Self Leadership Coaching Blog

A leader who wishes to bypass resistance, prepare hearts and minds and facilitate lasting changes for his or her organisation must understand and be able to use the power of story and metaphor. In a previous post I shared about the construction of metaphors and wanted to expand on this with specific relevance to leadership in today’s challenging environment.

What stories are you telling your people? Do you know what stories are you telling yourself?

The finance and banking industry has long used the analogies of Bull or Bear to describe the market and its leaders have been known to use military metaphors to ‘inspire the troops’. Perhaps it is time to come up with some more creative metaphors, particularly in Asia where there is a strong tradition of passing on wisdom through story?

From a Self-leadership perspective, personal metaphors are extremely important in terms of motivation and achieving objectives. I remember coaching one senior manager who described his situation as, “It feels like I am clearing snow from my driveway whilst my neighbour is shovelling it back on!” Contrast this with another leader who had become frustrated with the status quo and indecision around an important issue for his global function; he told me, “I am throwing red paint balls at the wall, so now the discussion is no longer what colour to paint the wall, but how do we finish painting it red?”

Personally I am fond of using sailing for a metaphor and if you have ever sailed you will know that it requires knowledge and skill to harness the natural elements which are constantly shifting. You must ‘set your sails’ and then work the rudder and sheets (ropes connected to the sails) to achieve the optimum speed and direction. If you pull on the sheets too hard you can capsize the boat, if you let them go slack you will flap around and go nowhere. I was talking to a senior leader recently who had achieved quite a substantial goal and was now just ‘going through the motions’; we chatted about what, on the horizon, he would need to focus on to cause him to tighten the sheets and really set sail again. After some reflection this senior leader realised that he could now focus on transforming the culture of his organisation from a ‘dog-eat-dog’ experience to one where objectives could be met through collaboration.

After the global financial crisis has anything changed? The story certainly has. Just keep kicking the debt down the road expecting growth to take care of things has gone from a fairytale to a nightmare. There’s a new game afoot, a game with tighter rules, a game where we are rewarded by adding value and we do this by thinking strategically but by being flexible in the present. This is not a game for amateurs but a game for professionals who can learn and unlearn to suit the changing circumstances. So the game is on, will you lead or will you follow?