Ulokcwinyu Ubia
I rarely write really long articles but welcome to my therapy session.
I have been thinking about this beast called leadership for a long time. I was privileged to get into leadership at a young age. I have slowly been nurtured by people I found along the way and have grown into roles gradually. It has been one of the toughest journeys that I embrace every single day. It has rough patches but I can say for sure that with the right team, it becomes beautiful.
Some of the most beautiful phases I have experienced have been projects where you are surrounded by people who understand you, or people you understand, without having to say a lot. Aside from the fact that it makes your work easier, it gives you the assurance that these people actually pay attention to details. This is where synergy comes from. It is not magic. It is not luck. It is people paying attention, communicating, anticipating needs and understanding that they are part of something bigger than themselves.
The past few weeks have been some of the hardest I have come across when it comes to leadership. I have almost found myself swallowing back my words about advocating for young people to take up spaces. Working with young people is great. There is a level of creativity and energy that comes with it. There is innovation. There is enthusiasm. There is courage. There is a willingness to try things differently.
However, and I stand to be corrected, many young people do not pay attention to structure.
I do not know whether it is a generational trend, but I suspect it is more of an individual thing. I have met young people who create structure. Those who have seen things go wrong and intentionally created systems to prevent the same mistakes from happening again. People who understand that if they are fortunate enough to occupy a position today, they have a responsibility to leave something functional for those who come after them. That is difficult work. It is difficult to break patterns. It is difficult to adjust to new structures. It is difficult to challenge habits that have existed for years. But it is doable. It is definitely not something that will kill us.
Then I have met young people who blame every single thing, including their laziness, on their predecessors. The statements are always familiar. “There has not been a structure.” “There was no system.” “People before us failed.” And in my head I am thinking, now that you are in a position to create the desired structure, what exactly are you doing? Well, apparently we are busy blaming those who came before us.
Here is the thing. Once a person seeks accountability and their statement starts with blame but does not end with a solution, it is highly possible that the problem is that person. I have watched young people be given opportunities to execute. I have watched them criticize the people who came before them. Then, once they occupy the same position, they repeat the exact same patterns they complained about. At some point we have to stop talking about what others failed to do and start talking about what we are currently doing.
Last week, I introduced something at my workplace. An Activity Brief. Why? To ensure proper and detailed planning plus execution. There was already a work plan in place. The problem was that it was not being taken seriously. Most of the activities would appear as one sentence. No context. No detail. No explanation. Rarely answering the why or the how. Now, coming from an applied theatre background, it feels disrespectful to go to the field without answering the what, why, when, where and how. Actually, let me go further. It is disrespectful to go and impose solutions on communities when you have not taken the time to find out from them what the problem is. You might arrive ready to address poor hygiene only to discover that the community’s biggest challenge is actually poor local leadership. You might plan an intervention around education and discover that what is really affecting school attendance is access to sanitary products. You might spend resources solving the wrong problem simply because you never asked enough questions.
The Activity Brief was meant to force us to think. To plan. To justify. To communicate. To anticipate. To be accountable. Unfortunately, it was not received well. Someone told me it was micromanagement. Another person said I was creating double work. Meanwhile, for almost four months I had continually asked for detailed work plans and reports. Then I remembered something. As human beings, we are quick to blame people for becoming frustrated, but we rarely examine the behavior that contributed to that frustration. We see the reaction. We ignore the pattern.
I am a soft leader. Yes, I am a soft leader until the softness is brushed off. I give people chances. I allow people freedom. Freedom of expression. Freedom of execution. Freedom to innovate. Freedom to make mistakes and learn. I believe in extending grace. A lot of grace. The problem is that people often mistake grace for weakness. By the time I am reaching the point of issuing directives, I have already tried everything else. I have had conversations. I have asked what the problem is. I have listened. I have put myself in your shoes. I have spoken to the people around you. I have done my research. And if you know me, you know my research rarely takes a short time. I observe. I listen. I reflect. I give people the benefit of the doubt. I go the long way of even talking to those that have mentored me about it, just to be sure, I am crossing over for good reasons.
Then there is another trend that fascinates me. We take our time doing things for others. We delay responses. We miss deadlines. We fail to communicate. Yet the moment we need something from someone else, we expect them to drop everything and attend to us immediately. I have always believed that if you treat people well, they will do their work. Provide them with the tools they need. Provide the resources. Provide the support. Remove the barriers. Then they will have no excuse.
