Leadership – A run, not a race

When I think about leadership, I am reminded of when I first started running. For many years I had wanted to be a runner. I would watch people head out for their morning run and think they looked aligned in body, mind, and spirit. They seemed strong and their bodies moved with ease. I would sometimes half heartedly try to run. I would put on some old shoes, run for a couple of minutes, and think next time would be better.

After years of thinking about running, I decided it was time to learn how to do it properly. I signed up for a learn to run program and attended the first session with excitement and pride. This was it – I was taking an important step to transform myself into a runner. It soon became apparent it was not going to be as simple as strapping on some newly purchased, and very expensive, running shoes and hitting the pavement. The fist thing I learned was that it was recommended we run three times a week to see results. Wait a minute. Three times a week? Wasn’t this a one day a week kind of thing? Then I started learning more things I could do to build my stamina, strength, and endurance. From strength training and nutrition to “rolling it out” and stretching, there was a long list of activities to supplement my running.

I was perturbed to say the least. I had signed up to run, not strength train. I felt I barely had time to run, let alone roll out my muscles. This was not how I envisioned my running experience. And to top it off, after all that hard work, I would have to keep it all up. It was not going to be like learning to ride a bike, where once you learned, you could check it off your list. To benefit from the effort I was putting in, I would need to continually maintain it as a practice.

Around the same time I was learning to run, I was also moving up into leadership positions in my organization. I soon came to see the parallels between my leadership journey and my running journey. 

Leadership, like running, is something that requires maintenance, nourishment, and fortitude. I had taken the recommended leadership courses, read the trending books, assessed my personality, strengths, weaknesses, and accepted responsibilities that showcased my willingness to manage complex projects. I equate this to taking the learn to run program. While these endeavors helped to get me in the leadership door (or on the running track) the thing that was going to transform me into an impactful leader was going to be regular training.

It required daily mentoring and coaching with my team, compassionate conversations, genuine relationship building, humility, introspection, and showing up each day with intention. Just like running, some days I would get tired and feel unmotivated. However, I quickly learned that if let myself lag in my leadership practice, it would not take long to feel sluggish, less inclined to put in the effort, and potentially, diminish the efforts that I had spent so much time crafting.

Now, when I find that I am not showing up as the leader I know I can be, I reflect on how I might need to strengthen my leadership muscles, nourish my reserves, or access supports to get me to the next marker.

And as with all goals – so much of our success is contingent on our mindset. For me, that means looking at leadership not like a race with a finish line, but a daily run.