Leadership and Management The biblical Solomon showed how the shepherd leader could use his rod and staff to manage wisely and to restore justice and judgment. With the leader’s sixth sense (derived from the staff), Solomon was able to restore a stolen child to the proper mother. With the staff, the leader is able to handle criticism, rejection, distraction, and opposition through effective conflict resolution and management. The leader agrees with 1 Corinthians 10:13 that “no temptation has seized you that is not common to man. And God is faithful. He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, He will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.” So nothing appears strange to the shepherd leader. Leaders fall and rise again, so their restorative self-management should be life giving, refreshing, and supportive. In Psalms 23:3, King David said of his leader, “He restoreth my soul: He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.” Shepherd leaders plan, organize, control, coordinate, direct, coach, and mentor. They are also expected to communicate the right core values, culture, and morals to the followers and be harbingers of hope, such that their legacies transcend. Leadership restores norms of society and encourages decorum. Some time ago, an e-mail was forwarded to me captioned “Touching Story of Appreciation.” The story was applied to illustrate a point in the book The Quest for Distinction. It is reproduced here to reinforce the need for leaders to concern themselves with social morality and for followership to be receptive. The story, slightly edited to aid the flow of reading, is reproduced as follows: One young, academically excellent person went to apply for a managerial position in a big company. He passed the first interview. The director did the last interview and made the last decision. The director discovered from the youth’s CV that his academic results were excellent all the way, from secondary school until postgraduate research—never a year that he did not score highly. The director asked, “Did you obtain any scholarship in school?” The youth answered, “None.” The director asked, “Is it your father who paid for your school fees?” The youth answered, “My father passed away when I was one year old. It was my mother who paid my school fees.” The director asked, “Where did your mother work?” The youth answered, “My mother worked as clothes cleaner.” The director requested the youth to show his hands. The youth showed a pair of hands that was smooth and perfect. The director asked, “Did you ever help your mother wash the clothes before?” The youth answered, “Never. My mother always wanted me to study and read more books. Furthermore, my mother can wash clothes faster than me.” The director said, “I have a request: when you go back home today, go and help to clean your mother’s hands, and then see me tomorrow morning.” The youth felt that his chance of landing the job was high. When he went back home, he happily wanted to clean his mother’s hands. His mother felt strange; happy but mixed with fear, she showed her hands to the youth. The youth cleaned his mother’s hands slowly; his tears dropped down as he did that. It was the first time he found that his mother’s hands were so wrinkled and covered in so many bruises. Some bruises incited pains so strong that shivers went down his mother’s body when they were cleaned with water. This was the first time the youth realized and experienced that it was this pair of hands that had washed the clothes every day to earn him the school fees. The bruises on his mother’s hands were the price that his mother had paid for his graduation and academic excellence and probably his future. After finishing the cleaning of his mother’s hands, the youth quietly cleaned all the remaining clothes for his mother. That night, mother and son talked for a very long time. Next morning, the youth went to the director’s office. The director noticed the tears in the youth’s eye and asked, “Can you tell me what you have done and learned yesterday in your house?” The youth answered, “I cleaned my mother’s hands and also finished cleaning all the remaining clothes.” The director asked, “Please tell me your feelings.” The youth said, “Number One, I now know what appreciation is. Without my mother, there would not be the successful me today. “Number Two, I now know how to work together with my mother, and I can realize how difficult and tough it is to get something done. “Number Three, I now know the importance and value of family relationship.” The director said, “These are the traits I am asking for. I want to recruit a person to be my manager that can appreciate the help of others, that understands the suffering of others in getting things done, and that would not put money as his only goal in life. You are hired.” Later on, this young person worked very hard and received the respect of his subordinates. Every employee worked diligently and in a team. The company’s results improved tremendously. When a young person is protected by his parents and habitually given whatever he wants, he develops an entitlement mentality and always considers himself first. He is ignorant of his parents’ efforts. When he starts work, he assumes that every colleague must listen to him, and when he becomes a manager, he never feels the suffering of his subordinates. For this kind of protected young person, he may be successful for a while but eventually will not feel any sense of achievement. He will grumble and be full of hatred and fight for more. If we are these kinds of protective parents, do we love our young ones or help destroy them? You can let your young ones live in big houses, eat good meals, learn piano, and watch big-screen TVs. But when you are cutting the grass, please let them experience it. After a meal, let them wash the plates and bowls together with their brothers and sisters. It is not because you don’t have money to hire a maid, but it is because you want to love them in the right way. You want them to understand that no matter how rich their parents are, one day their hair will grow gray, same as the mother of that young person. The most important thing is that your young ones should learn how to appreciate the effort of others, experience the difficulty of life, and develop the ability to work with others to get things done. Leadership is a generational affair handed down from one person to the other and sometimes in a cyclical manner: parent to child, boss to subordinate, leader to follower, and follower to leader. Leadership and management are complementary. The leadership lesson to learn from the story is that shepherd leaders are teachers, coaches, mentors, and managers. They teach the followers the importance of appreciation, teamwork, communication, and relationships. With the rod, the shepherd leader teaches action-mindedness enmeshed in service-mindedness, and with the staff, he practices and teaches social and influencing skills devoid of obsession for reward. In all, leadership is not always a particularly pleasant business. There is a price to pay!
Posted on: Wed, 11 Sep 2013 06:00:00 +0000