Be The Anteambulo

Dee Edwards recently opened a church in Sacramento and invited me to her first service. During that service she laid out her vision for the church and the roles of the people in it. When she got to herself, she described her role, the pastor, as the first servant meaning it was her responsibility to serve everyone as they carried out their responsibilities serving the church and the community. There is a Latin expression for this role, it is Anteambulo. The Latin definition is, “one who goes ahead and clears the way”. In this context, you can be the first servant or, Anteambulo wherever you are in your organization, family or team. As the Anteambulo, it is your role to clear the way for the people you lead. Clearing the way means to remove obstacles and to shield them from outside interference as they do their jobs.

Too often, people in leadership roles look out for themselves and in an effort to gain status or attention, throw their people under the bus or expose them to the whims of outside agendas. This is often frustrating for front line people and is almost always not productive for your team or organization. What ends up happening is, your people begin to resent you for their frustration whether it was your call or not. You’ll be seen as a weak leader, or worse, someone who encourages this frustrating, and unproductive habit. We all have to deal with directives or orders we have to carry out in spite of its impact on our stated mission. When that happens, share as much as you can with your team, let them know that this is a directive and that you are looking for the best way to get it done and behind you. Good information and opportunities to participate in the solution reduces resentment and empowers your team to be a part of the process. Rather than being resentful of you they will appreciate the openness and the information. They all get that directives happen and they will take care of it.

Way too many leaders step out of the way of mean, rude or pushy people. In an effort to ‘be liked’ or to avoid being ‘unliked’ will use their people as sacrificial lambs. I’ve seen it happen, a leader will call a member of his team into a meeting only to be blindsided by a berating from an unhappy client. This can be hurtful, in large part because your people expect you to protect them from such potentially painful events. Normal people don’t want to stand in front of an emotional avalanche, especially for another person, however as a leader and protector, it’s your job. Consider this first, when people are angry or emotional, they are not thinking or speaking rationally. Exposure to that doesn’t do anyone any good anyway, so it does not benefit your team to subject anyone to that. Secondly, you will recover from it more quickly from it. And third, you can use this experience as an authentic learning opportunity for that team member. Using this strategy, weather the storm then work with your team to resolve the issue, you can learn and build rather than diminish.

Usually, outsiders don’t have any idea of, or respect for, your mission or processes. Most times, they are people who are looking to get their way. To this end, they will yell, lie, exaggerate and go over your head so don’t be offended or upset about it. As a leader, you will have to not only keep your eye on the ball but keep your team focused on their jobs. Every leader gets derailed from time to time by people, inside and outside the organization, who just wants to get what they want. Your people expect you to shield them from outside agendas and excoriations from strangers. At one stop in my career, outside influences and verbal floggings were so common that the people on my team didn’t want to have any contact with people from the outside. It took a year to build trust and confidence to the point that they were comfortable in meetings. It took a year to rebuild what had been decimated by bad interactions with the public. The result of this turnaround was remarkable performance by an already talented but unappreciated team.

Last week, a colleague, we’ll call him Brett, defined for me his role as leader as he saw it and it helped me summarize the definition of Anteambulo. He said, “As leader, it is my role to give them what they need and protect them.” Exactly, Brett. It takes courage to be a leader, especially when you are protecting your people from outsiders who might go above your head in search of someone to support their agenda. When that happens you’ll get to see what your superiors are made of. Do we reroute people to the chain of command, proper process and the truth or do we continue down the road of mistrust, insecurity, and pain. I’d say that we work each day on being an Anteambulo, like Brett. Bret has a tough assignment and is turning it around, you can too wherever you are. There will always be risks with this, but guess what? As a leader, there will be risks anyway. You just have to decide which risks you are willing to take. To build up or break down. My experience as a leader and coach says to follow Dee and Brett’s example. Give them what they need and protect them and your team will SOAR!

 

William A. Brown

May 19, 2019