Celebrity Contributor Kelly Ford Talks Leadership

Tuesday, 11/17/2009

Photo ©stock.xchng

“Who would ever want to be King?”  Lyrics from one of my favorite Coldplay tunes, Viva la Vida. The truth is not everyone wants to be King or Queen, (although a title and crown does seem appealing). But we are all leaders of some sort in our own little realms and we are all subjects in someone’s kingdom. It’s as macro as the president of a powerful nation or as micro as the ring leader of a 6th grade clique.  Even if we think we aren’t in official leadership positions - people follow us. As a mother, a wife, a friend, a co-worker YOU do lead. Sometimes you lead gently like a beautiful poem by Maya Angelou and sometimes forcefully like a hip thrust from Madonna. (I want a cone bra to go with the crown.)

I know. I know. The topic of leadership is nothing new. Thousands of boring books have been written on it. There’s that one. What’s it called? The 1000 Irritating Habits of People Who are Way More Fabulous Than You in Every Possible Way or something like that. Are leaders born with it? Can you develop it? There are sports analogies out the wazoo. But since I have a fascination with heaving cleavages, the Tower of London and royalty in general let’s stick with the King/Queen metaphor.

A recent article in Psychology Today broke down leaders into two categories. The X Leader and the Y Leader. Queen X believes her followers are basically unmotivated and need their ruler to motivate them and direct their activities. Queen Y believes that followers are self motivated and self directed and do better with a hands off style. I’d like to add Queen Z as a third option. The leader (parent, teacher, boss or mentor) who zeros in on each person’s unique contributions and gently guides them to greatness through spectacular spurts of self-motivation and monumental lapses in it. That’s a more realistic and inspiring leader.

“And I discovered that my castles stand upon pillars of salt, pillars of sand.” Viva la Vida points out the pitfalls of being a leader. To be clear, it ain’t  easy being Queen…or was that green? Either way stepping up to the challenge of being a leader in our everyday life takes courage, but the reward is great. I had a very thoughtful talk recently with my 14-year-old who goes to a school that isn’t big into testing or competition. It’s a school that focuses more on developing critical thinking skills. I guess it works. He ended up giving me his thesis on how positive competition and constructive criticism CAN be.  Then I told him he was my favorite child. JUST KIDDING!

Which leads me to this point - listen to your children, your students, your employees, the people serving on your committee. They might just have something valuable to share that would help in your “reign.” They’re in the trenches fighting the battles of the kingdom.  It’s bloody out there. You can lose perspective from your comfy velvet throne. The best teachers learn from their students and integrate it into how they lead. Obviously each “leadership” relationship is different. And, we all have tough decisions to make in our roles as leaders. I recently handed down an unpopular verdict to my favorite child’s request for an iPhone. (Still kidding on the favorite child thing. Although he is VERY cute.) I had to consider our family budget and the validity of his argument that he would be able to research homework assignments more efficiently.  Nice try from a future King. 

“Listen as the crowd would sing, Now the old king is dead!  Long live the king!”  And finally Viva la Vida points out that change is inevitable and remember if you don’t like the current King or Queen…a new one is on the way.  Or to quote another song, “Life’s a Dance. You learn as you go. Sometimes you lead. Sometimes you follow.”

Posted by » walden
Tags »
Category » Family,Insider,