What is leadership? The textbook answer to leadership is that it is “a process of influencing a group to achieve goals” (Robbins et al., 2018). Drew Dudley has a different spin on leadership. In his TED talk that was given in Toronto he shared a story of everyday leadership that he doesn’t even remember happening. He shared how there was this girl who terribly afraid to start college and just before she told her parents she couldn’t do it, she met Drew (TED-Ed, 2013). When she met him he was in a real goofy hat and was handing out suckers for a Cystic Fibrosis Organization. Drew looked to the guy standing next to her and told him to give a sucker to the beautiful girl standing next to him (TED-Ed, 2013). He later shared how after this happened the girl decided she was right where she was supposed to be and could do college. The embarrassed boy who gave her the lollipop became her husband just a few short years later (TED-Ed, 2013). Dudley shared this story to point out that we all have lollipop moments in our life, moments where someone fundamentally made our life better (TED-Ed, 2013). He pointed out that we all also have been the one to give the lollipop, or have made someone’s life better, we may just have not been told yet. He explained how for many it can be scary to think that we have that kind of power, that we can become frightened by the thought that we matter that much to people. Why is this? He explained that this happens when we make leadership bigger than ourselves and about changing the world. In doing this we give ourselves an excuse not to expect it everyday from ourselves and from others (TED-Ed, 2013). He then shared a quote from Marianne Williamson which is, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us” (TED-Ed, 2013). He encourages us to redefine leadership to make it about the lollipop moments, how many we create, how many we acknowledge, how many we pay forward, and how many we say thank you for (TED-Ed, 2013). Leadership isn’t about changing the world, but about leading the people inside it.

Dudley, D. (2013, August 15). Everyday Leadership. Retrieved July 14, 2020, from

Robbins, S. P., Coulter, M., Martoccio, J. J., & Long, L. K. (2018). Management. New York, NY: Pearson.

student 2

Throughout my military career the word “leader” is thrown around a lot. Mostly it makes me think of those that outrank myself or that are in direct leadership positions. Drew Dudley mentioned that people are not quick feel comfortable admitting that they are a leader because of the fact that we have made it into something bigger than us (Dudley, n.d.). Leadership is the ability to influence a group to achieve a shared goal (Robbins, et al., 2018). This is looking at it from a managerial perspective though and the definition of a leader can be broader than that. I am active duty in the national guard and there are not that many of us. I was working with a soldier that is part time and she had mentioned trying to get an active duty job. She had waited until the last day that the job closed and decided not to apply and build a packet. I took it upon myself to stop what I was doing in that day and make her build that packet and get it in by the deadline. We got the packet built and turned in. She then was selected off of her interview and started her job. Three years down the road she found me at an event and told me how that job had changed her life. That ties perfectly to the fact that anyone can make another person’s life better and not even know it. Now I spend that extra time helping every soldier I can navigate their career, both in the military and in life in general.

References

Dudley, D. (n.d.). Everyday leadership [Video]. TED: Ideas worth spreading. https://www.ted.com/talks/drew_dudley_everyday_leadership (Links to an external site.)

Robbins, S., Coulter, M., Martocchio, J., & Long, L. (2018). Management (14th ed.). New York, NY: Pearson

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