I just read Sarah Robinson’s Bewildered and wanted to pick up the conversation here, as well.
Here’s a bit of her post for context:
Here’s what I see: There are a number of so-called leaders in the internet and social media space who seem to stick with what I can only call a “clique”. They primarily talk to this small group of peers, support this small group of peers and promote this small group of peers.
And I get it – they are free to make whatever choices they want, but from where I sit, it doesn’t look like leadership or expertise. It looks like high school and the cool kids table.
First, I don’t want to go back to another high school / cool kids discussion like we did in Launch Fatigue, which is still the only thread I’ve ever had to shut down. (By the way, ’tis the season.)
Second, thanks for writing this, Sarah. You beat me to the punch – I tend to wait until I have something constructive to say, but that may be a while because I, too, am bewildered, and I’m still exploring a lot of the space to see what’s the most aligned way for me to navigate it.
I wanted to pick this up here to give a somewhat different perspective, not as someone who knows better, or who’s outside, but rather as someone who’s exploring the space. Here’s what I’ve noticed:
1. It’s really challenging to have open, meaningful conversations with a crowd.
It normally devolves to small talk and drama pretty quickly, since a thread lasts about three minutes before a new conversant jumps in. For me, it’s about like jumping around in the kiddie pool – fun for awhile, but not really fulfilling. (Maven much?)
2. What people say they want and how they act are two different things.
I’m pretty inclusive and accessible, and it’s interesting to notice that people’s actions show that they prefer people to be exclusive. They want the attention of people whose attention is hard to get and get frustrated when they don’t get it. So people want inclusivity but value (or at least reward) exclusivity, if they’re being honest. (I’m not sure how to round that square.)
3. Your in-person behavior sets up a precedent and expectations about what you’ll do when you’re not in person.
I was at an event where I had some great conversations with a guy and I followed up with him via email to see how he was doing after the event. In case you’ve never met me in person, the boundary between Charlie qua coach and Charlie qua human pretty much doesn’t exist. He wanted to have a quick, impromptu conversation via phone with me, and I was aware that it might quickly turn into a de facto coaching call. So, before agreeing to a conversation, I tried to set some boundaries so we wouldn’t go there if that wasn’t what he was intending.
Granted, there are probably all sorts of ways I could have expressed it differently, but the bottom line is that he was upset and mad that I didn’t just pick up the phone, which is what he thought I should do. While I understand his feelings, I respectfully disagreed with his conclusion – if I picked up the phone every time someone wanted to talk to me, I’d be on the phone all day. I’m already on the phone for many hours most days.
Because I had made the space and intention to be open, generous, and free at the event, it seems that he had the expectation that I would be open, generous, and free outside of the event. But having a service-based component in the business means that I have to draw boundaries somewhere.
And, given the last point, people seem to value your service more when it seems harder to get. (Don’t try to game this – it generally backfires.)
4. Perceived social asymmetries alter expectations.
I’ll be writing more about this one soon, but I wanted to put it in here, too. I recently went to Gary Vaynerchuck’s book talk here in Portland, and many people were excited about the fact that he spent 30 seconds talking to them after they stood in line for 15 minutes to do so. I stood in the line, too, because I wanted to follow up about something I asked him last year.
Think about that for a second. Most people would feel disregarded and overlooked if you gave them 30 seconds of your time, but when there’s a perceived social asymmetry – in this case, fame and influence – it changes those expectations. A “Thanks [Name]!” tweet from Gary counts more, socially, than a “Thanks [Name]!” from me.
Many people praise Seth Godin because he responds to email. However, the praise comes not from the pure fact that he emails, but because of the context of the relationship. When there’s not so much of a perceived social asymmetry, people get mad when people don’t respond to email.
5. We can only be in so many places at once.
At a certain point, you have to make an intentional choice about what you’ll read, who you’ll talk to, and where you’ll get information on because you reach your consumption and connection point. Your threshold will vary – as a connector, Pam Slim can keep up with more people than I can, but as a maven, I can keep up with more information than she can. I can’t play her game and she can’t play mine.
