Kintsugi Leadership: The Art of Redemption in Leadership.
A quick internet search defines Kintsugi as “the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with urushi lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum.” The result is a new piece of pottery made from the pieces of the old but with beautiful additions which highlight the fact that the original piece was broken. Kintsugi is the Art of Redemption.
In leadership we use our influence to get things done through other people. It doesn’t sound glamorous, but this is the true baseline of leadership. As with all things that involve, and rely on, other people, mistakes happen. The pottery is dropped and broken. Sometimes this happens more than other times, and some people make more mistakes than others, but nobody is perfect and no team executes mistake-free all the time.
Have you experienced a time where you failed and your leader, or the person you let down, let frustration get the best of them and it permanently fractured the relationship? Even if you haven’t experienced that yourself, you likely don’t have to look far to find someone who has had that experience. For many leaders mistakes are frustrating. There is a spectrum of frustration, to be sure, but sometimes even the slightest inconvenience can trigger inordinate amounts of frustration. Why? Could it be that we are are too focused on the wrong things? Are we too focused on the infraction(s) of those on our team?
Disclaimer: I am not suggesting frustration and passion about results should be eliminated from leadership. On the contrary, without a passion for leadership and results, we are unlikely to make be great leaders.
What I am suggesting is Kintsugi Leadership — a mindset or tool to help us process those setbacks quicker, with more grace, and less damage to the influence and trust between you and your team. This mindset sees a mistake is an opportunity repair to original functionality while simultaneously adding value. Just as the gold added to the pottery increases the value of the piece, Kintsugi Leadership refuses to discard due to a broken situation, but rather looks to to win influence and develop skills through the mistakes. Kintsugi Leadership is the Art of Redemption in Leadership.
How do we perform this art? Let these next steps serve as a guide for you. It is up to you to discover how you an apply these principles within your spheres of leadership, but if you do, you can move toward Kintsugi Leadership.
Recognition of Ownership. As the leader, errors and mistakes fall on your shoulders. Kintsugi Leadership starts here. Without this recognition, there is no need to go read further. If you cannot see the mistakes of your team as an extension of the limits of your leadership ability or execution, Kintsugi Leadership is out of reach for you. Conversely, all you need to do to go down this path is ask yourself simple questions like:
Did I fail to provide clarity when delegating a task?
Did I lack clarity in my explanation of how success or failure in this task affects the achievement(s) of the team?
Did I fail to provide the proper resources for adequate execution?
Did I delegate to someone with the ability to complete the task?
Did I properly train, properly facilitate the training of, the person to which I delegated to?
There is no shortage of questions like this to ask, but the purpose of these questions is to isolate where you, as the leader, could have executed better to support your team and avoid the mistake made. Ask these questions and you will find the responsibility for the failure rests on your shoulders as much as anyone else’s.
Identify Opportunities. Mistakes change the landscape of the day, week, month, or even year. Just as the pottery breaks into many pieces, mistakes cause a breakdown in plans and results. Kintsugi Leadership requires us to look at those breaks as opportunities to add value through skills and invested influence. As we work to get our teams back online, ask these questions to identify opportunities:
Is there an opportunity to build influence with my team or an individual? The answer is yes. Your ability to leverage a mistake to build influence hinges on your ability to understand and believe in your level of ownership within the mistake.
What skills are needed to get the team back online? Don’t ask yourself, “What do I need to do to get the team back on track?” Boil it down the skillsets and the abilities you would employ to get the team back up and running.
Who can I teach this skill to in this new environment? Sometimes it is impossible to teach a contingency-based skill unless that contingency truly occurs. Did someone on your team make a mistake or drop the ball? Teach them the skill they need to avoid that mistake. Go one step further, give them the skills and support needed to get the team back online themselves. Perhaps the mistake made was outside of your team’s control. Great! It is likely to happen again. Teach your people how to handle that mistake when it pops up again.
How can I cast a vision for the team to move us through this hurdle? This is an opportunity bigger than just the individual. If the mistake affected the entire team, it is likely the whole team knows about it. Get in front of your team, own the mistake, and chart a course through the new environment.
Accountability Conversations. There are varying levels of mistakes. Not all mistakes are week-wreckers. Few are month-ruiners. A miniscule number are year-altering. A heavy majority of them are likely mere daily inconveniences that create a new hurdle to jump in the next 24 hours. Many mistakes don’t need intense conversation. Accountability is needed at all levels of leadership, but more importantly the skills and abilities we want to pass on cannot happen without interaction and the teaching of those new skills will likely feel out of place without the context of the “new environment” created by the infraction.
Trust your Team. If you have the right people on your team, nine out of ten times your team member knows when they dropped the ball. If that is the case a simple conversation of, “how can I help you get us back online” is all that is needed for Kintsugi Leadership. It’s as simple as that. This might not even be considered a “conversation” but simply an offering of support for what both of you know and understand needs to happen to move forward.
Collaborative Conversation. When you do have accountability conversations, whatever the scope of the mistake was, it is important to keep an element of collaboration. Without collaboration the buy-in to the new skills learned or the willingness to apply said skill will be minimal. Remember, in Kintsugi Leadership, the goal of the conversation is not to dispense blame or fault, but to redeem the mistake through new skills learned and value added.
Kintsugi Leadership - The Art of Redemption. This leadership practice begins with recognition of ownership. Your team is on your shoulders. Kintsugi Leadership refuses to discard team members due to a broken situation, but rather looks to to win influence and develop skills through the mistakes. Kintsugi Leadership asks us to look at the breaks and mistakes as opportunities to add value through skills and invested influence. It enables us to redeem mistakes and setbacks by leveraging the requirements of the new environment as opportunities to teach new skills and show support.
How can Kintsugi Leadership benefit you and your team?
Image: <a href="https://www.vecteezy.com/free-photos/kind">Kind Stock photos by Vecteezy</a>
