Leaders Don't Go It Alone

Have you ever seen one of those motivational posters? You know, the ones with something like a rainbow or a lion and a nice one liner of sage advice. Yes I know you've seen them, at work, at school, or heck even at the doctor's office.

Anyway, a little while ago I saw one of these posters that had an eagle and said something like "Leaders Go It Alone". I can't disagree with this sentiment more. Granted, sometimes leaders need to make the tough decisions which may be unpopular, or sometimes the leader will have to "remove someone from the team". However, leaders never go it alone!

Lets think about it. Assuming that a leader has to make a tough decision, that she knows will not go over well with the rest of the team. What should she do?

1. Well the first thing I would do is to do what leaders do best, use your influence to explain to the team why this is the right thing to do.
2. Next, listen! The team will probably have some very good reasons for doing things a different way. Maybe they have thought of things that you hadn't realized. Maybe, it would be best after all to do things their way.
   
3. Discuss both sides of the argument. Make sure everyone understands all of the costs and benefits.
   

OK, so lets say our leader has done her best to convince us and we (the team) have done our best to convince her but to no avail. Should she now storm out of the room, say "Damn it all, I am the boss, we'll do what I say, and I don't care what you think!"

Probably not the best idea right? Right. I would say a good leader should check her ego at the door and go with the team. I think it is such a problem these days that we glorify those people who act like loose canon's not caring about anybody else but themselves. While the selfish part of ourselves might want to run off, do things our way, and hope that everything works out in our favor just to come back and say "I told you so!"... most likely, if you have built a competent team they will be the ones who will be right.

So what do you think? No, I don't want to hear stories about "the one time I went it alone and was right". What these stories inevitably leave out is how this act strained the relationship between team and leader. But still, comments are much appreciated!

-Jason