purpose of leadership

When I ask the question “Why do or did you want to be a leader?”, many answer that they want to take on more responsibility and want to make a bigger difference. That’s like as if you buy the Christmas gifts in order to be seen as a great giver or because you just enjoy shopping itself . It’s interesting how quickly the real purpose vanishes  into the background: In giving it´s the joy of the recipient, in leadership it´s the lead for the people, the care taking, the support, the challenging-developing- ratio, etc. At work it is even a widespread practice and by this “normality” even more subtle: the large, responsible tasks are often done by the leader him-/herself, who is then “excused” for not being able to take care of the staff. And also the supervisor of the leader focuses more on the large, responsible tasks rather than on how his subordinate manager takes care of the leadership tasks.

In this Christmas season, I offer you therefore the following considerations:

• In the metaphor: Which effect criterion is in the foreground when you buy Christmas presents?
• If you are a leader: How do you excuse yourself when not considering the leadership of your employees as your most important task?
• If you are superior of a leader: How do you influence by focus and recognition how much your subordinate leader is following up the purpose of the leadership function?