Two Simple Rules To Become a Great Leader

I’ve got two messages that will apply to each one of us today and whether you see yourself as a leader or not because you don’t actually have to be a politician or a four-star general or some sort of chief executive to be a leader . Actually every single one of us can make a difference , every single one of us is a leader in some way or another because leadership isn’t actually about position leadership is about who you are.

But the real message of leadership has been buried deep over the years the last time I googled leadership I got 760million results in half a second ! It’s impossible to find what we really want in all that information. I don’t if you know but the average person on this planet spends up to six months of their life searching for everyday things like keys and mobile phones. Six months ! Of course the more stuff we have the harder we have to search for the things that we’re looking for.

Imagine searching through 760 million things to find your case and that’s the problem that we see today because thousands of different leadership models and concepts have all come together to form this complex tapestry like some sort of remarkable chemical formula that we assume any university professors can understand .Well I’m here to tell you today that leadership is actually very simple , it’s not easy but it is simple. And everything you ever need to know about leadership comes down to one of two simple but very powerful rules and if you grasp these rules and put them into practice you cannot fail to inspire others , be it teams organizations or communities.

So let me get straight to it.

Rule number one is incredibly simple and is the starting point. Everything that you need to know about leadership starts from this one principle. Rule number one of leadership is that IT’S NOT ABOUT YOU! or to misquote Bill Clinton “it’s about the people stupid” . Everything starts here . Eleanor Roosevelt put it like this she said “a good leader can inspire people to have confidence in the leader , a great leader inspires people to have confidence in themselves” . Why ? Because they get rule number one !

And a leader of course is only a leader when they’ve got followers, so the temptation is to create more followers who need you for the answers that you can actually then provide . But of course the best leaders don’t create more followers they create more leaders. They recognize that the idea of the hero flying in to save the day solving all of the problems answering everything just doesn’t make sense . The world is too complex for any one of us to have all of the answers. The secret is to always work on rule number one but it is only part of the picture.

The other key is still missing and that key is rule number two.

Rule number two is as simple and as powerful as rule number one . IT’S ONLY ABOUT YOU ! If ever you want to create change around you it starts with who you are and how you behave. A whole range of theories takes us through to the point that ultimately if we want to inspire others it’s about who we are.

Leadership and life is a bit tough. Things can go a bit pear-shaped from time to time and it’s easy to find ourselves blaming other people and pointing the finger elsewhere but the true leader looks themselves in them mirror and says if i want anything to be different it starts with me. Because the true leader recognizes that’s what’s going on around them is a reflection of who they are that’s the power of rule number two.

We recognize there’s no point waiting for everybody else to get their act together we need to start cleaning up our own act . If we want others to live up to our expectations then it starts with who we are and what we stand for and are we standing up for what we believe in or are we just doing time. Nelson Mandela absolutely nailed rule number two and he said “I couldn’t change others until i changed myself”. I don’t think for a minute this is anything new.

Ancient wisdom had this long ago . Lao Tzu said “ Mastering others is strength Mastering yourself is true power !” Cicero said “ The enemy is within the gates , it is with our own luxury , our own folly, our own criminality that we must contend “. These principles have been around for a very very long time because the rule number two of leadership recognizes that people around us don’t come with remote controls. They recognize that if we want to bring about change in those around us it starts with our behaviors , it starts with who we are because the environment that we create around us is simply a reflection of our thinking and of our behavior.

So when it comes to leadership in reality all that we’re doing in today’ s world is repackaging and redistributing what has been known for millennia. But life’s not quite like that. Life is a journey and sometimes we go around in circles and there’s no such thing as the perfect Leader. But the next best thing is a leader who really gets rule number one and rule number two.

We live in a really complex world that is crying out for simplicity. So let’s just take the lead on these two simple rules because there isn’t a single element of leadership that doesn’t hinge on one of these two principles:

It’s not about you

AND It’s only about you.

Psst : The writer Gaurav Vasishta is a teacher at Leapwaters, which is an online learning platform that teaches future skills . All Skill Camps are taught in live online classes . They teach Leadership & Life Skills . Check out at www.leapwaters.com