The Queen is dead. Long live the King…
Yes, colonial past hangover notwithstanding, I have to confess it IS the end of an era – if nothing else, she was remarkable for her attire, and her corgis!
But looks like I’m not the only one not being able to compute the new Monarch’s feet filling the late Queen’s very large boots – most memes on the net are trolling the poor guy for a) the long wait he’s had to finally become king, but b) also for his perceived (in)competence to do this job.
The question to ask, though, is – is it really his fault that there is this scepticism about his abilities. Maybe not. Maybe, quite apart from the fact that he’s spent 70 + years being lord in waiting, it’s also a case of the Queen having been larger than life/ TOO big a brand. And therefore, that big brand is shadowing all in its “wake”….Leads me to think of this very conundrum that I was discussing with a family member the other day…
In the corporate world too, and specially in the start up/ entrepreneurial world, a leader needs to build his/ her personal brand. Sometimes, nay, often, the personality of the leader is intertwined with that of the corporate. At the very least, very often the leader is the public face of the corporate – and a lot of the thought leadership/ the voice of the organisation and definitely the culture, stem from the leader.
It is wise, therefore, for said leader to build his/ her personal brand – this is even more important in today’s world of digital influencers and viral means of communications. Think Musk and Tesla, or, closer to home and a very different industry, Prannoy Roy and NDTV…the organisation and the leader become almost merged personnae.
But this inseparability of org and leader – is it too good a job done, or is it the harbinger of the next level of problems.
After all, What happens when the leader has to go – for whatever reason – to bigger/ better/ other things; or, just, as in the case of the Queen, to a better life…..if the head honcho has made the org too entrenched in her own way of thinking and acting, how does succession planning happen.
We experienced this moment when we four co founders sold our small sized business to a large org – the way we were structured, there was no clear one successor. The org taking us over did things their own way (as they needed to, to be fair)…what resulted was a gradual disintegration of the org we had built…maybe it was for the best; maybe this is the way it anyway would have panned out; but for sure I believe that had we had a clear strong leader as a successor, the course our startup charted would have been very different.
This is also the advice I was giving this relative – he is a strong charismatic leader doing many different, brilliant things – but he doesn’t yet have a strong successor. In his case, it is compounded by the fact that what he is doing is very new, and lies in the social welfare domain – hence there are fewer monetary compensations.
Every 3 months, he talks about moving on to the next big thing – and I have to speedily bring him back saying, wheres your successor????
So, what one needs to think about is – where does building the personal brand end, and building a successor begin. Whats the balance. How do you ensure sustainability of your legacy….in effect, long live the king, yes, but how do you make sure its also long live the kingdom…..
Food For Thought?
joshsang 