But the fact that we are limited in where we can be doesn’t change. If you’re interacting with hundreds of people, the addition of one additional person affects how you can interact with the other hundreds. The same thing goes for reading blogs, articles, websites, and such from your community – the addition of one more has a toll.
Part of “sticking with your people,” then, is making sure you have enough time to take care of yourself and the relatively small amount of people you can support in your ecosystem. Some people choose to pull back on the depth of the relationships to go for the amount of relationships. Others keep a smaller fire. Any choice has its merits and disadvantages.
I wish I could do more than share observations about patterns I’ve seen, but I’m learning as I go when it comes to this. There’s a delicate balance here in that we can love (agape) all people for the unique beings they are and we can’t give everyone equal attention, despite the best of intentions.
Love and care aren’t nearly as finite as time and attention, and that’s the rub. Or, to tie this conversation back to Sarah’s, you can’t lead everyone all the time if you want to be an effective leader, but being a leader doesn’t justify an exclusive mentality.
How you choose to navigate the path is up to you, but know that it’s a precarious path that’ll challenge your values and you’ll have to get used to the fact that the best that you can do isn’t good enough for a lot of people. The real question to stay present about is whether your choices align with your values.
From the other end of the spectrum, what you’ve said here about availability and expectations is pretty much how I see it too. I would just assume that the big name at a conference is astoundingly busy, and therefore (with the best will in the world), it’s pretty hard to have lots of connections with everyone. That’s the reality.
The thing is, the web fools us into assuming much of our connection is one-to-one when in fact it’s one-to-many. The highly popular web-based coach is going to have a bit of a nightmare at a web conference. It’s like me and my favourite author or actor: I love their stuff, I know we’d be great friends in some alternate universe, but I know if we meet them that I’m a fan, not a colleague or friend. Occasionally you’ll make great connections with the folk you admire, and that’s a bonus.
Final thought: there are so many brilliant unknowns that really, it’s best to build your own networks with the people around you who are open and available, and probably working at a similar level. The web is a lot bigger than it seems.
Great point about the web making us think our relationships are 1:1, Alison. Online connections can be flat because of the lack of physicality, but offline interactions are much more limited by space and time. It’s really apples and oranges.
At the same time, some of my best friends are now people I’ve never met and may never meet, just because they live in Australia and England. I was thrilled to death to get to meet Ali Luke, for example, because she’s across the water.
When we change our expectations, we can have flourishing relationships. It’s when we don’t see the differences that we get in trouble.
Great, great insight. When you have that style of writing to one person, people will naturally feel that they know you and have a connection with you. When you don’t respond accordingly, it creates bad feelings all around.
It’s not just social media, I have a friend who’s a (dead tree) newspaper columnist who’s had this issue for years.
It’s really true. Especially when you get emails when you’re on someone’s mailing list and they address it as “Hey _____.” We may know they’re not talking directly to us, but I regularly get emails back from people saying thanks for the personal email. Online we have the ability to reach many, but that definitely doesn’t scale as relationships become more intimate and the depth of connection grows.
One of the reasons i admire you Charlie is that you do wait until you can be thoughtful and deliberate to put something in writing. While I, on the other hand, tend to rush to the page a bit too quickly. 🙂
Having been on the inside occasionally myself, I totally get the challenges of having a ton of people wanting your time and how exhausting/impossible that can be.
I’m an introvert and have to absolutely withdraw from a big crowd to re-charge my batteries. Because of that, I try to be ultra-sensitive to people’s need for space.
This part of your post is really the crux of the matter for me:
” you can’t lead everyone all the time if you want to be an effective leader, but being a leader doesn’t justify an exclusive mentality.”
Reaching out and leading everyone who wants to be lead is, indeed, impossible. But deliberate exclusivity……I just don’t understand it, even it is a “marketing tactic”.
So I think I will just follow your navigation map on all of this. You are bound to do it with much more grace and gentleness than I. 🙂
Thank you, Sarah. I’ve got a follow-up coming which I think you may like, to, but I’m taking a bit more time to let it stew so I get it right. It’s not like any of this is going anywhere anytime soon.
