I have just come back from watching the movie "Invictus" which tells the story of Nelson Mandela and the South African rugby team (springbok) during the 1995 world rugby cup that took place in South Africa.
The movie shows the great character of Nelson Mandela, the man, who after 27 years in prison by an apartheid regime, was capable of leading and reconciling divided nation through a peaceful and highly successful transition. There is no point in relating Nelson Mandela's great personality in a blog and that is definitely not my intent here.
However,I found that we can draw many parallels between what Mandela did for the Springbok and what managers and leaders can do to drive and achieve success for their people and their companies. Some of these parallels that we can all learn from are:
1. Vision: In the movie, Mandela proves that to be a visionary is to see and believe in what other don't see or believe. Mandela's vision was that a victory of the South African team will bring the country closer. Despite the dire political, social and economic context, Mandela was capable of seeing what his aides and advisers could not see.
2. Through vision, true leaders create opportunities during crisis: Mandela did not only have the vision; He was also able to turn a difficult situation into a great success as he implemented his vision. He got personally and politically involved to support a low-performing Springbok as he brought them closer to the black majority of the South African people and brought the South African people to support their rugby team.
3. Get personally involved: Mandela did channel his support through the minister of sport or the director of the team, he went to the players and showed them his personal support and commitment to their success. He memorized their names before going to their encounters during a training session.
If we transpose this to a business situation this would mean that CEO's, executives and senior managers should not only know their direct reports. This should, as much as they can, go to the encounter of the players on the ground: engineers, technicians, researchers, line workers, field engineers, sales associates, customer service staff ..etc etc
4. Inspire: Once again, Mandela's interest in the well being of his country's economy and social environment did not make him forget that his people needed inspiration as much they needed jobs, money and healthcare.
He invested precious time and lots of energy to inspire the whole nation and bring them together defying the prevailing racial, political and economical divisions in a country that recently emerged from apartheid.
Once again, in a business/corporate context, this means that while meeting deadlines, delivering quality and profits are important, inspiring the employees of the company is also very important. Through inspiration, leaders can create an environment that unites their employees towards a common good while fulfilling their personal and emotional aspirations.
The movie really great and I encourage you all to go watch it and learn from it.
Ali
20 Dec. 2009
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