Host Leadership (and Guest Followership)
…a better model than Servant Leadership?
When I’ve been a leader, I’ve always felt that my job as a leader is to own alignment and then step back and support the folks doing the actual work – and that worked well for me. When I’ve been a follower, I’ve sought out leaders like that and chafed when I didn’t have them.
As I learned more about leadership, I started talking about “Servant Leadership” a lot. The idea that a leader leads by serving their folks wasn’t perfect, but it seemed better than the alternative. I was passionate about things like “Leaders Eat Last.” But I as I worked to teach those things to people it always felt awkward. What, exactly, was I asking them to do? What, outside of the abstract, did ‘servant leadership’ mean?
When most of us think “servant,” the image lands somewhere between Dobby the House Elf and Anthony Hopkins in Remains of the Day. To me, neither of these was particularly helpful in talking about leadership.
So I started talking about being a “host” instead. And it worked. People got it. I was excited – I’d finally had a good idea, and I immediately pictured myself on a stage signing piles of my new leadership theory books, and decided it might be good to do some homework on titles.
Google crushed my dreams (as it does), because someone got there first and better. Specifically, Mark McKergow got there first, with a TEd talk and a great book – “Host Leadership: Six New Roles of Engagement” with Helen Bailey. Since then we’ve seen other books and even a Host Leadership Community
It’s not as widely-known as it should be, and I want to put an anchor down on the idea that it should be widely known, and it should be foundational to those of us in the ‘changing things’ world – both as a pattern for us to teach organizational leaders, and as a pattern for our own behavior as change leaders.
This isn’t a book report; I’m going to filter McKergow through my own quick conceptions of host leadership here – and I’ll strongly recommend his book to folks who find this topic interesting.
First, to be a leader is to have followers. If you don’t, you’re just some person dressed in a funny uniform with a big stick marching by yourself down the middle of a street.
So we need to talk about a model that contains a clear and attainable vision of both leadership and followership. Our model of leadership has to be congruent with our model of followership – we have to be able to fit them together and what works for one half has to interact well with what works for the other.
And one of the beauties of host leadership is that it maps perfectly to a model of guest followership.
So what does it mean to be a host?
It’s contextual – hosting a formal dinner party is different than hosting an Oscars party is different than hosting a ‘watch football and eat bbq’ party is different than hosting a six year-old’s birthday party.
It’s delimited – as we learned to our dismay in high school house parties, we can’t – and shouldn’t – invite everyone. Our hosting is limited by time, place, and attendance.
Which means leadership can be situational – it’s OK for you to lead today and me to lead tomorrow and Julie to lead on Weds.
It can even be fluid and situational within an event – success looks like many conversations with many participants – not one lecture. Guests can serve each other.
It requires logistics that map to the desired outcome. Dinner Party? Beer bash? Kid birthday? Each requires the right resources at the right time – and while the host doesn’t have to provide everything (all the time) it is perceived as the host’s failure if there’s no birthday cake (or if, as was true in my case, a platoon of crazed five years olds are dismayed to discover that the birthday cake is a carrot cake – which seemed like a great idea the day before).
It’s driven by a desired set of outcomes. We want these two people to meet; we want to build a relationship with our boss; we want our child to have a memorable time.
…and this is nowhere near a complete list.
But can you start mapping these things to the responsibilities of a leader in an organization? And can you see how it contains elements of vision, mentorship, even control at times – all of which are part of a leaders’ toolkit – contained in something that’s inclusive and psychologically safe?
And better, can you see how it maps exactly to the idea of being a guest. What does it mean to be a guest?
Embrace the context and act in context – don’t wear a Raiders jersey and flipflops to a formal dinner party (or a sport coat to a Raiders watch party).
Be at the right place, at the right time, with the right people.
Embrace situational leadership – there will be a moment where as a guest you carry the conversation or pour the bourbon, and as a host, you sit back.
…and so on.
I like these models because virtually no one I know has a servant or has been a servant, and so I find that people are a bit put off by the metaphor - and more importantly it doesn’t contain clear patterns of behavior that we have models for.
But everyone has been a host or a guest, and virtually everyone can articulate what it means to be a good host or a good guest.
Still, I encourage you to read the books – damn you, McKergow!! You crushed my dreams!! – and more importantly, take some time to reimagine your roles in your organization in the context of being a great host or a great guest.