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Wisdom Under Fire: Is “Lead by Example” Enough? · Unspoken Career Truths

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  Welcome to Unspoken Career Truths.
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  I'm Lauren Levette Gilbert. And I'm Cara Wood.
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  And we're here to be the coworkers you can trust.
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  Hey, Lauren. Hey Cara, it's my favorite type
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  of episode. It is.
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  We are debating wisdom under fire.
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  Woo Hoo. So we've chosen, because April
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  is leadership month, to debate the phrase lead by example.
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  That's a good one, yeah. Are we gonna disagree?
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  Are we gonna agree? That's always the question.
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  I know. I think it's still the question.
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  I think we we honestly don't know at the start of this
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  episode. Nope.
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  But what we do know is that people debate the origin of
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  where this phrase came from. You could go all the way back to
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  Greek philosopher Epicetus who was a freed slave and he said
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  famously that individuals are responsible for their own
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  actions. So lead by example.
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  Do the things that represent you.
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  He was a Stoic or it's also often times like hide into a
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  Bible phrase. In John 1315, Jesus said, I have
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  set you an example that you should do as I have done for
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  you. I've often heard this as like do
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  unto others as they will do unto you.
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  So I think this is, you know, parlance that maybe is sort of
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  familiar to folks more recently, Albert Schweitzer right around
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  the turn of the 20th century, who was a missionary Dr. as well
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  as a physician and a musician, multi talented dude who won a
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  Nobel Prize for his work that was called reverence of life.
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  He said an example is not the main thing and influencing
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  others. It is the only thing.
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  And so again, this idea that everything that you that you do,
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  you actually have to like live this life that is by example.
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  I will just quickly mentioned that Albert Schweitzer has his
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  pro stance on colonialism. So he's a little bit of a
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  controversial figure because of his missionary work.
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  Oftentimes he had paternalistic ideas around who he was helping.
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  Even a debate on the origin. Yes, there's even a debate on
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  the origin, which I think often happens when we're talking about
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  like this phrase that feels kind of trite and common.
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  It's like, well, where did this come from?
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  And you can sort of see out of those three that it sort of
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  evolves, right? Like Greek philosopher just sort
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  of saying, hey, you're responsible for your own
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  actions. And then, you know, biblical
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  history saying, you know, setting an example so that
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  everyone else is living up to that example.
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  Is this this Christ like idea? And then more modern times just
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  being like what I do and how I live is important for everyone
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  to see. It's going to be a reflection of
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  who I am. So who wants to go first?
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  Do you want me to go or do you want to go, Carl?
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  Yeah. I mean, well, I'm kind of
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  curious. I guess my first question about
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  this phrase in general is just like, what's your interpretation
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  of it? Like what does it mean to you,
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  Lauren? So I learn more towards kind of
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  like the give what you get type of thing.
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  So like meaning like if you're a kind person, you get kindness
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  back, like lead by example, you know, like if you want people to
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  be more kind, be kinder, you know, like that's kind of how I
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  think about it. Like if you're in an environment
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  where people are not being thoughtful, if you're
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  thoughtful, you can kind of create that like energy, kind of
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  like the you get the energy you give.
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  That's that's how I think about it in that realm.
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  How about you, Cara? Well, and I like that because I
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  think a lot as you're describing that I'm thinking about how
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  often times like modeling behavior.
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  So you're like, all right, I don't see this behavior yet, but
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  let me show you how it could work and how good it could be
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  because I know it's possible. In my head, I went super
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  tactical. I was definitely thinking about
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  our podcast topic and, and, and working.
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  When you are the kind of manager that takes vacations, then your
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  other your team is willing to take vacations.
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  When you're the kind of manager who stays late, then your team
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  is pressured to stay late. So that idea of leading by
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  example is like setting this tone for everyone else and
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  almost in some cases dictating then the environment that you're
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  working in. I completely agree with that.
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  I think if you set the example that you can ping on the
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  weekends or send e-mail on the weekends, or I'm reading e-mail
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  on the weekends, there's a lot of pressure for the rest of your
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  team to do that. So I mean, I think the leading
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  by example or setting the right example is so, so true because
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  people pick up how other people are acting.
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  And especially if you're a leader, your team is looking to
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  you for guidance. They're looking to you because
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  they want to make sure that they're doing the right thing.
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  They probably want to impress you or they want your approval.
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  Like there's a natural tendency for most humans to want approval
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  from other humans, right? So especially in that kind of
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  like leadership persona, it's very, very prevalent.
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  So if you are setting a specific example, it's definitely
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  emanating throughout your team. And we've talked a lot about
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  like energy and the energy bring and the influence you can have.
