The Power of WHY

Years ago, there was a king who had no children. And with every passing year he was more and more worried to find the right man who would take his place. Then one day, to test a promising candidate, the king summoned all the potential candidates to a countryside place where there was a massive sinkhole. It was an enormous hole in the ground which could fit even a soccer field. Pointing to the hole the king asked, “What should I do with this hole?”.

“Fill it with water!”,

“Build a bridge across the sinkhole”,

“Make it a graveyard”,

“Camouflage the sinkhole to protect from the enemies”.

All the interesting and novel ideas started floating. Every candidate came up with an idea better than the previous one. King was delighted to hear all the ideas.

Then came a young boy’s turn. Without any hesitation, he said, “Why do anything with the hole?”
Silence prevailed. Everyone was shocked by his impudence.

Surprisingly, however, the king congratulated the boy and made him the next heir to the throne of that kingdom.

Hi Friends! Now let me ask you’ll one question.

Put yourself in a leader’s shoe and tell me what is most important for you and for your success – Is it the process, the organization, the timelines, goals or the people?

I bet it is the people. Because people build organizations, processes are meant for people, timelines are adhered by people and goals are achieved by none other but, people. 

And one of the leadership styles that pay close attention to people is Affiliative leadership.

An Affiliative leader is the one that follows the “People First” approach. These leaders show warmth and acceptance to members and create emotional bonds with them. Because of the warmness provided, members feel safe and have a strong sense of belonging to the organization and perform better. This leadership style is most effective when there is a need to mend bad feelings that may have developed in a group, or to motivate others during times of heavy workload and stress. This is one of the most impactful leadership styles. Some of the popular affiliative leaders are Dalai Lama, Joe Torre, etc.

According to a career builder survey, 54% of the employees stayed at their current jobs because they felt good with the bosses who watched out for them. While 32% said that they liked the people they worked with. This information shows that employees greatly value the individuals they work with. Hence a harmonious working environment is one of the important factors for productive results. And Affiliative leaders tap into this desire by facilitating a trusting employee relationship.

On the other side of the coin, affiliative leaders sometimes have a difficult time tackling with underperformers. Since poor performers might go un checked in the team, some employees might get an impression that their mediocre performance is good enough.

Nonetheless, the key to being a great leader is understanding what your people want and expect from you and why they want it. While sharing a shared goal and vision, leaders not only need to know what their followers are doing but they also need to understand why they are doing it. 

And going back to the king’s surprising decision to make the young boy as his heir...

The boy could not answer to the king’s question until he knew the king’s ‘WHY’. Only if he understood the king’s intentions behind dealing with the sinkhole, he could advise him to create the desired outcome. Perhaps, then the proper course of action was to do nothing. The king recognized that the young boy was insightful enough to seek out his intentions and uncover his “WHY”.

Fast forward to several centuries to today. Ask yourself,

“Why do you come to work every day?”

“Why do you as an organization do what you do?” 

And once you can answer these questions for yourself, extend the “WHY” to others. If you want to transform an organization, it begins by transforming the people. And to do so, you need to understand who they are as individuals.