Klik hiernaast als je in een paar minuten meegenomen wil worden door Simon Sinek langs een paar geweldige one-liners in een prachtig opgebouwd verhaal, hoe we allemaal op ieder moment de leider kunnen zijn, die we zelf wensen. En daarmee het team psychologisch veiliger maken.

Eén nadeel, de goede man spreekt 200 woorden per minuut. En dat is 75% sneller dan gemiddelde sprekers. Daarom hebben we deze speech ook hieronder voor je opgeschreven. Omdat jij én de speech dat waard zijn. Om het zo maar te zeggen …

Leadership has nothing to do with rank.

Right? I know many people who sit at the highest level of organizations who are not leaders. We do what they tell us, because they have authority over us, but we would never choose to follow them. And yet many people with no formal rank, with no formal authority who made the choice to look after the person who is left of them and made the choice to look after the person who is right of them and we would follow them anywhere. We call you leader, because you’re not at the top.

We call you leader, because you went first.

Because you took the risk to head towards the danger. You took the risk to express uncertainty. You took the risk to ask for help. That’s why you earn the rank of leader, because you’re litterly lead by the behaviour, you lead by example. When this person says ‘My leader is not taking care of our team’ I get that. The question is: who is taking care of the team? You can be the leader you wish you had. It does not require rank our authority to pick up the phone and say ‘How are you?’. And it can come form anywhere in the organization where one person may take responsibility to take care of the mental health of everybody. Congratulations, you are a leader.

When you take the risk, don’t go alone. Leadership is a teamsport.

What is also fundamental is that, whoever that person is must remember to act with others. In other words: don’t just make this unilateral decision that I’m just gonna take care of everybody, ‘cause my leader is ineffective and blabla blabla.

One: talk to collegues and say: he, I think what I need to do, I think our team is struggling, I think I’m gonna reach out everybody. Make sure that someone knows what you’re doing, leadership is a teamsport. Because things will may go wrong, things will get difficult, some people may not appreciate it. You’ve got to have somebody that you can call them and say: ‘Ulgh! What will I do?’

Giving a leader a safe space might be everything

Also: don’t assume a leader is ineffective, use the same empathy that we expect down the chain of command up the chain of command. Maybe my leader is stuck, my leader is confused, maybe my leader is stressed out of their mind, maybe my leader is dealing with drama, we have no idea what is going on in that person’s private life. Maybe my leader’s got marital issues or struggling with their kids. We don’t know. And so sometimes part of that check-in is to call our boss and: ‘Hey boss, you were really hard on us on the zoom-caal the other day. I just wanted to see. Are you okay?’ And giving a leader a safe space might be everything.

Maybe you don’t get the reaction you wanted. That’s the risk. Just be patient …

And also: don’t expect that you’re going to get the reaction you want immediately. Some people are reactors. Some people need time to think and to process before they react. So we cannot people to react the way we would react. Now let’s take the other scenario which there actually is a leader who is completely ineffective. And this is why I talk about telling people what you’re doing, because you could ruffle the feathers of a big ego. Right? You could ruggle the feathers of someone who’s insecure. And so it could come down on you. This is the risk of leadership. Remember read it?

Leadership comes with risk.

Which is if you’re willing to stick your neck out even it’s to take care of your folks it can sometimes backfire and hurt. The question is: is it worth it? And for most people who want to be a leader that risk is worth it. This is why we so admire leaders who put there careers on the line to do the right thing. Because they were willing to risk it. So you could risk getting in trouble. You could risk getting yeld at. You could risk being told: ‘Stop doing my job!’ All true. And if you’re alone in that you’re going to have to bear that stress. But if some other people know what you’re doing, you’ll find comfort and security and confidence just knowing that other people have your back as well. So make sure you got a leadership buddy. Leadership is a teamsport. You would never go scubadiving by yourself. It’s too dangerous.

Again: don’t try to be a leader by yourself.

Too dangerous, too difficult. And like I said: sometimes leading up is what’s necessary. You could actually help our leaders be better leaders, because we’re going to demonstrate the behaviour. We’re going to express empathy. We’re going to see how they are. We’re going to support them: ‘Hey boss, I got your back whatever you need I’m here. If you want to vent, I’m here. And give them a safe space also. It goes up and down.