I know that this title may be a little vague. But it has occurred to me that at some point in the life or career of a leader, there may come a time they will need to be relieved, so to speak. Now the kind of relief I am speaking of is not discontinuing your leadership, it is maybe taking a back seat in the family to a son, maybe it is grooming a son in law to take your daughter’s hand, or maybe it is a promotion in your organization or team.

As I continually struggle internally with this I realize how difficult it is for a leader to change roles. But do they really?

It seems to me even as I write this article, that we don’t stop leading, but rather we change the method or the lesson. I will get back to that in a minute. First, let’s talk about the opportunities and who we may “relinquish” our leadership too.

As fathers and leaders of our families, I expect at some point we will no longer be planning and hosting the holiday and birthday dinners and we will start being participants instead of the decision makers on family vacations. Does this mean we aren’t leaders anymore? Absolutely not! As Grandparents, I think we hold a sort of reverence that will allow us to lead without pressure and help our children learn to lead and follow in our footprints. I think it becomes our responsibility to change our leadership style to one that is more receptive than directory. I think becoming more approachable in our new role may make for an easier transition for new members to the team.

Let’s look at this new role from a corporate point of view. How does our role change when we accept a promotion? And what about when our team has grown to a larger team with several sub teams in it as it were? It occurs to me that this becomes a “Leading Leaders” role, (http://leadingleadersinc.com). I would challenge anyone involved here to checkout this web site, I find some of the insight interesting. I feel that a leader of leaders needs to be a catalyst in the mix of team leaders, “Iron sharpens iron…” In this new role, I think we need to be more of a mediator and listener as our group of leaders discuss their issues and find solutions, in other words we need to be more static in our leadership role in this situation.

So I ask you; Is this new role as leaders as important as being direct and dynamic leaders? Is this when we have to learn to tone down our leadership voice? How do we prepare for this role as a leader of leaders? Are we prepared to help guide young men that have attracted our daughters? Is it our place to interfere at all?

Photo credit: anyjazz65 / Foter / CC BY-NC
Photo credit: Stuck in Customs / Foter / CC BY-NC-SA