86: Floating Leadership

Recently, I have been thinking about a quality of leadership that I did not appreciate enough when I was younger.

I call it floating.

When someone brings us an idea, our natural tendency is to evaluate it.

Is it good or bad?

Will it work?

Do I agree?

Should we do it?

This is especially true for experienced leaders. Experience allows us to recognize patterns quickly. We have seen similar situations before, so an answer often appears almost immediately.

That ability is valuable.

But I am beginning to wonder whether experience can sometimes make us too quick to know.

An idea may have only existed for thirty seconds before we classify it.

Good idea.

Bad idea.

Possible.

Impossible.

Then we move on.

What would happen if we allowed the idea to float for a while?

Floating does not mean agreeing with it.

It does not mean avoiding responsibility or postponing every decision.

It simply means creating some space between hearing and deciding.

Someone offers an idea.

Instead of immediately evaluating it, we might say:

Interesting. Let’s leave that possibility here for a moment.

Another person adds something.

Someone sees a weakness.

A younger member of the team notices something the experienced members missed.

The original idea changes.

Perhaps another possibility appears.

Eventually, the conversation moves away from:

Whose idea is right?

toward:

What are we actually discovering together?

I think ego has a great deal to do with this.

When I need my idea to succeed, discussion easily becomes a competition. I defend my position. You defend yours. Even when we appear to be discussing the problem, part of us is protecting ownership.

But when ideas are allowed to float, ownership becomes less important.

My idea can change.

Your idea can improve mine.

We can abandon both.

A third possibility may emerge that neither of us could have created alone.

Perhaps the progression becomes:

My idea → Your idea → Our exploration → What matters

This requires a particular kind of confidence from leadership.

A leader must be able to tolerate a period when the answer is unclear.

That can be surprisingly difficult.

We often think leadership means having answers.

But perhaps mature leadership sometimes means having enough confidence not to give the answer too quickly.

Experience then serves a different purpose.

Instead of immediately using experience to close possibilities, we can hold it quietly while listening longer.

Ask another question.

Let the junior person finish.

Allow disagreement.

Remain curious.

Eventually, of course, floating must end.

Organizations need decisions. Teams need direction. In urgent situations, there may be almost no time to explore.

So floating is not the opposite of decisive leadership.

Perhaps good leadership needs both:

Float when there is room to discover.
Decide when it is time to move.

Too much floating becomes indecision.

Too little floating becomes premature certainty.

The wisdom is knowing when the moment has changed from one to the other.

I used to think that leadership became stronger as we accumulated more answers.

Now I wonder whether the opposite sometimes happens.

Perhaps experience can eventually give us enough security to say:

I may have an answer, but I don’t need to use it yet.

Let’s listen.

Let’s leave the possibilities open a little longer.

Let’s see what we are missing.

Because when ego becomes smaller, ideas can float.

And when ideas can float long enough, a group may discover something that no individual could have found alone.