All of what you say is true.
I “think” what Sarah might have been getting at (as was I in my Comment there), is this “rockstar” mentality that is nonsensical and entirely based in ego, not service (or the desire to fairly divide one’s time amongst clients, fans, and such).
The vast majority of us are NOT Seth Godin. Nor are we Donald Trump. Or Charlie Sheen. Or Brad Pitt. Or geez, even Ali Brown.
Those folks really can’t sit with their peeps at an event because they’d be, quite literally, mobbed and it would pose a security risk to themselves and to those around them.
The “VIP” thing irritates when we see all these self-appointed Internet celebrities put themselves into a category that is, quite honestly, ridiculous. They’re acting — and people are treating them as — VIP when there is no real reason to be designated as such.
I know you are not in this category because I’ve seen you in action. You don’t rock that way and thank God this is true.
But too many are starting think they’re rock STARS. And it’s just plain unfortunate. Radical idealists (who, my Gawd, we need now) like Sarah perhaps wish the Internet could remain the almighty leveler. But it’s not that way anymore, is it?
xo
Karri
The Internet has never really been that way, Karri. Of all the different forces at play in the world right now, the Internet force more mass asymmetry than almost anything else. If you’re in the top 5%, everyone knows you, it seems. If you’re in the bottom 95%, you’re a nobody.
Coupled with the point Alison made above, relatively few people are getting the eyes of the many, and the many aren’t getting the eyes of each other because they’re looking at the few.
Food for thought: who anoints the leaders or experts in this wild and wooly space?
When I said that the Internet is the almighty leveler, I was being brutally honest about the fact that folks who might otherwise be “uncool” offline can shine in other (more interesting) ways online. This is not to say that anyone can succeed — entrepreneurship is a demanding endeavor in any context.
But artificial barriers to success such as appearance or a physical disability or just coming from the wrong side of the tracks don’t hold up online in quite the same way they do offline. Or at least this *used* to be generally true.
Today’s Internet biz culture is shifting to reflect the same BS we’re used to seeing offline. This is what Sarah was getting at (IMHO).
Caveat: by contrast to what we’re discussing here, we’re in a bit of a bubble that is further entrenching the kind of social hierarchies that are emerging. A lot of people buying ideas and other stuff from each other … but not much else going on in terms of adding real value to the world at large.
Yes, you heard it here first 😉
As for who anoints the leaders? Tia got it right: you’re only a leader to the folks who consider you one. Too bad so many people are more interested in the business of self-anointment than the people they claim to be leading.
Usually don’t publicly comment on this stuff, so I’m treading carefully here . . .
“How you choose to navigate the path is up to you, but know that it’s a precarious path that’ll challenge your values and you’ll have to get used to the fact that the best that you can do isn’t good enough for a lot of people.”
I love this sentiment, Charlie.
What I DON’T love is “guru bashing” without anything specific or actionable, without any suggestion. We ALL have cliques, we all people that we are close to and people that we haven’t met yet.
When I’m at SXSW I’m primarily there to spend time with existing friends, I enjoy meeting new friends as well. In my opinion if I ONLY went there to catch up with friends I haven’t seen in a while that would also be a great use of my time. Maybe spending time with close friends is “exclusive”? Honestly it bothers me that that would be criticized. At the last sxsw I spent much more time with my friend David than anyone else, is that “exclusive”? I hope not, I really love seeing him and I don’t get to very often.
Am I “inclusive”? Well maybe not, because when I’m at parties I don’t walk around introducing myself to everyone. I know that I’m certainly never rude to anyone or ignore anyone. But at events like sxsw I spend the vast majority of my time with my friends or “clique”. And I usually purposefully set up one-on-one time with people as that’s my favorite way to get to know someone. That could be definitely be called “deliberate exclusivity” as I’ve chosen to exclude all others from that time.
