Will We Be Brave Enough To Choose Better Leaders?
Another week, another external review of poor corporate or political governance. Between politicians throwing parties during Covid, preventable corporate environmental disasters and payment scandals being revealed, are we not tired of this? We are creating industries to review poor leadership while a more obvious, and sustainable, solution would be to just choose better leaders.
Often leaders are selected because they are perceived as ‘safe’ choices. They have a business or political CV that provides a sense of safety to the selector, selection committee or the electorate. But we are moving through a time of great global change and our collective problems are many. We need to be brave enough to look for people who will lead us in new ways. The greatest leaders throughout history have been the disruptors. Those unafraid to question the status quo. We celebrate the Martin Luther Kings, the Gandhis, the changemakers in our history but they were not celebrated during their lifetimes. Existing systems made it difficult for them and no selection committee would have chosen them. Will we be the generation to change this trend? To accept and celebrate inspirational leaders and new styles of leadership when they appear during our lifetime.
This is a conversation about courage. Our courage. It applies not just to those who lead but those who select them. Business leaders, HR people, recruiters, employees all the way to us as communities and the electorate. Will we be brave enough to choose someone who is different? A person who will disrupt the status quo and, by extension, disrupt all of us. This is the future of business leadership, executive committees, boards, and political parties if we want a different world. Brave leadership supported by us; brave people.
Who leads us and how they lead is our responsibility. It is easy to pontificate about how we would do it better, I know I do this all the time. But this is our choice to make. We must be brave enough to take a risk on new leaders, to be intentional with our voice and vote. We must also support leaders, new or existing, as they make difficult unpopular choices which serve our collective future but perhaps, in that decision, not you.
If we want the world to be better, we must first be better. Better at paying attention to what is happening around us, better in our choices and better in our sense of responsibility to each other. These are our choices to make. Better leadership starts with us.