What I am currently learning is that sometimes people simply want to do things their way. And there is very little you can do to change that. There are people who will blame leadership every single time. At work. In friendships. In organizations. In families. In their personal lives. For them, everyone else is the problem. They are sparkling snow. Perfect. Untouched. Un responsible for anything. Yet these same people will do little or nothing to support the people around them. If anything, they will throw others under the bus the moment accountability appears. An interesting pattern indeed.
When we were studying Applied Theatre at university, one of the first things Dr. Lillian Mbabazi taught us that once we call ourselves a team, it ceases to be an “I” affair. It becomes a “we” affair. That lesson has stayed with me for years. If you are part of a team and your leader constantly reports using “I” instead of “we,” there is a problem. Likewise, if you are part of a team but never contribute, never communicate and never take ownership, there is also a problem. A team is not a collection of individuals working independently. A team is a collective responsibility.
The thing about my soft leadership is that it is rooted in trust. It is not following up every minute. It is not hovering over people. It is not constantly checking whether you have done what you said you would do. It is trusting that you will report back. It is delegating authority and expecting ownership. It is saying, “I am available whenever you need me,” and actually meaning it. It is stopping what I am doing because someone on my team needs support. It is creating space for people to grow.
The challenge is that when a soft leader’s heart gets broken, a different leader emerges. To be honest, I am afraid of that leader too. Because once that leader emerges, the room for negotiation becomes smaller. The room for grace becomes smaller. The room for excuses disappears. It is no longer, “What do you have to say?” Because when I created room for you to speak, you took advantage of it. When I gave flexibility, you interpreted it as a lack of standards. When I gave trust, you interpreted it as a lack of oversight. At that point, leadership becomes directive. Not because it is preferred. But because it becomes necessary. Sad that it is after this that we begin listing all the negative things. After this, we call people difficult. After this we say leadership has changed and “they think we are attacking them when we give feedback.”.
But there is a positive side to all of this. It reminded me that leadership is not about being liked. It is about being responsible. There is a difference.
I am learning that trust and accountability must walk together. One without the other creates problems. Trust without accountability creates loopholes. Accountability without trust creates fear. The work of leadership is learning how to balance both. I am also learning that structure is not punishment. Structure is care. Structure is respect. Structure is sustainability. Structure ensures that work continues even when people leave. Ask yourself, “If I left my position today, would my successor have where to start from or would they start from square zero? Would you like to be the successor who starts from square zero?” Structure protects teams from chaos. Structure protects communities from poorly planned interventions. Structure protects organizations from repeating the same mistakes.
The irony is that most of us appreciate structure when we are benefiting from it but resist it when we are asked to create it. We want organized workplaces. We want responsive leaders. We want efficient systems. We want accountability. We want excellence. But we do not always want the discipline required to create those things.
Maybe that is where I currently find myself.
Learning that leadership sometimes means being misunderstood. Learning that leadership sometimes means carrying the weight of a vision that others cannot yet see. Learning that leadership sometimes means being called controlling when you are trying to establish accountability. Learning that leadership sometimes means choosing what is necessary over what is popular.
And perhaps that is okay.
Because despite the frustrations, disappointments and moments that make me question whether young people are ready for the opportunities they keep demanding, I still believe in young people. I have seen too many brilliant young leaders to completely lose faith. I have seen young people build organizations from nothing. I have seen them create systems where none existed. I have seen them take responsibility for mistakes they did not make simply because they understood that leadership is service.
Maybe the issue is not age. Maybe the issue is mindset.
Maybe leadership begins the day we stop asking who failed before us and start asking what we are doing with the opportunity in front of us. Maybe leadership begins when blame ends and responsibility begins. Maybe leadership begins when we realize that every generation inherits a mess from the previous one, but great leaders are remembered because they left things better than they found them.
As for me, I am still learning. Every single day. I am still learning how to trust without becoming naïve. How to remain soft without becoming a pushover. How to be firm without becoming harsh. How to hold people accountable while still recognizing their humanity.
Leadership remains a beast. A beautiful beast.
Some days it roars and reminds you how much you still have to learn. Other days it quietly teaches lessons that no classroom ever could. But every once in a while, you look around and see a team working well. A community changing. A young person growing. A system functioning because somebody insisted on building it. And in those moments, you realize that the difficult conversations, disappointments, frustrations and sleepless nights were not in vain. Then you wake up the next morning and do it all over again. Because leadership, for better or worse, is not a destination. It is a daily decision. And today, despite everything, I still choose it.
@UlokcwinyuUbia.
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