I DO consider myself a leader and don’t consider any of the behavior above contrary to leadership. If I’m misinterpreting this whole thing – what ARE the specific behaviors that are un-leader-like?
I’m with you on this one Laura. When I’m at an event I absolutely do like to make new connections, especially the people that I may not have had a chance to meet that I would like to. That might mean people that I’m fans of or that follow my work.
However, most of the time I like to connect with and strengthen the relationships I already have. In my opinion, that’s a much more sane use of my time. If I’m spending all my time seeking new connections, they’re going to remain pretty shallow. And as Charlie said, you end up feeling like you’re splashing around in a kiddy pool. 🙂
By the way, I’m bummed that I didn’t make it to SXSW, but I hope we get a chance to catch up soon Laura. I think you’re a great leader and a great friend.
I like to meet new people who accomplish amazing things, and work extremely hard, but conferences are the last place I look for those people.
Instead, when I find that I want to “meet” someone, I’ll send an email their way. Or I’ll see if anyone in my existing network knows that person and can introduce me. Then, at conferences, I’ll look to strengthen that friendship by meeting up and saying “Hello.”
I’m still open to meeting new people at conferences, but after traveling to several conferences, I realized one thing: you can’t tell if someone is full of it, and more often than not, they are. I know this sounds harsh, but my time””anyone’s time””is a scarce resource and I prefer to make the most of it. That’s why I prefer to interact over email first, and face-to-face second.
Also, to echo Laura’s point, I also hate “guru bashing.” I find that the people who do that often want something. Or, as Laura aptly put it in one of her articles, they want to take a “guru” to lunch to get an hour of consulting for free, heh.
I completely understand where you’re coming from, Laura. What many don’t understand is that the leaders themselves are more comfortable with their true friends rather than with people they don’t know.
And, if my experience is like other people’s, I usually don’t presume people know me in the first place. It’d be might presumptuous to expect that any given person would want your attention.
Last year at SxSW, I was standing by and talking to Brian Clark and people kept coming up to introduce themselves to me. I found it odd, for, in my mind, they should’ve wanted to talk to Brian. It took me a bit to figure out that people actually knew who I was and gave a damn. Trippy.
If I am correct, it appears that the complaint is with how perceived leaders act with the people that choose to follow them and whether or not the leader is living up to the expectations that are being thrust on them.
Charlie, I agree that there are times where we have “the space and intention to be open, generous, and free at the event” but that we have to keep that separate from how we act outside of events (this is our livelihood we are talking about here!) People who expect free outside of an event because we spoke to them AT an event are not being respectful of our businesses.
However, the frustration I have was with how some leaders handle themselves AT these events. The very word “leader” indicates that there are people that are following them. As Karri said, we’re not talking about Hollywood celebrities whose interactions with the masses poses a threat to their health; the crowds I saw at the SXSW parties were pretty tame (was surprised by how early most big parties ended). 🙂 But there is an expectation that people will interact by the very fact that they are in attendance at these parties. (PS – Not calling you out. You do awesome from what I hear.)
Who I’m calling out are those who accept the role of leader but refuse to interact with the “little” people at these parties and events. I’m sorry if it DOES bother some people that it would be criticized, but when we accept the mantle of leadership, we give up some of our freedoms in order to serve the people we are leading. Choosing to spend time exclusively with a small number of people is not bad; choosing to spend time exclusively with a small number of people WHILE AT AN EVENT is a poor choice for a leader. A leader needs to remember that they are leading people and that there are acceptable expectations placed on them when attending certain events. When attending events called “meet-ups”, chances are pretty high that people are going to want to meet-up them.
What I saw at SXSW (and other events I’ve attended) is that there are some leaders who willingly accept the position of leadership, willingly accept the money they receive from the people they are leading, but are UNwilling to interact with those people at events DESIGNED for interaction.
This is not to say that boundaries shouldn’t be drawn outside of the events; I totally think you are right in setting expectations for what was possibly the expected free coaching call. However, anyone willing to be a leader (and especially if they are calling themselves that) gives up certain freedoms…one of which is the freedom to be exclusive without having people think they are snubbing their followers. They still have the right to BE exclusive, but there are consequences to it. Attending large events with the intention of spending time with existing friends may lead to bad perceptions about those of us who are in leadership positions. And I think the perception comes from realistic expectations not being met (or at least addressed).
