Leadership is like wearing a bull’s-eye on your chest during hunting season, according to Dan Allender in his book Leading with a Limp: Taking Full Advantage of Your Most Powerful Weakness. The core assumption of the book is: “To the degree you face and name and deal with your failures as a leader, to that same extent you will create an environment conducive to growing and retaining productive and committed colleagues.”
Allender goes on to describe the type of leader we expect – someone who has authority, confidence, charisma, an ability to make tough decisions – but leaders invariably fall short of expectations (which are often conflicting) and thereby incur the wrath of many. Leaders have to deal with loneliness, betrayal, unpopularity, making tough decisions, failing, and carrying the weight of having inflicted pain on others.
The book says many things that are helpful in dealing with the downside of leadership. Leaders do need to know how to stay open to criticism, admit faults, seek forgiveness for mistakes, and remain humble. However, by the end I found the book just a bit too depressing. In my view, some people have the gift of leadership, and organisations really do work better when a gifted leader in charge rather than a humble apologetic person who is not gifted as a leader.