What is Leadership A Story and a Suprising Answer

[Music]

my name is jim and i’ve always been

fascinated by words that we use all the

time

but we don’t really know what they mean

take v for example

i’m going to use the word v a lot in

this speech in fact i just did

and you probably use it all the time too

but i have no clue what it means how to

define it how to describe it as someone

who doesn’t know the english language

luckily it doesn’t matter if i can’t

define thee but what might be a little

more consequential

how about the word leadership do you

know what it means you know it doesn’t

matter what kind of group i ask if i ask

students or

or managers or executives or even folks

in the c-suite not only do people

struggle to answer the question they

won’t even make eye contact with me when

i ask it because they’re afraid i’ll

call on them

and make them answer now now some people

tend to think of it as popularity

charisma or public speaking ability or a

carefully crafted image or even

financial success

let me tell you as a researcher that we

don’t believe leadership really has

anything to do

with most of those things since we know

it when we see it we can’t define it but

we kind of know it when we see it maybe

the best way to learn about leadership

is to tell talk about it through a story

let me tell you a story from the united

states civil war about a man named

colonel

joshua lewis chamberlain he was a

professor in maine who was so motivated

by the union cause that he signed up to

be an officer

and he commanded a unit called the 20th

maine i started out with sixteen hundred

men

but by july first 1863 down to about 266

because

well war is hell let’s pretend you’re

joshua chamberlain and you are commanded

to guard a point of strategic importance

in gettysburg called little round top

the battle of gettysburg is tomorrow now

if you know anything about the civil war

you know it’s between the north and the

south

uh gettysburg is in pennsylvania pretty

far to the north so if the confederacy

is pushed this far north

they’re doing pretty good this is the

one moment where it looks like the

confederacy is going to win the civil

war

we need to get this one colonel

chamberlain unfortunately with only 250

men

you’re like i can’t i can’t defend this

position possibly you go to high command

say i need more men they say they don’t

have any you say you don’t understand

i’ve got to have more men they say nope

you say

it can’t be done without more men and

they say fine and they give you 120

mutineers from the second main now

history is a little vague as to why the

men

these 120 men were so angry one of the

reasons that pops up a lot in the

history books is because of

a bureaucratic bungle that the

government made that could never

possibly happen in the modern era where

basically remember

19th century these guys can’t read they

can’t write for the most part

they thought they were signing contracts

for two-year contracts

for service the government accidentally

gave them contracts for three years of

service and now the two years are done

so they think they’re done they think

they’re going home to their wives to

their families to their livelihoods

to their farms only for men with guns to

stop them and say nope you’ve got

another year well no i don’t i only

signed for two nope you sign for three

it’s right here you can imagine

why they might be irate luckily today’s

government would never

do anything like that so colonel

chamberlain’s got these 120 mutineers

but he really needs them to fight for

him so he says you know what what do i

do how do i get him to fight for me high

command says well you know make them you

can shoot them

if they disobey you have the right to do

that so again imagine you’re joshua

chamberlain

uh think about what you would say in

this position you’re going to give a

speech to them that night you need to

motivate them

to fight for the union what would your

what would your teachers say what would

your coaches say what would your boss

say

to get these men to fight for the union

in this pivotal moment in our nation’s

history

now my students are often surprised when

i tell them that there are no surviving

youtube clips of this speech uh from

1863 but what we do have

are diaries uh journal entries letters

written home

and historians think they’ve been able

to piece together the gist of what

apparently

was a fairly short speech these probably

weren’t as exact words but

this is kind of a combination of

everything that it seems like people

have managed to piece together here’s

what colonel chamberlain actually said

i’ve been told that if you don’t come

with me and serve in this union army

i can shoot you but you know i won’t do

that

not to good maine men we’re down below

half strength the confederates are

coming

and we need you no doubt about that so

many of us have come

and served and died and we did it

because it was the right thing to do

we’re an army going out to set other men

free and what we’re fighting for in the

end

is for each other we know not of the

future and cannot plan for it much but

the cause for which we fight is higher

our thought is wider

that thought is our power but i think if

we lose this fight

the war will be over we’ll lose the

whole war

but if you choose to come with us i’ll

be personally grateful

that was the whole speech 120 men

signed up to fight the next day

and the battle of gettysburg went up and

down

different sides had the momentum at

different points but there was one

critical moment where

up on little round top colonel

chamberlain and his men were starting to

run out of ammunition

if i was in that situation i’d probably

run like hell that’s not what they did

a bayonet charge was called for they

launched they struck the surprised and

demoralized confederate setting up off a

domino effect

that ended with the union winning the

battle of gettysburg the battle of

gettysburg was the turning point that