“…there is an expectation that people will interact by the very fact that they are in attendance at these parties.”
Exactly.
I haven’t been to SXSW but last time I checked it wasn’t a sock hop.
Kinda like twitterati snoberrati huh! There are still a few highly regarded people we all know who never bother to respond to tweets and that’s something I just never got.
It’s twitter, it’s social media, you’re a leader but when did you become blind to good manners and values?
I doubt the ones I’m thinking of get anywhere near the amount of messages that someone like Seth does and yet, they’re too far above it all to respond.
There’s a fine line between strengthening existing relationships and excluding others at the same time.
Having said this, we’re all entitled to do it the way we wish.
If someone doesn’t respond, their values aren’t in alignment with yours so just walk on by. Leaders are not leaders to everyone, no matter how great you are. Leaders aren’t leaders by value of knowledge or teaching either.
You’re a leader when someone considers you one.
Personally, if I ever went to SXSW, I’d make sure I connected with some people I really wanted to know better and then I’d keep some time for mingling with new peeps.
After all, there are no strangers – just friends we haven’t met yet 🙂
Cheers!
I hear where this is coming from, David, and I just wanted to add this in there for perspective. The assumption that they’re at an event to hang out with “new” people is a stretch, actually. In the conference swirl, you normally end up tagging along with your friends because you feel the most comfortable with them. (see my comment above.)
The truth of the matter is that many people don’t go to event parties explicitly to interact with new people. Furthermore, they may have been in acting as a leader (in your definition) all day and want some off-stage time with their friends and peers. If they don’t go to the known parties, they’re excluding people. If they don’t hang out with people at the known parties, they’re excluding people.
The only option, then, would be to go off somewhere alone, but why should they? They came to the event to hang out with people.
It’s hard to be “on the stage” all day, and we often don’t know what people have been doing when we don’t see them. My point here is not to advocate one behavior or the other, but, rather, to show that it’s not as simple as you’d think.
Shoot. This topic’s a toughie for me. {Charlie, you also inspired me to leave a comment over on Sarah’s original post.}
Having owned a popular brick and mortar biz in my hometown and being the “face” of that biz and the primary customer service person {not to mention ALL the other roles from maintenance girl to brand strategist to buyer}, I can relate to the pressure to be ‘on’ and accessible and inclusive all of the time to your fans/readers/customers/supporters. I used to feel incredible guilt and stress if one of my favorite customers walked away without me feeling as if I gave her her ‘due.’ It sounds ridiculous and egotistical {geez} to type that out, but I was in people-pleasing mode and believed that my interaction with every customer could make or break the biz at any moment. {And maybe I was right; maybe it could’ve.}
So I can relate to going to an event among one’s peers AND supporters and wanting to hole up and stay insular. Probably not the best choice, but a very human one.
Like I said in my comment on Sarah’s post, I haven’t done my first BlogWorld or SxSW yet, but I can imagine myself there: I’d keep primarily to my peer group and NOT seek out A-Listers unless I had something substantial to say to them or to thank them for. I’d hang out with people with whom I felt most comfortable! I wouldn’t go to an event like this on a mission, so to speak. At least not an overt one. 🙂
So it makes sense to me that A-Listers and leaders want to enjoy an event and spend time with their peer group, too. I do think it’s super excellent when anyone in a leadership position makes it a point to converse with people who support them {clients, customers, fans}, but I also think that said supporters should be aware of not monopolizing a leader’s time. There’s only so much of any one human being to go around!
Now downright snobbiness and giving people the cold shoulder or the brush-off? That’s another issue entirely . . .
Great adds, Abby. Thanks!
