“Do good leaders make good parents?”
It is just another question to ask, not an end of the discussion
What would it impact if you find out the answer is YES? or NO? will it make you a better leader or better parent? To me, the impact that comes from trying to answer such questions is in process, the layers you uncover, and the journey into the unasked questions.
We tend as individuals to quickly race to the bottom of the barrel. We want to avoid the I-Don’t-Really-Know situations or the I-Need-Time-Before-I-Answer, or I-Need-More-Info moments. I guess social media made it more prominent, everyone wants a stake in the conversation, everyone wants to say they relate, they have a strong conviction, answers…all within minutes…because in few more minutes you have to move on and do that all over again for a different topic and different people!
I don’t know the answer. I know how things feel though. I know how it feels to sometimes be a bad parent, and disappoint your kids, or even partner. I know how it feels when you are a good parent, the sense of content when you know you got a moment right. I know how it feels to know your team trust you and trust your decision as a leader or a team member in a specific moment or topic, and I know how it feels when you let them down. I think of it as a series of moments, decisions, trials, touchpoints…by some crazy space-time science, come together at certain points.
Empathy is probably the most important bit I think that connects and overlap between good leaders and parents. Empathy makes the journey more challenging, it tends to amplify feelings and emotions, inner screaming voices are louder, and burdens are heavier. But life tends to be simpler. Simple doesn’t equal easy. It just means you know what you care about now, and what you are willing to go through because you care. The alternative is just a wild beast in a jungle of complexity as far I can explain.
It is Monday. Be the best parent you can be right now, and be the best leader you can be right now. Simplify it; be as good as you can in whatever you are doing right now, no matter how simple and tiny that task is. As long as you have a chance to do it over and over, then you have a chance to make it better every time, and that is the point.
