So. You Think You Pay Them Enough?

It happened to me again yesterday.
A moment which never fails to grab me by the throat.

The moment when a father shows me pictures/videos of his youngest child.
The moment of almost-disbelief when he tries to describe how…

“This little person is completely changing me.”

And they struggle to articulate that feeling which is more than mere responsibility.
They try to explain the sense of lifelong obligation… to nurture this Beautiful Being.

In this tiny private moment at the start of an effusive Business Summer Party…

a lesson about how we think and behave as leaders…
slapped me in the face.
Hard.

The lesson I needed to be reminded of was magnified later that afternoon.

I glanced at one of the organisers of our Summer Party.
Penny Power, OBE.
Co-Founder of the extraordinary business club… ‘Business Is Personal’ (BIP)

I watched her looking over the mingling community she’d brought together – yet again.

Her face… it was literally glowing.

So, I walked up to her and asked her… “How does this feel? This gathering?”

And she confirmed…
“They feel like my extraordinary children. And I’m responsible for their welfare. That’s how it feels.”

Probably the most terrible mistake I’ve made as a business leader is thinking that employing somebody is an exchange.

“I give you money. Pay you well.
You give me your labour… doing all you can to fulfill your job spec.

And that’s our contract with each other.”

A crass idea, when stripped to its nakedness.
Yet so very easily applied.

Today, far later than I should, I see this…

A Leader Worth Following… sees beyond the obvious contract.
A Leader Worth Following… asks the question…

“What am I doing with the lives these people are placing in my hands?”

Because the people in our teams give us something we can NEVER give back.

Their precious time.
Their attention.
Their belief.
Their years.
Sometimes… their very best years.

Which leaves you and I with this unsettling question…

“What has this person already given me… that I can never repay?”

There are pivotal experiences that teach us starkly about stewardship.
Parenthood is certainly one of them.

Children teach us something about Time.
It passes.
And it never comes back.

Yet it’s a lesson that, in the busy-ness of leadership… we can so easily forget.

Years ago… I thought that paying someone well settled our account.
Years later… I understood there was an account I could never settle.

Because someone who gives me five years of their working life…
has given me five years they can never have again.

Five years of mornings.
Five years of energy.
Five years of possibility.

Five years spent helping me build…my endeavour.
My dream.

I can pay them generously.
I can thank them deeply.
I can help them grow.

But I cannot give them those five years back.
They are gone.

And perhaps that is the terrible beauty of stewardship.

We are entrusted with something we cannot replace.
Someone else’s precious, finite Time.

When I finally understood that…
I began to understand what it really means to be…

A Leader Worth Following.

I just wish I’d understood it much earlier.