(As promised, here is the first one)

The Courage to Assume Responsibility

Courageous followers assume responsibility for themselves and the organization. They do not hold a paternalistic image of the leader or organization; they do not expect the leader or organization to provide for their security and growth, or to give them permission to act. Courageous followers discover or create opportunities to fulfill their potential and maximize their value to the organization. They initiate values-based action to improve the organization’s external activities and its internal processes. The “authority” to initiate comes from the courageous follower’s understanding and ownership of the common purpose, and from the needs the organization serves.

Commentary

Leaders who are appointed to an official leadership position in an organization that lacks a strong culture of courageous followership may experience a phenomenon known as “reverse delegation”. That’s where the members of the organization see the leader taking up responsibility, and in response think: “hey, this is great!”, and relinquish their responsibilities in such a way that duties begin to fall increasingly to the leader, who then becomes overwhelmed.

Such an organization will never go anywhere. It has found its level, and no matter how much energy you put into it, it will remain there. The members of the organization are happy with things the way they are, and can’t see the point in doing anything more. There is no commitment to improvement.

Organizational success is about who first, then what. With the right people on your team, you can make pretty much anything fly. With the wrong people, no matter how great the plan, it just ain’t going to happen. I use the concept of the “Empowered Disciple” when applying these understandings to ISKCON:

“The “authority” of the empowered disciple to initiate action comes from his or her deep awareness of and alignment with the mission of the parampara, as received through their spiritual master.”

As I used to tell the residents of our ashram in Wellington: “Don’t expect ISKCON to take care of your economic development!” I got this from Srila Prabhupada’s warning: “Don’t go to Vrndavan to solve your economic problems!”

And as I read in Peter Block’s Stewardship one manager informing her team: “These positions were not created for your career development, they were created to impact the bottom line of the organization.”

A real team player is someone who believes in what the organization stands for, what it seeks to achieve and to serve. They are passionately committed to these same ideals, and so are attracted to this organization as a means of serving these ideals in an organized way. Such an individual automatically contributes to organizational success because they are completely aligned with the organizational objectives. This is what Stephen Covey refers to as the fundamental principle at the organizational level: alignment.