Have you ever read "Water Margin" story? It is a story about 108 heroes who lived in Liang Shan Po mountain where they fought against corrupt government in China.
During their rebellion against the corrupt government, the government armies could not defeat them at all. All the great generals being sent by the government either were defeated or joined the heroes because of their vision.
What was the secret of their success? How could they stand against the forces greater than them? Actually, the only way that government could win against them is by offering amnesty to them and gave them positions as government officials. During their time as government officials, many of them felled to their death during the campaign against the China's enemies. After the campaign, they were scattered to different areas in China and they lost their power.
In his book, "Good to Great", Jim Collins said that one of the key in propelling good company to become great company is putting the right people on the bus and putting the wrong people off the bus. It means, in order for leaders to succeed, they will need to surround themselves with great people.
Jim Collins wrote in his book, "Look, I don't really know where we should take this bus. But I know this much: if we get the right people on the bus, the right people in the right seats, and the wrong people off the bus, then we'll figure out how to take it to someplace great." (Good to Great, page 41).
I believe this statement is true. During my careers in several large organizations and also by observing other organizations, I saw that the successful organizations always had great people within the organizations. I also experienced it myself. One time I joined a bank who just had new retail banking division. The bank was just expanding its retail presence in the country and did not have great infrastructure yet. 90% of the staffs were new and all except one person in management team were new. At that year, we were given an almost impossible target to achieve. We had to grow our deposit number by more than 1000%. After one year, we achieved more than our set target. How could it happens? We didn't have great infrastructure and our branches were not so many compared to the more established bank. What we had at that time was a great team. Everybody in the management team worked together and provide their expertise in order to achieve the target and at the end, yes we did outperform.
So, we understand that to be an effective leader, one will need a great team for support. Then what should the leader do in order to have a great team?
Let's learn from Song Jiang, the leader of 108 heroes:
Song Jiang was humble in admitting that he would need the team to achieve the vision. Leader who lead from the heart must be humble enough to admit that in order for him or her to help other people, he will need the help from others also. Many times in the story, Song Jiang was shown asking other people to join their cause even though it was enemy's general. As long as the person had the good character, believe in the vision and also has ability, Song Jiang would ask the person to join them. He even at some time wanted to relinquish his leadership position and let other people who were better than him to lead.
Song Jiang knew his own strength and weaknesses. Song Jiang understood that he did not have great martial art prowess and also his ability in military strategy was not as good as other people in his team. His strength was the ability to unite a group of talented individuals and inspire them to achieve great things. I see a lot of leaders who always think that they are smarter than their team. They always want to do everything by themselves and not trust their team to do it. in the end, it will jeopardize their organizations or divisions as it is not possible for one person to be able to be great at everything. Leader who lead from the heart must understand that they have limitation and they need other people to fill the gap
Song Jiang could inspire others to follow the vision. If you read the story, many heroes choose to follow Song Jiang because they believed in him and also because they believed in the vision that Song Jiang represent. If you want to build a great team, you need to be able to inspire them to follow the vision that you represent. The vision of 108 heroes was to bring justice to the society and demolish corrupt government. Many heroes were attracted to that and they chose to follow Song Jiang because he not only talk about the vision, but his life showed that he believed in it. That's how leaders can inspire their team regarding the vision, by showing it with their lives. Song Jiang did that and many people chose to follow him.
In summary, leaders who lead from the heart need to be humble to acknowledge that they cannot help other people with only themselves. They will need to have great people as their team and then they can achieve their visions to help others. Let's start to build great team within your organization and you will see that your organizations will grow to become great!
Written by
Darvin Widjaja
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