Last weekend I went on a surfing holiday with a group of friends. We woke early Saturday morning and began preparing for the day. When I get up I love a good cup of coffee (filter coffee). One problem the house we were staying in only had Nescafe. Now I drink Nescafe at work because that is what is on offer, but it doesn’t mean I like it. In fact many of my colleagues joke that the reason they take their coffee with milk and sugar is because they don’t like the taste of Nescafe. So why drink it?
Judgements aside, the ease of making a cup of instant coffee is its greatest benefit. Scoop, pour, and stir – and you have a cup of coffee. But I will say the flavour, the quality, and the enjoyment of that morning cup of coffee is not the same. Think of the difference between fast food and a three-course meal, the level of satisfaction from the fast food rarely equals the level of enjoyment from a great three-course meal.
Our society is too caught up with instant gratification. Yes sometimes things need to be done quickly but in always looking for the fastest or easiest way out of a problem we forget about the importance of trying things. Quick wins minimise the importance and necessity of failure. They narrow the concept of success, causing a cycle where people are expected to succeed quickly and often.
We are not all born leaders. Becoming a good leader can take a lot of time.
Recently I have started to play with the idea of the Nescafe leader. It is a fascinating concept. It is the “scoop pour and stir style” of leadership, where leaders are more likely to be born than made and if you don’t do it right the first time then it does not work. These are leaders who are off the shelf, ready to go, and super experienced with need for development but no need to be tried and tested prior to an emergency.
I have yet to meet a person who can do these things. Many of the inspiring leaders I speak to have had to take a much longer road with hard knocks. They did not hear someone’s top tips and become. They recognised the fact that we are all different. What works for you may not work for me and vice versa. So the leadership learning process is about transferring another individual’s understanding and making it relevant to me.
Ultimately I ponder the value of top tips for leadership. Do they help people become better leaders of do they distract them from their goal, leading? Nescafe coffee drinkers could do with sitting and enjoying their coffee – from the process of making it to the flavours it can generate to the social aspect it can bring to one’s life. In the same way we should look at leadership as a process to be enjoyed, with stages and times.
