Shared Leadership—What We Give Up

10/19/21

Dear friend,

Last week, I shared with you about the core value of shared leadership we uphold in the Light House community and why we lean into it.

(If you missed that article, you can read it here.)

Today I thought I'd press a bit deeper into this topic and share what I'm learning we give up when we choose to share leadership with other people, and what that's like.

You might wonder, "Does this apply to me if I'm not in leadership anywhere?"

I'd hope it does.

And that's mainly because the things we "give up"—and the things we gain (which I plan to write about next time)—all come down to what we believe about ourselves and about what happens in relationship. These are things that could be helpful to all of us, no matter whether we're in leadership or not.

I hold a pretty broad view of leadership, by the way, which is also why I think this could be helpful to more than those in formal leadership roles. I think all of us, when we know our light and live into it, exhibit leadership, care, and influence.

Okay, so here are two things I'm learning we give up in shared leadership, and then next time I'm going to talk about the things we gain.

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First, we give up being the star of the show.

I ran two small businesses before the Light House came along, and both of them were places I considered myself a "solopreneur," or solo entrepreneur. It was just me there, doing all the things that got done, being the one people got to know, and having a direct relationship with all the people who came along.

I loved it that way, and the Light House started that way too.

But once I realized shared leadership was something we were being invited to embrace, I had to start letting go of the special feeling that comes from being the one-woman wonder of a solo enterprise.

It became less about people knowing and appreciating me and more about them knowing and appreciating each other. It became less about what I could offer them with what we did and more about what we could offer them, together, which was so much more than I could have done alone.

Which leads me to the second thing I've learned we give up in shared leadership, which is having all the good ideas.

One thing we've been doing this year for our glow-ups, which are weekly live gatherings for the community that orbit around monthly themes and are led by members of the community, is bringing all the glow-up leaders for a particular month together for a collaborative session.

When we all come together as a group to hear what each person is bringing for their glow-up and how their glow-up fits within the flow of the whole month and what the others are doing, something really cool happens.

New ideas that emerge as the group collaborates. They share what the haven't figured out yet or are unsure about, and the group puts its mind on those things and offers suggestions. Or they hear what someone else is doing and get a new idea for their own—something that could create a tighter thread between the gatherings for that month.

It's fun to watch them spark off each other, their suggestions and ideas far above and away more interesting and inventive than I could have offered on my own—and I love that!

And there's a special kind of magic that's felt when the members of a group all contribute something to the whole and everyone starts to feel like they're creating it together.

It becomes an us thing.

Things are really beautiful when they're an us thing.

And that's the part that connects to what I mentioned at the top, about how so much of this connects back to our beliefs about ourselves and about what happens in relationship.

I'm going to talk more about that next time, when I talk about what we gain from shared leadership.

Yours in contemplative light,
Christianne