GreatRidge Station

The tension between knowing and doing is very real. Let me start this post by pointing out that God made us whole people. There is no way to separate our intellect from our emotions from our physical capabilities from our spiritual selves. We cannot put knowing and doing into some kind of false dichotomy. In fact, the word for knowing in the New Testament of the Bible refers to knowledge gained through experience–knowledge tried on the forge of day-to-day life.

This should encourage us, but it should also terrify us. In a society that places such high value on education and learning, there is precious little value placed on the doing.

James reminds us that  “So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.“  Knowing how to lead is not leading. Having a vision is not necessarily visionary.  What we do becomes the anvil on which we make that which must be made. It involves hard work, and at the same time, a delicate, sensitive touch: One does not forge a wrought spoon in the same way that one forges a garden spade.

Years ago, I used to play pool. We had one friend who we called “The King of Slop.” He played every game hard, and his rule was hit every ball as hard as possible, in hopes that momentum carries something into one of the pockets. He even broke the lamp over the table once. And he won a few games. His problem, though, was that when the pressure was on, he didn’t have the subtlety or finesse to bring a game to an elegant close. He failed to see the difference in the game when there were only three balls on the table, rather than a full rack. As a result, we beat him. A lot. And when he wondered why, we feigned ignorance (hey, we were young and not very gracious).

Leadership must be done with both power and grace. You need to develop leaderly savoir faire, so that you know what to do. Equally important, though, leadership must be done. And if you know that you ought to be leading (or how you ought to be leading), and you fail to do it…well, that’s a sin.

The French have a word for it. Actually, the French have many words for many things. It’s like it’s a whole language, or something. Sorry. I’ll start again.

The French have a word for it. Savoir Faire. It means, roughly, the knowing in the doing; the ability to evaluate a situation and take the actions that the circumstances require.

Sadly, many people have the knowing, but somehow cannot seem to integrate this with the doing. One of my former students made the observation regarding one of his highly educated colleagues, “It’s like he has all theory, but no practical understanding whatsoever.” We’ve all known those people–and, if truth be told, we’ve all been those people in at least one area of our lives.

Leadership is a unique discipline. It has a variety of skills that can be mastered, but never perfected. Two leaders may evaluate the same situation in very different ways. They may try the same resolution, but their results may be different. I had a student years ago who had a gift for making dysfunctional teams functional again–why would the same group of people follow her, but not someone else?

Psychologists tell us that people learn by creating complex patterns of information interaction in their minds. Psychologists call this gestalt theory. Not that I’m taking sides in the debates on psychological theory; I just want to make the point that such patterns can be destructive when a leaders says things like, “oh, I’ve seen this before,” and then goes on to apply his or her standard solution to the problem. One’s patterns of thinkings can cause no end of trouble, since they often substitute for real critical thinking and analysis.
No matter how good you are at leading, pride in your own successes is the factor most likely to cause you to fail. Savoir Faire may, indeed, be everywhere, but we must remember that rarely is knowledge complete or certain, and rarely is our analysis accurate. The difference is simply that one who does something is way ahead of the ones who do nothing. Remember: Leaders Lead.

Leadership is hard. I’m not sure I’m the best case study for this, but my experience has been that I get thrown into leadership. I rarely seek it out. It tracks me down. In years past, I tried to escape, but today, I’ve come to recognize some of the patterns of my life that make me a leader, whether I like it or not. I’ve quit fighting it, and I’ve quit running away.

That does not mean that accepting a leadership role comes easily. The easiest transition I had took place several years ago, when I stepped in behind someone who had quit working about three years before he retired. That was an ideal situation, because not only was leadership lacking, people knew it was lacking and were eager to have someone take on that role.

Sometimes, I found myself stepping up to the plate simply because someone had to. I recognized that it would be detrimental to a whole team of people if I didn’t take some action, and so I did. That, frankly, did not work out very well because I wound up in the uncomfortable position of being the scapegoat for a very lazy, but equally powerful formal leader. I was vindicated, but not before the company had eliminated about 40 jobs in order to fix the problem. A couple of months later, they realized the real source of the problem, but unfortunately, it was too late to save that side of the business.

Today, I find myself in the position of taking on a leadership role from one of the best leaders I know. This is a first for me–in the past, I’ve always boldly walked into leadership vacuums and made things happen. This time, things are happening, and it’s my job to keep them that way. It’s as though I’ve been handed an old, valuable pocket watch that must not be overwound or underwound. I’m aware of my responsibility, and I face it with just a little bit of terror.

All of this has given me pause to consider not only my leadership experiences, but the things that I know that I must do. This is what I will explore in the next couple of posts.