I’ve been hearing a lot of buzz about wanting to be a Project Lead or they wanted to be considered as a Senior Developer in a company. It’s a great title to have because you’ll be considered by others to be a high-level specialist with a proven skill to show. I’ve been wanting that title since I was in my first years of employment imagining that you’ll just give directions and that’s it. Being paid to just give orders isn’t bad but as I’ve matured I realized that being a Lead isn’t what it seems to be.
I had met someone in the past and asked why is it so hard to transfer job for a better pay and a good title. Something amazing happened. He said, “I wouldn’t sacrifice an environment where I can grow and being led by someone who I trust.” I was curious about that last line and asked some more. The more I asked, I learned that he felt that every day he was being taught to become someone who can lead others. I argued, “is ordering someone and managing a team fun for you?” He answered, “being a leader doesn’t mean managing a team. It’s about leading a band to a right direction.” I was baffled because I thought it’s all about work but it’s not. It’s a whole different thing to be lead as if someone is teaching you how to walk rather than being ordered to walk on your own.
Managing vs Leading
I learned that managing and leading are totally different. To put it simply, you manage non-living things and you lead living beings. Beings who have emotions and intelligence are bound to be lead and not manage. If we think that a workplace or business needs to manage their people and disregard the feelings of their workers then what’s the difference between us today and our ancestors who practice slavery? The only thing that I can think of is that today slaves wear suits, pants, and shoes, but the fear of being terminated at the end of the day still exist. In the past, if a slave doesn’t work his/her work well, they will be whipped, tortured, and killed. Now, we terminate people leaving them miserable finding a new job to feed themselves. They are not disposable pawns, they are people.
No One is of the Same Person
As Simon Sinek said, nobody wakes up every day to be managed. No one likes that. People wanted to be lead in the right direction. The irony is that people say, “you’re big enough, you know what to do.” Then what? Isn’t it great to hear if your immediate superior tells you, “just do it, if you fail, find out what’s wrong and do it again till you succeed.” I think we all have that attitude of “since I can do it myself then you won’t you?” Spoilers! You are two different people and each and everyone has their own way of doing it. They might be slow to learn or fast to adapt and even if you end up the same result, you two are different individuals. Cut the, “you’re just like me” or “be like X” line because no one is two of the same person.
Leaders are Humans too
I also met another person who is in a different spectrum. I resonated with him because we have the same mindset about a management role. The mindset of you’ll need to kill/torture yourself for the betterment of the team. I was scared in the past to take the lead because of its too much work. I wanted to live my life as normal as possible. I wanted to be contented and the truth is that we’ll take the lead at some point in our lives and it’s unavoidable. The whole idea of stress, pain, and all dirty things is a part of it is true but remember that you have a team, not a draggable object. Maybe the reason why we are scared of the pain is that we don’t want to feel inferior to our peers. We don’t want the shame of being a weak leader. We wanted to be the alpha because we are the leader. If you are in-charge, try to open up your weakness and notice their responses. At the end of the day, it’s not you who will deliver the result, it’s your team.
If you find this post interesting, feel free to tweet me (twitter.com/rhygonzales) your thoughts and I’d be happy to have a conversation on Twitter.
