The Cost of Leadership: Humbling the Pride

We are working on our series about the Cost of Leadership. The theme is to open the dialogue on the cost leaders pay when you assume a leadership role in your profession or organization. Those who do this transition correctly know there are many costs to them personally and professionally, and to lead others means you pay the cost regularly. Leadership is an active profession. It has wonderful rewards when you do leadership with honor and integrity.

In our first segment of this series, we discussed the cost of leadership in the change to peer relationships. As you grow in your leadership and take on more responsibilities, your peers may not always remain your peers. How you manage that transition sets you up to be a better leader and future success. Our next cost is a more personal one. The cost is how to lead with a humble pride.

Many times as a leader, you will find yourself at odds with your organizational leadership decisions or the directions given to you from your boss or leadership. Sometimes you are asked to present a new program, process, or directive you do not believe or support. Now what?

Humbling your pride can cause personal turmoil, but can be invaluable to your character development.

A recent discussion with a leader showed this cost of leadership. This leader had made a personnel decision in their organization and after it was completed, senior leaders directed the decision to be reversed. There was a lot of discussion on the issue, but senior leaders did not want to change their decision and informed the leader that not only did the leader have to correct what was done, but they confirmed they believe the initial decision was incorrect.

This leader after much review and searching did not believe the initial decision was incorrect. Now, leader, what do you do?

In our development on our leadership journey, we are taught, there are books written on it, and every leader will tell you that leaders make decisions. And we all know that every decision we make, statistically, cannot be correct. Leaders must always be prepared to admit when they have made a mistake and correct it. That is what great leaders do regularly.

How leaders act when they must admit an error they do not believe is an error is different skill and emotion. I am using the term pride here. We all have an honest and appropriate amount of pride in doing our jobs and doing them well. As a leader you must constantly be developing your skills, honing core competencies so you are prepared to lead, you must stay on top of current and upcoming trends in your profession so you can lead with vision. As leaders, we take pride in constantly working to improve and evaluating our actions for opportunities to improve.

In leadership though, it doesn’t always work that you have a say when you will accept responsibility for something you do not believe you did wrong. The guilt you feel that comes when you have to admit your error is the same if you committed the error or not. The sting comes in when you take the responsibility for someone else’s decision. The cost to you now is the process of how you humble your pride.

You have a responsibility to the organization and to support its senior leaders. We know the trifecta of lines we don’t cross as leaders: immoral, illegal, or unethical. This is not the situations we are talking about. In organizations, difficult and sometimes sensitive policies or decisions are not made when they should. This lack of clarity affects the organization and you as a leader. It can place you in the position to do the right thing, to humble your pride, and to make sure the team is taken care of and also the organization.

Let me share with you what I have discovered as a way to work through these situations where you have to humble your pride. These “3 Rs” are ways you can correct the situation, grow from the experience, and then help another leader when they are confronted with a similar experience.

1. Resolution: Don’t take it personally. As cliché as this sounds, honestly, this is the most difficult part of humbling your pride. You must be responsible, accept the mistake, and press on. Clearly, our culture does not promote accepting responsibility for an error we did not commit. Leaders put their heart and soul into doing a great job of leading their teams. To be told you did it wrong crosses into your personal as easily as your professional life. This is more difficult when you don’t agree with the decision. You do take it personally. Stop. Take a breath, and realize there are things you will change and things you will not. If after your evaluation on the subject you would still not change your original decision, then there is nothing personal to take in this incident. It is a difference of opinion. It doesn’t make your decision wrong or theirs right. Don’t sabotage yourself by focusing on a personal attack when it was a difference of opinion. Move on.
2. Response: Respond in a concise, accurate, and accept responsibility. When you respond and admit there was an error, then do so as accurately, as brief as possible, and ensure you support the new decision positively. As an example, when the decision is made the holiday schedule you created is not going to work because another unit needs to borrow several of your team members, then as the leader of your unit, you must adjust and notify your team. Your team needs to know you understand the impact on them. They don’t need to hear how you vehemently disagreed, how senior leadership didn’t change their mind, and they don’t need you disrespecting senior leadership. They do need your support, the knowledge you engaged and articulated the impact on the team and the mission, and your commitment to work a reasonable solution. The humbling of your pride is showing you can be a professional even when it is most difficult. They need your positive approach and they need your leadership when you are struggling to give it.
3. Reflection: Take time to debrief self or with a mentor. When it is done, it is time to reflect on the event. Humbling your pride is difficult for any leader at any level. It doesn’t get easier the farther you advance. In fact, I believe it is more difficult. The cost of humbling your pride is to complete your evaluation of the event, learn if there is something you can do differently so you don’t repeat, give yourself some time to feel how unfair it was, and then get back to work.

I read a great article/blog the other day by Jeremie Kubick. In his article titled Humility vs Pride and Why the Difference Should Matter to You, Jeremie states “It is better to be humble than proud; secure instead of insecure; confident instead of overconfident and responsive instead of resistant.”

The key take away if you do not pay the cost of leadership by humbling your pride is this, if you cannot work your way to pay this price, then you become resistant to change. Your leadership is better than that. Pay the price of humbling your pride and watch your character and leadership soar!

Leading with you,

Dean

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