The GPS Model Of Leadership
Transcriber: Evelyn Bagley
Reviewer: Hani Eldalees
To begin with, we are born leaders.
But we must be trained through a process
to become good leaders because
the word “leader” is not enough.
It needs to be good. It needs to
be trained and be professional.
And we live in such different ways.
For example, today I chose
to read this speech,
this conversation between us to you guys.
And you guys chose to lead yourself to be
here today, to become my audience.
It all depends on our different
perspectives and our roles in life.
Today, I am the guest speaker,
and you are my audience.
And it is such an honor for
me to be “standing” here
on this honorable stage of TEDxYou.
So, the first thing is that
a leader is not just a title.
I use the words, “Not just.”
If I say, “A leader,” it’s not a title.
That might be wrong somehow.
So, I wanted to use the words, “Not just a
title” to be more precise.
Simon Sinek once said, “A boss has the
title, but a leader has the people.”
You can imagine yourself being a king
or queen or a leader of a country.
That is when the title is very,
very important to you.
Well, my high school years,
I used to be the president of my
high school English club.
And I had been working with a lot of
passionate young students who were at
the same age as mine or younger than me.
However, I was not a good leader.
Why?
Because I drafted our projects,
I carried out some ideas, and then
I did everything on my own.
I had a team of about 20 members.
And they were there to only support
me mentally because at that time
I was very confident about myself. And I
did not pay attention to the fact that,
“Oh, I am the leader. I have to guide
people through everything.
And I have to divide to work for them
and let them collaborate with me to
ensure the best work quality.”
However, I did not do that. I did
every single thing on my own.
For example, if I planned a project,
I would be carrying on my shoulders
like raw scripts, be the M.C. ,
make the whole program. And
that stuff like that.
I did not delegate any work
to my team members.
That was a pity of my high school life.
I finally recognized that
being a leader is being
the person who grows with others, who
works and develops his or herself
with other friends, teammates, partners,
companions.
And rather than a person who has the
higher role or a higher authority.
So, where does a leader start?
A leader starts by having a vision.
And if I am leader of my English club,
I have a vision of enhancing my fellow
high school students to develop their
English into a higher level. That is my
vision. And then, I gather people around.
And if I am a leader,
start with a vision.
I would need to influence
people by my goal.
And if they realize that, “Oh, I have
the same idea or the same thought,
the same goal to go ahead for just
like him, just like Nam,
I would join his team
to make that project
or organize that club together with him.”
So, if a person tries
to do everything his or her best,
they would become leaders themselves.
They do not need everybody to
elect them and lucky draw
or something like that.
You just only need to drive yourself
towards the best destination for
the whole team and for
yourself personally.
Therefore, being a leader is not
just a title, not just a title,
but it is the crown of responsibility
and hard work alongside with respect
towards your companions, your partners,
your teammates or your friends
to be the simplest.
So, the responsibility of a true leader.
What makes a true leader? And
how do we become one?
The first person you learn to
lead and manage is yourself.
And I really love this piece of advice
from John Maxwell that states,
“When you lead yourself, use your head.
When you lead others, use your heart.”
There were times when I witnessed my
team members missing the deadlines,
the given deadlines, the given
task they did not fulfill on
the missions given to them within
the team. And I was questioning myself.
I was questioning my own ability to lead,
whether I am a bad leader,
or am I a good one?
Why did I let those things
happen to my team?
The same thing also applies in my daily
life where I make mistakes.
I have grown from blaming all of my
life, and when I had some problem,
I would be like,
“Oh, fate is so unfair with me.”
And I would try to blame other external
factors. “This one doesn’t do well.”
“This one doesn’t do as required.”
And now that I have grown from that phase,
I try to carry and receive the whole
responsibility on my shoulders.
As the first part I have mentioned
is, being a leader is
the crown of responsibility and hard work.
So, how do I do my work with a teammate
when there are different types of people
with different types of skills? The first
thing I want you to do is to
observe. Observe others’ work performance,
whether they have potential or they
are just not active enough as
the job requires. And I would like to
divide them into two types of people
in a team. The first one is
the one with the talent,
the potential, and the hard
work, responsibility.
And the second type of people is the
people who are not active.
And they are also divided
into two sections,
which are the person who is not active
and a person who is “lacking of”
some potentials inside of them.
And my way of dealing with those types
of people is that when I meet
a person who devotes themself
really hard to the team,
I will recognize them more often.
But not too often
that they become arrogant. It always
starts with a question; why?
Why do those things happen?
When you are a leader, you do not just
get to know the team. “Hi, my name is Nam.
Your name is Leeann. Your name is Yong.”
For example, or something like that.
You want to understand your members more
and understand their thinking process
because as I have mentioned before, people
will want to be in your team if they
have the same purpose as yours.
It’s by having that same purpose
and the same destination.
They might have different different
thinking processes.
We are different humans,
different individuals.
So, our perspectives of things
are completely different.
So, learn to sympathize and listen
to them first to know why.
As I have stated earlier, we are “born
leaders,” but leaders aren’t only born.
They are made through a process.
Back in my high school year, I was
enhancing my English skills.
I love English. I love listening to
English songs from The Carpenters.
And I love watching the movie,
Alice in Wonderland.
Therefore, I aim for a higher education
and dream about scholarships
and studying abroad and all of the
nominations, the honorable one.
And I was paying attention to my success.
But when I decided to found
an English club,
which only started by talking
to my English teachers.
Just a short meeting and then my
English club was born. Why?
Because I care about my high school
students’ English ability.
That is what I founded my English club.
From this short story, I want to imply
that before you are a leader,
you care for your success and you are
paying attention and all of the hard work.
