M. Scott Peck, in this book, The Road less Traveled, describes the change framework between psychotherapist and patient the way we describe it between leader and team. I wrote about this in the 8 Essentials of Leading Teams on page 212…
“It has been said that the successful psychotherapist must bring to the psychotherapeutic relationship the same courage and the same sense of commitment as the patient. The therapist must also risk change. Of all the good and useful rules of psychotherapy that I have taught, there are very few that I have not chosen to break at one time or another, not out of laziness and lack of discipline but rather in fear and trembling, because my patients therapy seemed to require that, one way or another, I should step out of the safety of the prescribed analyst’s role, be different and risk the unconventional. As I look back on every successful case I have had I can see that at some point or points in each case I had to lay myself on the line. The willingness of the therapist to suffer at such moments is perhaps the essence of therapy, and when perceived by the patient, as it usually is, it is always therapeutic. It is through this willingness to extend themselves and suffer with and over their patients that therapists grow and change. Again as I look back on my successful cases, there is not one that did not result in some very meaningful, often radical, change in my attitudes and perspectives. It has to be this way.”
Read the quote again slowly. Substitute the word leader for psychotherapist, the word team for patient, and the word leadership for psychotherapy. Slow down. Reflect.
We, the BTL Band, are not therapists. We are Builders. We will make you do what you can. We will suffer alongside when you struggle. We will challenge you to be better, especially when you’re winning. We will share hard truth and listen to it too. You will feel like we’re in it with you, because we are. Some will fire us for bringing too much heat. Some will catch fire when we light ‘em up. Some will become built to lead. Some will become built to leave.
Today’s BTL Band practice lit me up. We went back to the beginning, not to reminisce but to remind. We went back and built each other a bit stronger. You are blessed, reader, if you have a few such souls around you.
Live hard. Love harder…
BUILT TO LEAD 