[sidebar]Laura and Jonathan: I’ve never met you and don’t really know either of you that well save for some social media chat, so this isn’t directed at you specifically. But I would like to attempt to address what seem to be questions or objections to the (perceived or real) issue of exclusivity …[/sidebar]
If I might be so bold as to ingratiate myself once more …
No one is saying it’s wrong to use these events as opportunity to strengthen existing relationships. Of course we want to reconnect with peers we feel close to! That’s natural and that’s good for business too.
But let’s be clear about Sarah’s original point:
This air of exclusivity – and dare I say self-importance — that seems to be in vogue right now is getting a little tough to take. At the end of the day we all put our pants on one leg at a time.
Yet by the way folks are carrying on, you’d think that being an “x-figure entrepreneur” or having “x number of followers” imparts the wearers of those labels some Divine Right to be a snob. Or charge exorbitant fees for “personal access.” Or drink wine with Christ. Or look the other way when someone just wants to say Hello.
Ultimately, the fact THAT so many people feel the need to defend it, talk about it, wear it — whatever IT is — only serves to further prove the point that it’s well, about as deep as a kiddie pool.
Karri
I hear the frustration here, Karri, but the “Yet by the way” paragraph is a match that could start a flame war, which would only serve to shut down an open conversation. I know it’s a sensitive, wooly subject, but let’s keep it open.
There’s definitely an IT here, but what it is, is far from clear. And I’m saying stop! Hey! What’s the sound?…
No flaming intended and I definitely don’t want to shut down the conversation.
But let’s call a cigar a cigar: one doesn’t have to go searching far to find all kinds of personas yacking on and on about how much money they make, how many followers they have, WHO they think are, and how buying their programs will impart nothing short of a miracle upon anyone with a credit card (or a big enough home equity loan) to pay for it.
That’s not flaming. That’s a statement of fact. That it happens to be the big pink elephant in the room few are willing to talk about is simply inconvenient for pretty much any of us who work in a coaching/consulting capacity.
So that’s the IT. That’s the thing we’re trying to hear through the noise. That’s the sound of a values clashing.
I try to view people as individuals and not associate them with their ego or false self. I have become friends with successful business people that are millionaires, but I choose to view them as ordinary people with a lot of money.
Great stuff Charlie.
I liked your point about how Seth answers email. I used to question his stance on sites like Twitter and Facebook but perhaps he is right. Seth knows that he can’t possibly respond to people effectively on Twitter and so he doesn’t raise that expectation in the mind of his fans and peers.
Isn’t that what this is at least partly about? Time? Energy? A persons ability to “include” someone is a time and energy requirement. There just isn’t enough to go around.
“A persons ability to “include” someone is a time and energy requirement. There just isn’t enough to go around.”
That’s an insight that’s hard to see in another person, Russ. We all see it for ourselves, but sometimes it’s not easy to see in that person we want to make a connection with. 🙂
Thanks for this thoughtful post, Charlie.
This issue comes up a lot. And I think it comes up for almost all of us as we struggle to find larger audiences — we see the people we admire, they’re harder to approach than we wish they were, and we get frustrated and blow off steam.
Your post helped to explain and unpack some of the behaviors in a way that wasn’t loaded or accusatory, and that’s very rare. Thanks. 🙂
Thanks, Sonia!
I’m glad it didn’t come off as either loaded or accusatory, because the truth is that I myself do the same things and have to think about what’s going on. I get frustrated when someone gives me the cold shoulder, and I get disappointed when I figure out three days later that I completely overlooked someone who was standing right in front of me. And, a lot of times, I find myself just having to do the best I can without knowing whether it’s “right.”
The road is rockier when you’re walking it than it appears when you’re not.
I’d like to offer this up: the conversation has evolved considerably since my original post. And it seems that there is a lot of energy being spent on making people who hold conflicting viewpoints “wrong”. Is it possible that there is something to be learned from everyone’s perception and/or reality?
If we aren’t open to learning from people who disagree with us, I’m not sure how to hold the conversation. And the thing I know is most true for me is this: if I have a strong reaction against something, chances are I recognize a kernel of truth that makes me uncomfortable.
