סיפר רבי מאיר חדש, מתלמידי ישיבת חברון, על ביקור שערך האדמו"ר מגור אצל הסבא בעת חוליו: בעת שהותו במלון הגיע לביקור האדמו"ר מגור עם קבוצה מחסידיו. הוא התפלא לראות, כי התלמידים עזבו את הישיבה כדי להיות במחיצת רבם, והם משמשים אותו במסירות וביראת כבוד.
"אני רואה שגם לך יש חסידים – פנה הרבי אל ה"סבא" – אז מה ההבדל בינינו?"
לאחר לכתו אמר ה"סבא": "דער רעבע מאכט חסידים (הרבי עושה חסידים), און איך מאך רעבעס (ואני עושה אדמורי"ם)".
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Some people say that in order to have leaders you must also have followers. But the truth is:
True leaders don’t create followers, they create more leaders.
Followers are dependent — they need to be told what to do. Creating followers brings additional workload for the leader. It creates a pattern of dependency that leads to stagnation, as the organization’s capacity to change reduces to the capacity of the single leader. The leader becomes a bottleneck.
When times are stable, creating followers can make sense. It aligns everyone behind the leader’s single goal. But when times are churning, the ability to flex and adapt becomes paramount.
To survive in times of change, the organization’s ability to adapt must be greater than rate of change in the marketplace.
Leaders who create followers reduce the capacity of the organisation to adjust.
Leaders who create more leaders increase the capacity of the organisation to change and to grow. They increase its resilience and agility.
This brings a new issue: how to coordinate the different parts, which of the multiple opportunities to pursue. But this is a good problem to have — especially compared with the alternative, which is stagnation. And if the new leaders are true leaders (who also create more leaders) then it is an issue that is relatively easy to deal with.
Leaders who create more leaders expand their ability to create results at a distance. They increase their own capacity as people and the results they are able to achieve. And they increase the ability of their organizations to succeed.
That means, the more leaders the better.
Do the people you work with encourage you to be a better leader or a better follower? What do you encourage in the people around you? Which approach will serve you better over the next 24 months?
