Why leaders fail – 1

Even gods have clay feet. Leaders do fail and sometimes fall from halcyon heights to the damning depths of ignominy. But leadership failure is largely predictable and so, largely avoidable. But men hardly learn from history until they become history! Men who have towered over the heap hardly learn until the heap towers over them!

Over the next few weeks, I will be examining the various pitfalls in leadership that could account for predictable leadership failure. They are booby traps on the path of every leader. No matter how smart you are as a leader, you will at some point or the other be faced with one or more of these pitfalls. However, when you know their potentially damaging effects to your leadership function, you learn how to navigate your way around them before they become your albatross.

Have you heard about Abdul shoes? I am talking about those foot wears with long, pointed tips that remind you of some oriental magician. If you attended primary school in the sixties, you would have read about the escapades of the character Abdul in one of the New Oxford English textbook series.  In a story adapted from an original titled The Emperor’s New Clothes, written in 1837 by Hans Christian Anderson, Abdul was a reputed trickster who came to an empire where the Emperor was a megalomaniac whose delusion of infallibility had turned him into a tyrant whose word was only challenged on the pain of death. Abdul was intent, not only on cutting him to size but also making him pay handsomely for it. After eulogizing the Emperor to no end about his glory and the splendor of his kingdom, Abdul proposed what was to be the crowning glory of this splendor, a royal garment that no other king or emperor on earth had ever worn. This garment would be different from any other in many respects. Hand-woven and customized in a way that befitted royalty, it would be invisible to anyone who was a ‘sinner’. When completed, the emperor would wear it in a grand parade around town. Anyone who didn’t see the resplendence of this sartorial masterpiece obviously had unclean hands. This would also enable the emperor to know who his enemies in the kingdom were! Buoyed by his ultramega-size ego, the emperor was ecstatic. Abdul and his friend requested for a lot of money to buy the materials required as well as a lavishly furnished house where the weaving would take place. Abdul and his friend were having the best time of their lives. From time to time, the emperor who was the only one permitted so to do, would come visiting. The duo would proceed to ‘show’ him the ‘garment’ with colours and tapestry fit only for kings and which they described in the most glowing language. The emperor saw nothing but his ego would not let him admit it. After all, the emperor must not be seen as a sinner. So he foppishly nodded and smiled as he also held aloft empty space in admiration of his impeccable royal ‘robe’.

As the day of celebration drew near, the emperor had announced to the whole empire that there would be a feast to which all his subjects were invited. On that occasion, he would be wearing the world’s most beautiful regal attire, one whose beauty and sartorial elegance would be invisible only to sinful folk.

• INEC transfers Ekiti REC to Ogun

Expectedly, on the appointed day, he pulled no plugs regarding the prepared feast. A new royal horse was on standby, drummers and singers were to herald the procession round the capital while the people lined both sides of the road to witness the royal wonder. Following Abdul’s instructions, the emperor was not to even put on any undergarments as the robe would compensate for all of that! Abdul painstakingly “dressed” up the emperor to the ‘admiration’ of his aides who took turns to compliment the king on this royal feat and Abdul on his sartorial professionalism and attention to detail. Dressed in his birthday suit, the emperor mounted the new royal horse. The music went into a deafening decibel. The crowd openly cheered but secretly sneered at what everyone saw but no one dared mention. Even the emperor saw himself naked but he dared not admit it. The emperor is infallible and sinless! He sheepishly smiled and waved at everyone. At the centre of town, he dismounted from his horse and decided to dance to his subjects’ admiration. The frenzied charade continued until one little boy who could not figure out what was playing out or why, shouted in a voice that overshadowed the music, “Daddy, come and see. The emperor is dancing naked”! I have seen this scenario play out over and over again in many organizations.

An over-bloated ego is the number one albatross of any leader. When a leader allows his ego to prevail over his capacity to reason, he is on a precipitous free fall! If a leader can master his ego, he can handle almost any other challenge that confronts him in leadership. No wonder the Bible teaches that the man who is able to rule over his spirit (read ego) is stronger than the man who overruns a city.

An egoistic leader is a disaster waiting to happen. Success is spelt P.E.O.P.L.E. When a leader loses sight of the simple fact that he owes his leadership to people who chose to submit to him, he becomes autocratic and conducts himself with the “my way or the highway” attitude that leads by suspicion and coercion rather than trust and relationship. To an ego-driven leader, the position becomes more important than the purpose of leadership. This makes him place his charisma above his character. He operates with the illusion that he can get away with blue murder. In our clime, it is the sole cause of the impunity of immunity. He tolerates no dissent because he operates under the illusion of infallibility and omniscience.

Egoistic leadership breeds sycophants like a carcass breeds maggots. When the followers, who see his underbelly too clearly, notice their leader’s intransigence, they simply help him to massage his ego until he self-destructs. By the time a nondescript ‘child’ (read circumstance) bursts his bubble and smears his face with his own dung, it is usually too late to beat a retreat. Some leaders never recover from the humiliation.

Whenever life puts you in position of leadership, always be reminded of the fact that there are several other people who could have occupied that position. Some of them are evidently smarter than you! So, it is a privilege, not a right! And more importantly, it is a call to serve people, not the other way round. A misunderstanding of this is the reason we have rulers rather than leaders in our polity. When you see a leader goaded by position rather than by purpose, ego rather than ethos, you are looking at a time-bomb primed to implode!

Wondering what happened to Abdul? Well, he wasn’t the emperor, so it really doesn’t matter! …continued

Remember, the sky is not your limit, God is!