So, I’m willing to listen and learn from this conversation so that I will better understand.
“..if I have a strong reaction against something, chances are I recognize a kernel of truth that makes me uncomfortable.”
I agree, Sarah. People are feeling *something* and if we peel back the layers of this dialog, there *is* an issue, an element of reality. So we have to be willing to examine what that *something* is. Even if it’s not altogether “aligned” with the current talk stream.
It seems to be that there are some different ways out there of relating to well-known people in conference situations. Although I’ve been to lots of conferences, I don’t think I’ve seen any ‘off’ behaviour of the kind that some people have described. So it’s hard to know whether we are all talking about the same thing.
I also suspect I’m a bit of a social pessimist in these situations. For me, expectations would follow our relationship. If I’m known by (but maybe not best friends with) a well-known internet person, then I would expect to maybe get to know them better. If they’re a mega-personality, and I admire them from afar, not so much. And I know that people get swamped, especially popular people.
I am definitely curious about meeting people in person that I previously knew online (and I’ve met some of my closest friends online).
I also – I kind of hesitate to say this – but I think you truly have to be cautious about casting people in a leadership position relative to yourself. I assume that well-known figures will treat their community with respect, in line with the online personality that everyone already knows, but beyond that I’m not sure what their responsibility is.
I sound like a Scottish grandmother: ‘Expect nothing and you won’t be disappointed’ 🙂
Finally – as with actors or writers – someone could have a fairly appealing online persona but be a bit obnoxious in real life. (Or having a bad day) That’s just life.
I want to shed some light on this pattern from a psychological perspective, because it makes so much more sense from there.
The fact is that from a deep, unconscious, early childhood place, we’re all actually wired up to seek certain qualities that are “elusive” or, as we’re talking about here, “exclusive”.
Each of us leaves early childhood with a set of emotional needs that are left over from the way we were parented and socialized. It’s not the parent’s fault in any way, it just happens. And we’re left with perceived holes in the ego that need constant filling up with attention, recognition, validation, acceptance, belonging, inclusion or any number of things that we didn’t get enough of.
“Leaders” are those we tend to project authority onto, thus putting them into a similar role as our parents. We then go about seeking from the leader whatever we didn’t get from our parents, because the instinctive brain tells us that when we can get this elusive emotional “food” from someone who is
difficult to get it from – just like our parent – THEN we’ll know we’re OK.
(Another word for this is “imago” and you can read about it in more depth here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imago_Therapy)
The irony is that, when we’re coming from this wounded story, it tends to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. It either sets things up so the elusive ego food can’t or won’t be given or, when it is given, it’s invalidated, denied or misunderstood.
I would say that many of the “issues” people have with leaders doing whatever they do actually come from these wounded stories. It’s not really about THEM, it’s about what we say their reaction means about US – that’s the big IT as far as I can tell.
Charlie, I really hear you wanting to meet others with both kindness and discernment, and I believe that one of the most helpful things for any leader is simply to understand that these patterns and projections are in play.
That way, we can stay in kindness, even in the face of someone’s wounded response to our treatment of them and hold space to help them see it clearly.
(I guess maybe it’s time for me to write the Emotional Needs 101 series!)
Susan, that is all really fascinating, thank you for taking the time to write it up for us. I recognize a lot of myself in that.
Thank you Sonia! I work with this stuff in myself and in my clients all the time. Knowing about it and working with it consciously can turn an event like SXSW, with all its “social asymmetries”, into a doorway for healing these old stories and remembering that we’re all doing the best we can, even those whose treatment we have “issues” with.
And by the way, Charlie, I just LOVE the term “social asymmetries”. It really sums up the essence of it.
Three thoughts…
Firsties, Charlie’s list is terrific for all of us (since we’re all leaders, right?) to keep in mind as we continue to work to act and lead consciously. Your list is a great place to start from to have a sense of the dynamics, constraints and opportunities that come with leadership and communications. I think this list is great for all of us to reflect upon for what we might want to keep in mind as we make our own leadership choices.
