To the Mentor: Just a Few Men in the Room
I discovered long ago that if you pay close attention to others, you might just hear the voice of God, or even a generation speaking back to you. During a former career in marketing and sales, I spent three to five hours a day routinely ferreting out meaning from the stories of prospective graduate students anxious to make a good impression. As Francis Schaeffer once remarked, after examining the basic claims of philosophers, skeptics, mathematicians, and mystics: "there are just a few men in the room." He concluded there are only a few theories to explain life's basic questions and most of the world's thinkers are saying the same things, but perhaps in novel ways.
Taking exception, of course, to his men-only reference to the best thoughts and thinkers (as I know women too have a thing to say about life and truth), I concluded similarly in matters of the formation of leaders. Throughout my years of sales conversations as a recruiter, I had not been laboring day in and day out to merely keep up with the files and phone calls of a thousand stories. No, the cavalcade of human experience that ran through, over, and around me annually, shared a cadence, a rhythm, a few common themes.
I concluded: the motives for seeking leadership formation are but a few. With apologies to Schaeffer for adapting his words, "There are but a few motives in the room." I discovered, when emerging leaders seek more education, buy books, and seek mentors, coaches, and guides, they are often moved by impulses to grow in one or several of these areas. It seems that no matter what story they tell when the appointment begins, it tends to end with one of these few motivational plots.
An emerging leader invites deeper work in his/her:
CORE. Many people seek leadership formation to address deep matters of the heart. Maybe it's healing, or integrity, or identity or trajectory, but they sense: “unless I address THIS (and often, the "this" has yet no name), I cannot lead.” The core is that “black box” within that can feel murky, or raging, or vacant, or passionate. It's the place where the talk comes from that must match the walk. All of us, always, are at work on the core.
CONFIDENCE. Many others seek leadership formation to make the world, and their actions within it, predictable. Bobb Biehl, well-known executive mentor, rightly offers: "Confidence is a by-product of predictability." Many emerging leaders are shaky until they have been put through paces that help them gain internal certainty that they can meet the demands that lay ahead. Growing in confidence is what we all must do when beginning new things.
CREDIBILITY. Credibility is the gift of approval offered by watchers of your life. Many emerging leaders long to hear: "I'd bet on you!" or "I believe you, believe in you, believe you can, believe you will." If confidence is an internal core message, credibility is an external community message, the social side of the same soul coin. We all long to be understood and affirmed as worthy of others' respect.
COMPETENCE. Competence is the ability to produce the desired effect consistently and on-demand. This comes from exercise, experience, and exposure. It comes from employment. It's what emerging leaders are looking for when they ask questions such as: In what areas do you excel? How did you achieve this command? How did you come to know yourself to be competent in this area? These are natural questions for any of us who have wanted to make a contribution in the world around us.
As mentors, knowing the person before you is moved to be there by specific motives or specific priorities can be useful. This is not to imply the emerging leader is aware of their motives any more than you are aware of yours. Most people remain mysteries to themselves for a lifetime. But you can be helpful by teasing out these motives into clarity and directing the conversational energy toward getting intentional in a growth path that addresses the pressure or opportunity.
There are just a few motives in the room. Serve the emerging leader by helping them match the learning path with the motivation. Reflect on your own experiences of when you sought to grow in your core, confidence, credibility, and/or competence.
Freely share your stories of being a growing person, moving from "Befores" to "Afters."
Motives matter. Got a motive story you think might help others? Post it on our Facebook Page or send a message through our blog site (leaving out names and other identifying details "to protect the guilty").
