Ego and generosity? The leader’s balance

Power isn’t the problem. It’s what we do with it. Olivier Courtois discusses an action plan for balancing ambition with the value you can add

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Olivier Courtois

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Leadership involves reconciling a paradox. On the one hand, it is difficult to emerge as a leader, to generate the energy and motivation needed to influence and lead others without a healthy dose of ego. On the other hand, an excessive ego will prevent an emotional connection with others, which, I’m sure you’ll agree isn’t a good start if you want to create commitment and trust. I’ve observed that effective leadership always relies on a balance between ego, the self-centred, and generosity, focused on the needs of others.

Ego

It all starts with ego and personal ambition. To say the least, the concept of ambition is controversial. It carries many connotations. I personally take it in its most positive sense coupled with the word generosity. There can be no leadership without a certain will to power and influence. Gandhi, Mother Teresa and Mandela were not without it. Far from it.

Leadership implies knowing what you want, having personal ambition, egocentric to a certain extent, and being comfortable with that ambition. I take issue with the criticism levelled at politicians, or leaders in general, that they are power-hungry and have overinflated egos. Fortunately, I’d like to say, there are human beings who enjoy having power.

Those who criticise are often no less sensitive to the attractions of power in their own context. The problem is not power itself. Nor is it that we enjoy having it. The question is what to do with it? What do we try to get with it?

Generosity

Ego, ambition and the will to power, essential drivers of leadership, must be accompanied by a large dose of generosity to develop a leadership posture: a generous person, who has a big heart, who shows high feelings of devotion, of self-forgetfulness, who gives of themself to others, their family, their neighbours, their city, their country, a human group or a cause, automatically has a purpose and an audience. Generosity is the purpose of all human endeavours and all human life. It is where the material and the spiritual meet.

Prosperity can only come from bringing value to others. The world only makes sense in exchange with others. If my egocentric ambition drives me to develop and offer a service or product that is of no interest to anyone, no matter how hard I try, at the end of the day I’ll have no choice but to starve or beg. My survival, my prosperity, my happiness depend solely on my ability to bring something of value to others.

To develop leadership skills, ego and generosity must coexist. Because generosity alone does not automatically transform its author. Many people are revolted by poverty, some make donations, some help on the side, but few have the ambition to devote their lives to transforming the situation on a large scale. To do that, you need ambition.

Of course, the human value of a leader cannot be measured by their level of ambition and generosity. Every commitment is respectable and not everyone has the same talent or the same opportunities. Luck will also play its own part.

You should never blame yourself for not reaching the level you were aiming for. On the other hand, you must try and do what you can on your own with ambition and generosity. In business, however, the value of a leader is often measured in dollars, pounds, euros, yen or yuan as indicator of their ability to transform available energy into added value.

Let me suggest the following reflection: what is your ambition for the next five years? The timeframe is arbitrary and you may decide to shorten it to two or three years. However, I would advise against too long a timeframe, which would dilute the benefits of the exercise.

Describe your ambition in no more than one sentence. For example: ‘become a manager in my field of activity in my current company or elsewhere’, ‘get my degree and move to Asia’, ‘become chief executive’, ‘create a foundation’, ‘enter the top three’ or ‘have a fortune of x thousands’.

From this ambition, you will now define three pillars that will form the basis of your action plan. For example, if your ambition is to become chief executive, you might have as pillars: clarify my purpose, consolidate growth in my current role and stakeholder management. If your ambition is to consolidate your wealth, you could choose as pillars: start an investment plan, develop my financial knowledge and join a community of investors. You’ve got the idea.

Then for each pillar, define two steps. For example, if your pillar is to develop your knowledge, step 1 could be to read and take online courses and step 2 to consolidate by subscribing to specialist magazines and joining a club. These steps can be arranged in chronological order, or as two separate, parallel sub-pillars, depending on your needs.

Finally, the activities section allows you to move on to concrete actions. List a series of concrete actions for each stage. You can concentrate on one pillar or step for a certain period of time, then move on to another or operate in parallel. As you can see, the further to the right you are on the chart, the more evolutionary the space is and the more frequently you need to update it.

Once the exercise is complete, all that remains is to implement the roadmap and update it regularly. To this end, ask yourself: does my action plan balance my ambition with the opportunity to demonstrate my generosity to bring added value in the form of time, energy and tangible resources?

• This text is from 'The Seven Dysfunctions of Leaders: 21 questions to transform your business, your career and your life' by Olivier Courtois, Novaro publishing, November 2024. See here for details.