It takes maturity to know when time is up

 

By 

Mark Ocitti

Serengeti Breweries Limited

Summary

·         Mastering the art of grooming successors and knowing when to pass the leadership torch on to them is a great way to ensure legacy and continuity

It is finished”, John 19:30.

Probably the three most powerful words in the New Testament of the holy book. Believers consider this

statement the gambit to Christianity as we know it today.

I opine though that leadership scholars should study them for a significant lesson in leadership. Jesus Christ (c. 4 BC – AD 30/33), the founder of Christianity had, a few years before he uttered these words recruited 12 disciples, all commoners from the local communities of the day.

He had worked with them, daily traversing the countryside and environs of Galilee and Judea (in present day Israel) which were then colonies of the Roman empire, as he spread his message, showing them the ropes and preparing them to take over from him when he was gone, all the while telling them that that day would surely come, and soon too.

The disciples on their part were initially slow in internalising the message he preached and the imminence of his mortality, but as time went by got to understand it better.

When he was certain that they were ready he offered himself to his enemies like a sacrificial lamb knowing very well that they wanted him dead, and he was right! Now he lay on the cross upon which he was crucified, crucifixion being a common corporal punishment used by the by the Persians, Carthaginians and Romans of the day, and just before he died he uttered the famous words.

His was a mission accomplished, and now he was announcing to his twelve disciples that hence forth it was up to them to carry it on.

Mastering the art of grooming successors and knowing when to pass the leadership torch on to them is a great way to ensure legacy and continuity. In reality though it is a leadership trait that is currently in very short supply.

Many a good leader today is guilty of paying lip service to the practice of identifying and building successors. Even more are guilty of failing to hand over leadership reigns even when the signs that they should do so are glaring. There are several reasons why this is so but in my opinion two of them stand out.

Firstly, depending on the kind of leader one is and the style of leadership one practices it is possible for one to develop a false sense of infallibility.

Failure to position oneself to constantly receive constructive feedback places one in a position of darkness in as far as the reality around him/her is concerned. A similar fate surrounds those that do receive the feedback but fail to act on it either by ignorance or intent.

In both cases they lose the ability to feel the pulse of the organisations and teams they lead because they are constantly being fed on intelligence that drives only their interests.

Before long they are consumed in a belief that only they have the solutions that their organisations require yet in reality they fail to offer real time responses and solutions to real issues around them.

They lose trust in their teams and surround themselves with only those that reinforce their sense of infallibility which leads them to ignore the need to groom successors.

Secondly, it is quite common for leaders who have been in the same position for a long period of time to develop metathesiophobia, better known as ‘the fear of change’.

Leaders with this phobia find it difficult to face the reality that they will have to pave the way for others to come after them.

They cannot envision themselves in any other roles other than the ones they hold and as such fail to identify and groom successors in the false sense that by not doing so they will continue in their positions indefinitely.

They too start to lose relevance after a while thus paving way to unfortunate inevitabilities.

For the sake of avoiding the above and similar pitfalls it is imperative that leaders be constantly aware that grooming succession and handing over the reins of leadership when the time comes to do so is actually a key leadership function.

Key signs like ability to garner team respect, to receive and act on feedback, to manage conflict, to listen and to act as a sound board for ideas will, among others, show that a groomed successor is ready for the task, and this should be one of the cues to the leader that the time is nigh.

The leader on the other hand should look out for cues like feeling like they are in a comfort zone and not being challenged any more, the job does not put you on edge anymore and has lost its thrill, running out of ideas, not empathising enough anymore and not able to generate winning fresh ideas to know that their time too is nigh, and at this point a good leader will start the long walk towards the culmination of that function.

Thankfully though difference between the bible story and corporate leadership handover is that there is hopefully no need for corporate leaders who are ready to hand over to experience crucifixion in order to do so.