caused the union to win the civil war

the civil war was the turning point that

changed the course of a nation

it all came back to that speech that

fantastic example of leadership from

colonel chamberlain so let’s talk about

that

just a little bit really quick what did

he do he didn’t coerce

he persuaded now unless you’re in the

mafia

your boss probably doesn’t have as much

power over you as colonel chamberlain

had over his men

sure your boss can can fire you could

demote you give you a bad performance

evaluation something like that

colonel chamberlain could kill these

people he had the right to do that

that’s the ultimate power to get people

to do what they want

but he said nope he gave it up with the

very first line of the speech he gave up

that power he didn’t want to coerce them

he wanted to persuade them

because he wrote he believed that they

would fight better if they fought

because they wanted to

not because they have to and then he

talked about them he persuaded the men

that the cause was noble and worth doing

we’re an army going out to set other men

free what we’re fighting for in the end

is for each other so i ask you

as a leader or someone who wants to be a

leader think about what your team does

your organization does is your cause

noble and worth doing

think about that for a second the answer

might surprise you one time i was giving

this talk and there were two banks in

the room and someone from the first bank

stood up and said

that’s not really what we do it’s not

noble and worth doing we do investments

we make money

someone from the second bank stood up

and said and by the way second bank does

exactly the same thing as the first bank

same good services said of course what

we do is noble and worth doing we help

people afford their dreams we help

people retire in comfort

we help people buy their first home

their first car how could that not be

noble

sometimes it’s all in the way you think

about it the way you frame it what’s

your real goal

as you’re making money he persuaded the

men that the cause was noble and worth

doing and

he he respected them he tried to help

them but he said even though you’ve been

wronged i need you to come with me and

help others

and in the course of that he turned the

tide of the war change the course of a

whole nation

now now there’s a name for this approach

to leadership uh

there are people who talk about it one

that one that shares power instead of

hoarding it one that puts others first

and develops them and helps them to grow

and succeed

one that gets together with teammates

and followers to talk about how what

we’re doing can make a difference in the

broader world

it’s called servant leadership and it

was

founded by a man called robert greenleaf

who worked at a t as their very first

director of management research he

studied

leadership what worked and what didn’t

for over three

decades before coming to this conclusion

that this servant leadership thing

was in his opinion the best way to lead

the non-profit he formed today it’s

called the greenlee center for servant

leadership

it’s still around it’s still doing great

things to promote this style of

leadership which i know

sounds idealistic a little bit like a

fairy tale now let me come to you as a

professor

and a researcher of leadership there’s a

lot of evidence that it actually works

it’s not a fairy tale there are

literally hundreds

of peer-reviewed published quantitative

papers

hundreds showing that servant leadership

has a unique empirically demonstrated

effect

on motivation performance satisfaction

commitment finances everything we’re

interested in it has a unique effect

right now in the modern context in fact

a lot of research indicates

that servant leadership is even more

effective than more goal-centric forms

of leadership or profit-centric forms of

leadership here’s something i call the

paradox of leadership

if you want to make lots of profit talk

less about profit

and talk more about how what your team

what your organization is doing

to help customers help employees to help

partners to help communities

research shows that actually less of a

profit focus will help you get

to more profit so what is leadership

well former president dwight eisenhower

has a really great definition he said

leadership is getting people to do the

things you want done

because they want to do them not not

because they have to not because they’re

forced to not because they’re worried

they’ll get fired

not even because they want a promotion

or they’re trying to suck up to the boss

but because they genuinely want to do

these things that’s real leadership

great definition but how do you do that

how do you motivate people to want to do

these things

well research and one of the pivotal

moments in our country’s history

show that servant leadership might just

be the best way to do it

i still don’t know what the word v means

i probably never will

but i’m starting to get just a little

bit of an idea about what leadership

might be

it’s sharing power it’s developing

people it’s helping them grow it’s

having

foresight and thinking ahead and

listening to what ideas others have and

it’s motivating

by talking to people together to talk

about how is what we’re doing making a

positive difference for someone

for a customer for a partner for another

employee for another team

for our community maybe even for broader

society if you want to get ambitious and

i know it may sound idealistic

and not like what you’re expecting from

a leadership talk but research says

it really really has a uniquely powerful

effect

it’s called servant leadership read

about it think about it

give it a try it might just change the

way you look

at organizational and team management

and leadership for the rest of your life

it can make you a better leader it might

just help you to make a

big difference in the life of someone

else a customer an employee

a follower maybe your community

everybody wins

and that’s what leadership is