Bold Followership

Well, hey there, Cadre. Happy Monday. How are you doing? I'm going to wait a moment, as I know it always takes, just like any good gathering of people, whether in person or online, it takes a moment to walk in the door, to get comfortable, to carve out some space, to focus and do the things that you do when you spend time with other people. So on Mondays, we talk professional development, right in maybe a traditional workspace or work cadence. Monday is the beginning of something, the beginning of a work week, maybe the beginning of a chapter, the beginning of a new project.

So on Mondays, every single live stream spends some time looking at that. Looking at you, having the opportunity to consider how you do, what you do with your lives. Hey, everybody. It's nice to see you showing up. This morning we had the opportunity to have Luke and Jean and Matt jump into live streams. You can always check those out if you miss them by simply scrolling back a little bit. And you'll see their shining faces waiting for you to. To engage. And you can comment, and they get updates on messages.

So if you watch a live stream, not live, well, you can still settle into that live feel. And if you ask a question or share a comment, they get little notifications and can check in with you later. Later on today, you'll see my friends Nick and Daryl signing on for a little live stream action as well. Hey there, Marisa. Nice to see you, my friend. So, on Mondays for professional development, I always speak about one of my favorite topics, and that is following and not following passively and following as if you don't have.

Have power, but flipping that script and saying, actually, who has power in this world? It's not the Taylor Swift and the Beyonce. It's the people who are excited by what the Taylor Swifts and the Beyonces are putting into the world that starts their movement. Now, again, it's a little chicken and egg, right? We can go ahead and say that without the Taylor Swift and the Beyonce, there wouldn't be anyone to follow. Yeah, that's true. And at the same time. Hey, Luke. Hey, speak wonder. Nice to see you, my friends.

And in the same breath, without the people following the Taylor Swift and the Beyonce, they wouldn't be able to have the impact that they have. So in a world where we often focus on the tailors and the Beyonces, I spend a few minutes talking about the rest of the people within that formula. The people who listen, who respond, who amplify, who share, who translate. So I'm going to use a little scenario that I often start every single one of so little backstory. I also, along with being an executive coach and a consultant, working with a lot of communication and change management work, I also have a background in telling stories in the theater.

So I do a lot of theater education. Every time I sit in either the artistic director's seat or the music director's seat, I always ask this question to my actors, to the people within the show, I say, what is your job as an actor? What is your job? They always pause because it sounds like too simple of a question and definitely isn't a trick question, but it's a question that we normally don't think about. We often sit in the role of the job that we do, and we go, I do my job. But if you're ever asked the question, what is actually your job?

Maybe there's something to dig into there. So I ask the actors, what is your job? And some of them say, to act. And I go, okay, what does that mean? What is to act? And then normally I get one of two answers. They go, well, it's my job to do what the director tells me to do. And it's at that moment I go, ah, I beg to disagree, but normally there's someone in the room who digs into, like, what is acting? And they go, well, it's making choices. And I go, that's it. The job of an actor is to make choices.

And then I ask, what is my job as the director? And they pause again. And if they're still in that mindset of, well, it's my job to do what the director tells me to do. They get silent. They go, well, I don't know what my job is, because you haven't told me. But the people who are looking at acting as the job of making choices, they go, well, if I'm the actor and it's my job to make the choice, then it must be the director's job to share their feedback and perspective on the choices that are being made.

And to say, yes, that is the right choice for the situation. Or I would say, what a good director would do is, I see your choice, I understand your choice, and let's try a different choice. Directors have an easy job when the actors are making choices confidently, because all the director's job is, is to go, okay, let's align all of these choices to tell the story that we want to tell. I will tell you it's a hard job in the seat of director when the actors are waiting for the director to tell him what to do.

That's why I always say it's not the job of the actor to do what the director tells him to do. And in a similar vein, it is not the job of the follower to do what the leader tells them to do. It is the job of the follower to make the best choices within their perspective, to tell the story, to do the work that is at hand. And all of a sudden, the leader's job is to look at the choices being made and to go, well, what is our vision? What is our purpose? What are we attempting to do together? And that leader's job is to make sure that all the followers, if they focus on their bit, that all their bits are working together to accomplish the bigger goal.

So I'm curious, all of you out there, think about when you are in the seat of follower. Are you waiting for someone to tell you what to do? Or are you looking at the world that you have signed up to be a part of and going, okay, from what I understand, I should be doing this because this is going to meet my skillset. This fits what I've been told, my part of this puzzle, my part of this project, my part of this story is, and I'm going to confidently, courageously do that thing, trusting that my leader, if they're being a good leader, is going to say, hey, you know what, I see what you're doing.

I understand why you're doing it. And one of two things, keep going or let's do something else. If the leader all of a sudden goes, no, I want you to do this. I want you to do this. I want you to do this without acknowledging that having bold followers is the way that we change the world and the leader needs to adjust their perspective on what their job is. But followers, we have an opportunity to boldly exist within the world that we've been invited to be a part of. And all of a sudden what happens?

Yeah, an active follower, not a passive follower. Right? Speak wonder. This is bold followership. Think about that actor who's waiting to be told what to do on that stage. I call that a bad actor, an actor who goes, I've been given the opportunity to fill a certain part of this story and I'm going to bring myself to it. All of a sudden we can start telling some pretty powerful stories together. So ask yourself, bold followers, are you waiting to be told what to do? Are you making choices, trusting that your leader will affirm your choices and say, those are the right ones or the wrong ones to get to where we're trying to get to together?

We'll talk to you soon.