Secondsies, I can’t tell what the emotional content is about the supposed “cool kids” observation…there’s definitely content there beyond ‘bewildered’. I’d suggest letting it go and moving on to the whole reason a person attends SXSW or any other conference…to grow and learn, right? The more interesting conversation to me is…what are some great ways to use conferences?
So, forget the “cool kids” junk and twitter an impromptu fundraiser for Heifer Intl or water.org in the form of a “best blogging post headline” content in the hotel lobby. Hey, even 50 bucks will change the world for thirsty kids. Or put a poster up in the hotel bar with “Your best advice for…” and see if the entries get better or worse as the night drinks onwards (okay, it probably coarsens). Or invite 4 other people to a specific good diner/restaurant that are not doing anything like you are doing and have everyone share.
Instead of worrying about other people’s leadership, try developing your own skills.
Thirdsies, I find this whole “cool kids” concept weird and frankly, lame. Every single name that is a rock star at SXSW that you and I can name right here and right now…not ONE person in my life would recognize. Sorry, Charlie! (Not that I think you think everyone cares 🙂
And more importantly, all these people don’t CARE that they don’t know these names or people or their work or their leadership or supposed lack thereof. (I’m pretty sure 99% of the people I know don’t know what SXSW itself is!) This is true in all areas of life. All endeavors are just little ponds in the end. Even actual real rock stars can’t be picked out of a line up by most people in most corners of the world. I am also passionate about children’s lit and education. Jonathan Kozol, anyone? Deborah Meier? Francesca Lia Block? John Green? Yah, that’s about what I figured.
So, let’s move on to working hard on lowering the level of world suck (to put it John Green’s words)! And to flourishing productively! Or is it productivity with flourishes? Productively flourishing?
I’m a bit late, so maybe it’s already turned into a discussion about “cool kids” but I think there’ s some real substance to Sarah’s and Charlie’s points.
I think the danger, from a leadership point of view, is that it all starts to become a giant echo chamber. The same people talking about the same things to each other. After all, it’s damn hard to reach out to new communities and add something to them, especially when you’ve got a nice comfortable community already willing to listen to you.
I take great inspiration from leaders who continually try to reach out in new ways to unexpected communities, a relatively simple concept that could benefit all our businesses, not to mention our lives.
I found Sarah’s post & this post to be good, thought-provoking reading. I think that for me, it all comes down to context, context, context.
I’ve seen some of the behavior Sarah talks about, and I didn’t read her post as guru-bashing at all. Like I said, context. If, at the Art of Nonconformity meetup/party at SXSW, Chris Guillebeau would have sequestered himself in a special VIP room for A-Listers only, it would strike me as bad behavior. If, at a private party that he wasn’t hosting, he spent most of his time talking to people he knew and not circling the party to say hi (as is expected when you’re the host), that’s not bad behavior.
I also think it’s about how you react when someone approaches you. To continue using Chris as an example, because he’s such a great one, I talked to Chris (both at the AONC party & a private party, actually), not wanting to take up a lot of his time but just to say hi and thanks for providing an amazing resource, and he was very approachable and polite both times and we ended up having a nice short little conversation.
In comparison, a friend told me about approaching an A-lister at Blog World, just to say hi and that she enjoyed their blog. She walked up and introduced herself and the A-lister literally just looked at her for a second and walked off without saying anything. To me, that definitely crosses the line into bad behavior. If they had said “Hi, nice to meet you, I’m sorry but I have another commitment that I need to get to right now”, or something, that would be understandable. But to not respond at all and just walk off is blatant rudeness.
As a slight aside, the example you bring up in number three is baffling to me personally, because I would actually be incredibly grateful to have you lay down those limits ahead of time. I worry about taking too much of peoples’ time or energy so for me, it would be awesome to know ahead of time – this is what’s okay, this is what would cross over into coaching and we could set up a time/date/invoice for that, or whatever.
This is a great discussion, the comments are good reading. Thank you for hosting it!
Ahh, sorry, catching up on my blog reader & didn’t realize that this post/discussion was a few weeks old.