It's a big word. Not in actuality, but in essence. Two syllables that carry with it one of the most difficult concepts in our collective consciousness, and yet gets thrown around almost as much as "love".
But what does it mean?
I had an interesting debate with a customer today - someone whose opinion I value a great deal. And it truly was a debate - there were no emotions attached, simply a clear disagreement on a principle. What the principle was isn't relevant to this blog - however, the reminder it offered to me was.
You see, some people misunderstand what leadership means - they believe it's about convincing others that your "way" is the right one. Well, sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn't... but that's not the hard part about leadership.
No, the hard part is realizing that your way isn't always the right one... and that sometimes we need to let others find their own way. Or realize that maybe we're wrong. Or (and this is the hardest one) - accept that we may never find common ground. And when that happens, we must be willing to stand up and fight for their right to express a different opinion, even if we disagree with it 100%. We believe we have that right... the true measure of our commitment to that belief is acknowledging others' right to the same principle.
I'm loathe to print other people's ideas or writing, because more often that not I think that it's a shortcut... or worse, we simply haven't thought things through on our own. At the same time, occasionally, someone says what you're trying to better than you can say it yourself - and this is one of those cases.
There is a value in disagreement - as leaders, the challenge is for us to learn to find this value separate and isolated from emotion. If we can learn to master this - then we've taken ourselves to a whole new level of leadership.
I'll leave you with the following. It's a segment of a speech from the screenwriter Aaron Sorkin in the 1995 film "An American President":
You want free speech? Let's see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who's standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours. You want to claim this land as the land of the free? Then the symbol of your country can't just be a flag; the symbol also has to be one of its citizens exercising his right to burn that flag in protest. Show me that, defend that, celebrate that in your classrooms. Then, you can stand up and sing about the "land of the free".
But what does it mean?
I had an interesting debate with a customer today - someone whose opinion I value a great deal. And it truly was a debate - there were no emotions attached, simply a clear disagreement on a principle. What the principle was isn't relevant to this blog - however, the reminder it offered to me was.
You see, some people misunderstand what leadership means - they believe it's about convincing others that your "way" is the right one. Well, sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn't... but that's not the hard part about leadership.
No, the hard part is realizing that your way isn't always the right one... and that sometimes we need to let others find their own way. Or realize that maybe we're wrong. Or (and this is the hardest one) - accept that we may never find common ground. And when that happens, we must be willing to stand up and fight for their right to express a different opinion, even if we disagree with it 100%. We believe we have that right... the true measure of our commitment to that belief is acknowledging others' right to the same principle.
I'm loathe to print other people's ideas or writing, because more often that not I think that it's a shortcut... or worse, we simply haven't thought things through on our own. At the same time, occasionally, someone says what you're trying to better than you can say it yourself - and this is one of those cases.
There is a value in disagreement - as leaders, the challenge is for us to learn to find this value separate and isolated from emotion. If we can learn to master this - then we've taken ourselves to a whole new level of leadership.
I'll leave you with the following. It's a segment of a speech from the screenwriter Aaron Sorkin in the 1995 film "An American President":
You want free speech? Let's see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who's standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours. You want to claim this land as the land of the free? Then the symbol of your country can't just be a flag; the symbol also has to be one of its citizens exercising his right to burn that flag in protest. Show me that, defend that, celebrate that in your classrooms. Then, you can stand up and sing about the "land of the free".
~Guy
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