Recently, after my article Why Employees leave the organization? A friend of mine told me that he is facing the same problem. He runs a software company of around 10 people and out of which 4 are the founders of the company (startup). The problem he faces is the inability to retain the employees. I had a detailed discussion with him to dig down into the problem. And as the best approach is to ask as many WHYS, I did the same. I asked him a lot of questions and at the end of our discussion, we realized that the issue can be a lack of leadership. There is no person among the founders who drives the team. In fact, everyone should be a leader.
According to him, they have provided all the basic facilities (that a startup can afford) to their employees. They arrange weekly one-to-one meetings among the team to identify if anyone has any problem with the organization. All was good until he shared that all the founders sit in a separate room and the team sits in the main hall. This is the point that I believe is one of the major factors that increased their turnover rate.
Be a leader
A lead must be a person who influences his teammates. A person who drives his team and inspires them. Once the team gets inspired by their leaders, they will start joining their lead to help them achieve their goals.
A lead should be IN the team.
There is always a captain in the field that actually plays with the team for the team. He is the one who boosts every team member and encourages the team members to give their best shot.
If all of the founders are in the broken car, and asking the team members to push the car. No one is going to do it. You have to start pushing the car yourself first. Only then, people will join you by seeing your efforts and will.
I used to work in a startup where the CEO was a tech guy. He was an early adopter of new technology. I remember, one day we went to the office, and the code of 1 module was all changed. He shifted the code from java to kotlin (programming language). At the moment, we were frustrated because we had to adapt to the impact of this change. But now we realize that it was the right time to get our hands dirty with kotlin (programming language) and he drove us to do so.
Simon Sinek, in his book, Start with Why, says that “The leaders sit at the top of the cone – at the start, the point of WHY – while the HOW – types sit below and are responsible for actually making things happen”. This means that along with a leader with a clear vision, there must be a person who ensures the right path towards that vision.
Conclusion
A leader is not a person who is sitting in C’s position. In fact, he can be everyone, who loves to take responsibility for others, who loves to help others to achieve their goals. A leader is a bus driver, who makes sure that the bus and the people sitting in the bus are up for the same destination. If their destination is not the same, the bus has to stop again and again to drop the passengers. It will cause delays to reach the destination and make other passengers angry or frustrated too. A leader should make sure that journey is pleasant.
Have you ever faced a situation where the organization lacks leadership? There is no one to drive the team? Or to inspire the team? Let me know in the comment section below. Also, if you agree with my thoughts, hit the like button below 😉
