of competence". This is an absolute and irrefutable truth. Loyalty, like trust should be earned, and not demanded from subordinates else you would be standing on slippery slope. Any loyalty that can be bought is always available for the highest bidder and cannot be trusted. Good leaders should never 'buy' loyalty; they should rather earn it by consistency of character, competence, faithfulness and trustworthiness.
When a leader understands and is empathetic, people will follow him.
You really do not need to have it all. When a leader shows genuine love and concern for those looking up to him, people will gravitate towards him or her sincerely. Leaders should learn to live worthy of the title they bear.
When people are loyal to you, be quick to celebrate them. Do not hesitate to tell the world of their strengths and capabilities. Do not castigate them in public and celebrate them privately, as a matter of fact, to the best of your ability, celebrate them publicly and correct them privately. That is how you show that you genuinely respect them.
As a leader, you must also learn to share victuals with the people you are leading, as much as you are fast to share instructions. Be visible in their lives; do not only be available for the good days you need to be there in the bad ones too. Good leaders are North stars in the darkest nights; a leader who refuses to know your days of pains should not know your days of gains, he is not worth it.
Leaders must learn to appreciate the efforts of their subordinates, and give them credit whenever they perform well. There are leaders who are stingy with appreciation and some do not do it often or well enough.
