208 Leading with NLP
out’. Leadership is an adventure of self-development, of
finding resources to overcome the setbacks and the
guardians on the way. And it is an adventure of going outside
yourself, overcoming external obstacles, developing your
companions and achieving your vision.
Obstacles and resistance are not always what they seem.
Japanese temples are often guarded by statues that look like
ferocious demons. The first thing you notice about them is
one hand held up in a stern gesture with the palm outward.
It clearly means ‘STOP!’ But when you look more closely,
you see the other hand is making an inviting gesture for you
to enter. What is the real message? It is whichever one you
pay attention to.
Traditionally, a leader cannot move on to the next stage of
their adventure until they have found someone to replace
them at the level they were on. So leadership is also about
being a coach, a mentor and developing others as leaders.
Of the many skills and ideas in this book, three stand out for
me. First is building trust – trust in yourself and trust in oth-
ers. Trust is built first of all by pacing, understanding where
you are right now and acknowledging that. Then you build
trust by continually testing your own strength and that of
others. You can only do that by co-operating, by assuming at
least at the start that others are trustworthy. This also links to
optimism. Leaders assume they will succeed unless they have
evidence to the contrary. They do not assume they will fail.
At the same time, however, they look very carefully at all the
difficulties that could stand in the way and plan for them.
Take a moment now to review your own ideas on leader-
ship.
What is it about leadership that has made the most
impression on you?
What ideas about leadership are you most attracted
to?
What ideas are you least attracted to?
What ideas about leadership have you had confirmed?