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  And I think that correlates so much.
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  Yeah, I think of one of the best managers that I ever had, owner
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  of the meat market. You know we had maggots in our
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  dumpster unfortunately, which is a disgusting thing to have the.
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  Worst. When he jumped right in there
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  with the rest of us to like hose them out of the dumpster.
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  And so like to be that leader who's acting exactly as you want
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  everyone else to act like we have to clean up this terrible
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  mess that we've made is, you know, is a great leader.
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  Like I'm always like, if my boss isn't going to jump into
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  dumpster or maggots with me, I, I, you know, that's the kind of
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  person I want to work for. So.
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  I love that I have a similar example.
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  There was not magnets and there was no dumpster involved but
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  there was a very massive excel sheet so I had to.
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  We got asked by like a retailer to create 250 images in 2 days.
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  And. I had the option to either
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  delegate it to the team or jump in and do it together.
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  So I said, hey, listen, I did not set this, but we have to
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  meet it or we're going to get fined.
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  What we're going to do is I blocked a conference room.
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  Everybody bring your laptop. Here's the images.
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  We're going to split them in. It was four people.
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  We're going to split them in four.
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  We're each going to take a chunk and we're just going to crush it
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  out in the next couple hours. And we just kind of went in and
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  we did it together. And I think it made them feel
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  really great because I was helping.
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  We were all like going through it together.
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  They knew that I had their back and I felt the energy in the
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  room change when that happened. And so I think that's a great
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  way to say like, hey, either whether it's maggots in a
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  dumpster or a fire, you have to put out a jerk jump in.
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  Yeah, exactly. Well, I will for contrarian
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  sake, I will also say that, but I have another, I think this
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  this phrase has another kind of question attached to it.
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  So like lead by example. I think my other question is
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  there are other things to lead by.
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  So what aside from example might one lead by?
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  Like is it vision? Character.
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  Is it character? Is it, you know, motivation like
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  we often talk about or we hear about visionary leaders or
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  inspirational leaders? Do we want to disagree with
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  Albert Weiser saying the only thing is example?
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  Is there something else that a leader should add to the list?
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  Should be lead by example and. I'd argue that all those other
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  things we talked about are, are the examples, are the actions,
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  right, like leading with strong character or having the right
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  principles or I think they all kind of fall under the same
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  umbrella in my opinion, right? Like you're leading by you, like
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  you're leading by who you are, and those are all elements of
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  you. When you're leading in a space
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  that is visionary or unpaved, is it possible to lead by example
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  the way that you might approach a problem, but not by an actual
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  example you can provide yet because the future is uncertain?
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  Yeah. I think in that case, the
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  example would be your character and who you are and like how you
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  treat people, because I think people remember people and
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  people remember how they were treated way more than they
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  remember that Excel sheet or the work that I just talked about.
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  Like. So I think that resonates much
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  more. And even all the leadership
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  styles we're going to be talking about this month, I think that's
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  even important too. It's about the people and how
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  you make them feel versus like how much work you did.
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  But there's something about where you're headed that I think
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  also can help people. Like in addition to an example
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  that you can put in front of people or an action you can
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  immediately take and show them like I'm here in this
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  spreadsheet, like you, you kind of already had it in your
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  example, like we're going to avoid fines because we're all
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  working together to do this. So there is something.
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  Outcome. Yeah, there's this outcome that
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  you have to add. So there's the example of work
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  that's already been done or that's being done in front of
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  them. But then there's also a where
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  it's going to take you because in addition to how they feel,
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  people also want to know kind of what's in it for me.
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  Where am I headed? Where is this person taking me?
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  Yeah. Great point.
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  I all of this. It's crazy to me.
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  I feel like I say this a lot, but like at the end of the day,
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  almost every problem comes down to like being human and like how
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  humans react and how they feel and their nature.
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  And I think this is another really great example of that.
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  Yeah, Today at lunch, a friend of mine was telling me about
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  this idea of approaching people to make sure that you're
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  answering the question. If they're asking you the
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  question, do I matter? You're answering it with yes.
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  And I think it's really important as we talk about
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  leadership because everyone on your team matters.
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  They're they're making an impact on your team, even if they're
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  not working the way that you want.
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  Like everyone has an influence on the team.
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  We need way more of that in the world, Cara.
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  Yes. So you all matter to us.
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  Thank you for listening to this podcast and like.
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  Thank you. Chime in to have this
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  conversation about other people who've inspired you by their
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  examples or other things that you lead by.
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  Or share wisdom under fire and we will talk.
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  Got it in a future episode. Thanks everyone.
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  Thanks everyone. And that's a wrap.
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  Thanks for joining us on Unspoken Career Truths.
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