You are devoting yourself
to your own success.
But when you are a leader,
you care for others’ success too, not just
the team members of your projects,
but the people that can be affected
by your projects.
Success can come from a lot of different
and unique and various types of ways.
It can simply be a success
mentally or physically.
I founded the BUV Lotus Association
to create and spread
stories within our community and enrich
more high school students for BUV.
And the way we work is that we will have
a meeting each week to discuss
and brainstorm new ideas that we
will have made into real life.
We discuss and brainstorm our ideas
and try to debate to find
the best ways to look at a matter.
Then we would divide the workload into
each team member’s role.
As the role of the president, I had to
do all the hard work, mostly
a lot of the hard work that I’m glad
that my team shares very well with me.
And I am very grateful for my team
because we are working in and for
a nonprofit project and organization.
And they are very hardworking.
They spend their time with Lotus, which
makes me really happy and proud of them.
Therefore, I am very grateful
for having them in my team.
And gratitude is something that I always
want you to have by being a leader
or not because being
grateful for someone
or something can change their lives.
Or it’s life. And your life too.
When you learn to become grateful,
you will not be taking
anything for granted
as if they were naturally happening
without a reason.
You have to recognize people’s hard
work and celebrate their success.
I remember when I first entered BUV.
I applied to become a TEDx
core team member. And I failed.
I failed horribly, as I recall
in my mind right now,
When I stepped out of the interview room,
I was underestimating myself.
I was looking down on myself.
And I wrote inside my phone,
my phone here.
And I wrote Inside the notebook on
my phone that, “I failed to become
a TEDx core team member, so I decided
to become a TEDx speaker instead.”
And then, today, that line just came true.
And I am very proud of myself
and grateful for
every single person who has ever said,
“No,” to me or rejected me in my life
because without them, I would never
be successful as I am today.
And success, for me, is being able to
inspire people and sharing my story.
And this failure story that I have just
mentioned to you is my life lesson
because I chose to lead myself out of
discouragement and disappointment.
And I focus on myself with a belief that
I will succeed even greater
than my previous goal.
For example, I applied for
a TEDx committee member,
and now I am here as the role of
a TEDx speaker.
And I want all of you to have
that belief with me, too,
because starting to self lead is starting
to believe in yourself
and have some motivations
toward your goals.
And what to do if you fail several times
when in your journey of becoming
a leader, a “proper leader.”
We all make mistakes. And we
all have all the time in
the world to improve ourselves.
And our teammates are there to help
us and guide us through together.
As I have mentioned, to self
lead with other people is
an achievement that you
always want to help.
So, you must never underestimate yourself
when you do something wrong
as the position of a leader
or team member.
You must focus on the fact that
we are leading together.
We are leading the whole thing together.
And we are developing ourselves together.
Becoming a leader is a process,
not a self-made goal.
There is a hidden model that I have
been hiding under my speech for
the whole time, that you have been
listening and understanding that model.
I call that the GPS model of leadership.
Can you tell me what GPS
means in real life?
Anybody know what GPS means?
I have a hint for you. It’s like
in a map, like a Google map.
Yes, it’s a global positioning system.
It’s like when you use a map or
a Google map to lead the way,
you have to understand what a GPS means
and how it positions your place
on a map. The same thing, we
apply with leadership.
This GPS model of mine will guide
you through and sum up everything
I have just said to you the whole time.
My G,P, and S stands for
gratitude, patience, and self leadership.
Gratitude is being grateful for
everything. For your team,
give them appreciation and celebration
as if you are celebrating
your own success.
It can be a word of encouragement.
“You have done a really good job.
I’m really proud of you. Please
keep up the good work.
The whole team is very proud of
you too.” Or just a cookie.
I remember I gave my team member a cup
of Starbucks because they just work
so hard, and they stay like
overnight for the work.
And I didn’t even ask for that.
But she devoted herself a lot. So, I
just gave her a cup of Starbucks,
even though it’s not much, that she
is very grateful for that, too.
As long that your team members
are recognized,
they will not lose their passion towards
the work they are doing.
Have you ever been not recognized
when you do something meaningful
for other people? I have been like that.
And I have been discouraged a lot
because I do a lot of things and many
people just do not recognize my success.
And sometimes I’m truly lost when
I get that type of feedback.
So, I want all of you to be
grateful for your team
and all of their team members’ hard work.
And just give them some
words of encouragement.
Somebody said, “It’s not sure when you
give them appreciation, they will deliver
the best work quality.”
It is somehow true
because you never know how
how people will react.
But a word of encouragement is still
better than none, right?
The second thing is the P. The
P stands for patience.
Whenever your team members
miss the deadlines,
I know you can lose your temper
and grow mad at them.
However, you can also choose to be
a good listener, to lend them
a hand, to understand the causes.
Being patient while you lead is very
crucial to the team development.
But being patient, however,
is not standing a person
who is irresponsible for too many times.
It does not work like that.
Being patient is when you listen
to understand the causes
and what you can do to help them,
not do everything for them.
And the last thing is also the thing
that I have mentioned throughout
the whole talk, which is self leadership.
As I have made this point quite clear
throughout the talk,
stop blaming yourself
before leading others
because a true self leader
lies in the head,
but a true leader lies inside the heart.
So, being able to self lead means
you are self disciplined.
And self discipline means self love.
So, never stop trying to
make yourself
a better version of the yesterday you. And
be patient with yourself on the choices
and the decisions you make.
I sincerely thank you for leading
yourself to listen
and get some takeaway from my speech.
So, I have my very last question.
Are you a leader?