Leading with Distinction

There is a part of us that believes the following: Your leadership will be respected, your rewards will be equivalent to your hard work and determination, and you will always be treated with fairness and respect by your leadership team and organization.

Well wouldn’t that be wonderful.

     Some lessons I learned early on in my career and profession is that disappointment, lack of integrity, and sometimes less than professional leadership can drastically impact my life and profession. Sad as it is to say, I have seen it replicated not only in my life, but in the lives of those I know personally, professionally, and through several professional organizations. There are just times when you will be treated poorly, unprofessionally, and many times with viciousness and vindictiveness unseen before.

Sometimes you are just “victim” to the political nature of the organization. Personally, I have felt the sting of such occurrences. My hope has been that at times, it has been just an oversight or insidious in nature. Other times, I know it was done intentionally. In any case, your response and reaction speaks to your leadership and your character.

Conversations recently with some colleagues has highlighted to me this type of leadership impacts, behaviors, favoritism, or intentional sabotage is consistently experienced and ongoing. It’s the ugly side of leadership many do not wish to face head on. And many respond poorly. Your reaction to this goes from quietly hiding away and walking away from leadership to an outburst of anger and aggression. Neither is a leadership characteristic which I believe represents true leadership or a professionalism.

A senior executive recently shared his story about workplace sabotage by another leader. As the situation developed, my colleague shared as it became evident he was not going to get the promotion he worked so hard for that he was lost for how he wanted to respond. He felt helpless and lost on what he should do. He was not sure how to react to the lack of support from his leadership team, but also in response to the sabotage.

My colleague’s experience is a true cross road leaders at every level will experience. Unfortunately, more than once in their career for some. So how does a leader handle these type of leadership experiences. The experiences where your leadership team or organization has treated you unfairly, has been absent in their responsibility, or not truthful with you about your position or future with the organization? What if they are just plain mean and unprofessional?

Leading with distinction means your professionalism and character shine in the darkness.

     The situation of being mistreated by your leadership team or organization has a deep impact on you personally, professionally, psychologically, and at times physically. The wounds created by this treatment can break years of trust and disrupt your sense of value, degrade your self-worth, and create in you the opportunity to doubt your purpose and mission in your life and your organization.

It is at these dark times where leadership with distinction separates you from many other leaders. It takes moral and leadership courage, personal responsibility, and forgiveness to move forward. Here are three things I present to you to ensure you are known as a leader of distinction:

1. Respect yourself. When you evaluate the situation, you need to have a critical, hard look at your actions. Did they meet your standard, were you ethical, moral, and legal in your actions, and did you do the best you could for the situation? If so, then respect yourself, decisions, and leadership. There is always a requirement for a leader to learn from every situation, whether it turned out negative or positive, and then to learn from it. Not to evaluate your outcomes means you’ve lost a chance to improve and grow from the situation. But if in the analysis you are proud of what you accomplished, then respect yourself enough and not let self-doubt control or hijack your actions after you have been treated unfairly.
2. Responsible and logical decisions: Your actions, immediate actions after you believe you have been treated unfairly can have lasting and long impacting consequences. Those consequences can be negative OR positive. The initial shock at the discovery causes in most an immediate visceral response and in many instances a highly charged responses. A leader of distinction knows at this vulnerable point that immediate action is rarely needed. A responsible and logical response and decisions will provide you the ability to serve in the aftermath of this situation with honor, with your character intact, and will highlight your professional attitude. Many leaders during the excited phase post situation will create more challenges for themselves by their actions. They do such things such as gossiping about the situation, talking and spreading rumors, or talking to other employees and sharing the grievance with junior employees to garner sympathy or to create further distrust in the organizations. None of these actions serve you or your character well.
3. Remember, you are a professional: At your most difficult times, a leader of distinction remembers they are always on the stage for professional observation. I can share from experience, it can be one of the most difficult things you may have to do as a leader. To remember your reputation and character are on display when you are being watched after you have been wronged. Your actions after an unfair interaction may be the only thing that represents your character and who you are to those employees in the organization who respected you and valued you. Maintaining a clear and unequivocal professional demeanor and response means you clearly determined how you wish your character to be remembered. You lead with honor, now complete your leadership with distinction.

A final thought. Forgiveness. There is going to be a time you will need to forgive what happened to you. If not, you will have a tendency to hold onto the bitterness from the experience. There is no need to carry that burden around and to give away your energy to holding onto it. Forgive, learn from the experience, and move on.

Being mistreated by your leadership team or organization is devastating. You, though, are a leader and one who leads with distinction. In every situation, you remember who you are, what your purpose is personally and professionally. And then you respect yourself for your leadership impact, you continue to make deliberate responsible and logical decisions, and you ALWAYS remember that you are a professional. Then when your colleague experiences this situation, you walk with them through this challenge. In that action, we are building leaders with distinction!

Leading with you!

Dean

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