Many years ago, my institution paid for me to go on a tour of Israel. As with many such Israel tours, our trip included an overnight stop at the Dead Sea. The Jordan River feeds the Dead Sea, but there is no river outlet for the water that goes into the lake. Instead, the only outlet is evaporation into the intensely heated atmosphere at this lowest spot on the planet. The Dead Sea is located in a highly volcanic region, and the sea’s mineral content is approximately 31.5%, or around nine times the average mineral content of the world’s oceans (3.5%).
Because of the Dead Sea’s extremely high mineral content, buoyancy in such water is much greater than in ordinary seawater. This buoyancy means it is practically impossible for a live human body to sink in its water. Once you’ve climbed in, you quickly discover that you float much “higher” in the Dead Sea than you would float in the ocean. Like many visitors to the Dead Sea, I have a snapshot of me floating in a semi-reclined position in the lake while reading a magazine. I’ll spare you that scene. But here’s a representation of someone else doing that to give you an idea.
But my dip in the Dead Sea also taught me something else about its dense waters. Upon entering the water, I immediately became aware of every bodily orifice as well as every cut, scrape, or other abrasion on my body. They all began to burn. The pain was only moderate, but it was certainly enough to notice.
Leadership is like bathing in the Dead Sea. It will reveal your faults and mistakes more quickly than almost any other activity. We are all faulty and fallen. But leadership exposes our foibles dependably. And the greater the leadership responsibility, the more mercilessly exposed our errors will be. As leaders, our mistakes are out there for everyone to see, and there are few places to hide them even if we wanted to. The visibility of leaders’ faults reflects the essential responsibility of leadership. Leadership requires us to give away the credit and to shoulder the blame. Organizational activity certainly isn’t primarily about assigning blame when things to wrong. There are much greater lessons to be learned from our mistakes. Nevertheless, whenever humans lead other humans, there will be leadership mistakes. When we are the one making those mistakes, it’s our responsibility to own them. And owning our mistakes hurts.
The lesson here, however, is not merely the inevitability of leadership mistakes. Instead, the lesson should be about preparing for their eventuality for the need to learn and grow from our missteps. I have frequently expected too much of myself in this regard. I would work so hard to achieve some goal or complete some project. And when I fell short (either in whole or in part), my mistakes were all I could see.
If you aspire to leadership, you must resign yourself to the reality that you will make many mistakes. But don’t let your faults blind you to the vital task of growing from them. The humiliation your mistakes offer you will be an important counterbalance to your pride as well as providing the best learning opportunities you’ll ever encounter.
The good news is that the vast majority of mistakes can be fixed if we only look past the hurt and embarrassment they produce. I noted this in a previous post, Be A Solutionist. Concentrate on finding solutions to your problems and mistakes. Focusing on solutions helps you escape the “I’m such a failure” quagmire and move forward. And the more solutions you find, the more you will be empowered to turn mistakes into important lessons and opportunities for professional growth.
Go ahead, jump in. The leadership water is fine. It will sting, and the pain means that you have flaws. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to sink.