Leading in the rain
In a few weeks, I head to Chicago to Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership. I have four days with them in March and then return for four more days in June.
At the same time, I am on the Education Committee for the NATA conference, and we are looking to find speakers for that event. I’ve been doing research and listening to podcasts to go with our theme, Surfing Through the Waves. Our sub-themes are Breaking Barriers (focusing on DEI), Navigating a Changing World, and Seas the Day!
While we discuss speakers and look for people we can afford to have at the conference, I want to share with you someone I found compelling.
Alonzo Kelly is an executive coach, Professor, Best Selling Author, and Radio host. He’s one of the nation’s leading experts on leadership development, strategic thinking, and planning. I listened to his radio show and one episode called Leading in the Rain and it blew me away. In fact, I am going to listen to it again because I want it to soak in more.
Alonzo speaks about the literal rain as how as kids we loved to play in the rain but it was our parents that weren’t thrilled about it. As it starts to rain, we center more on our appearance – what is the rain going to do to our clothes? Commute? Mood? Each time that happens we forget more and more how we loved the rain at some point.
Rain can be literal, or it can be what we are going through now. The rain can be COVID. It’s changed our appearance, our plans, our mood, and our attitudes.
He says we all want to be leaders or in charge but “Everybody wakes up wanting to be Superman, forgetting that Superman had a bad day every day.” We only call the superheroes when it’s raining – not when it’s sunny. Leadership and most needed when it’s raining.
He’s not wrong. Our community at Temple Sinai has not only stepped up but run at the rain these last few years. Thank you all for being a part of the storm and learning to just get damp at times.
I encourage you to listen to the episode and I’d love to hear what you think!
