The leaders we admire most are those with exceptional character traits. But where do those traits come from, are people born with them or are they developed? While it is true that people can develop useful traits, it is also true that there are some natural, perhaps inherited traits that are important for leading others.
One of the most important traits is a particular mindset … a way of thinking that leaders tend to have.
Try an experiment with me. Think about an organization where you work, go to church, or a club in which you are a member. It could be a current or past organization. Then answer this simple question.
“What could be done to make this organization more effective?” Got your answer in mind?
The vast majority of people will answer the question in terms of what someone else should do. Very rarely will a person answer the question in terms of what they could do. That is a mindset; a habitual way of thinking about the situations you are in.
For those who have an internal mindset of assuming responsibility, their mind goes naturally to “what should or could I do?”
Try asking others that question and listen carefully to how they answer. You will see how rare that mindset is.
One ancient example would be the Bible story of Nehemiah, a Jewish slave living in Persia as a servant to the King. The story begins when Nehemiah’s brother visits with news about how the people in Jerusalem were suffering. The walls of the city had been destroyed and were now just heaps of stone and fire had burned the gates. With no protection or security, the Jewish people lived in fear and were desperate.
There were many ways Nehemiah could have reacted to this dire news. He could have felt sad for the people and prayed for them. He could have blamed them for being lazy and not working to rebuild the walls. He could have seen it as their fate for disbanding their army. Or, he could have said, I am a lowly servant, what can I do?
But Nehemiah did not react in any of those ways. Instead, upon hearing of the dire situation in Jerusalem, his mind instinctively went to: “What should I do?”
Nehemiah assumed personal responsibility for the situation, he prayed to God for guidance and strength, then he traveled to Jerusalem and led the effort to re-build the walls of the
city.
Another example is the story of Lin Hao. At the opening ceremony of the 2008 Beijing Olympics the Chinese Team was led by Yao Ming, the 7-foot-tall NBA basketball player who is recognized worldwide. He was accompanied by Lin Hao, a second-grader from the Sichuan Province. A month earlier, Lin Hao’s town was leveled by an 8.0-magnitude earthquake killing 90,000 people and most of his classmates.
Lin, although injured and bleeding, managed to crawl to safety. Then, despite shouted warnings from rescuers, he went back into the rubble twice. First to pull out two severely injured classmates, and then, finding 10 more trapped students, he led them in song until help arrived.
Later, at the hospital where his own wounds were being treated, a reporter asked him, “Why did you keep running in and risking your life?” Lin’s reply, “I was the hall monitor today, it was my job to keep my classmates safe.”
Can you imagine a second-grader thinking like that? He did not see the safety of his classmates as someone else’s responsibility, nor did he see the situation as fate beyond his power to influence it. Instead, his young mind went immediately to “what could I do” and then he acted.
That way of thinking is rare, but very important for those who volunteer or lead. It actually has a name in psychology … the Locus of Control … and the mindset of assuming responsibility is highly correlated with career and personal success. When we look outside ourselves for what others should do, we are often blinded to the options or actions we could take.
Fortunately, our mindset is not set in stone. We can practice looking at situations and imagining that we are 100 percent responsible and think about what we could do. So, the next time you see a problem or something that needs to be done in your church, school, workplace or civic group, think of 10 things, however small, that you could do.
Then, you will have options for choosing to volunteer to help or perhaps to lead.
Michael Donovan is a contributing writer for the Cherokee Scout and Adjunct Professor at Young Harris College. His book Leading – Helping Others Achieve Results is available on Amazon. For comments and feedback, contact him at 727-460-8759 or pdsdoc1@aol.com.