[October 1, 2015] One of the lessons leaders quickly learn in the military is that leaders eat last. In truth this means that leaders forgo their personal interests to support the team. To say that leaders eat last is also symbolic of the notion that leaders accept their responsibility to assist people – who are part of their team – to perform their best even under any circumstance.
In the military I always ate last (literally). Once as a U.S. Army company commander, there was no food for the last few soldiers to eat. By eating last I discovered my cooks had not prepared sufficient quantity of the meal and with that knowledge I helped fix the problem … and quickly. This was my philosophy of not just the literal eating of a meal but how all of my leaders put their soldiers ahead of their personal concerns.
“Bookstores have entire ‘self help’ sections and not a single ‘help others’ book.” – Simon Sinek
Leaders eat last is an outwardly concept of how we interact with others. Much is written about ways to make ourselves better and while this is good information it rarely involves helping others. Author Simon Sinek asks how can we explain that some organizations consistently do better than other organizations. In one of the most popular TED presentations (link here) he talks about the issue of “why does your organization exist?” He says that they must answer the question “why” to be the best.
The finest leaders excel at inspiring people. One of my themes here at theLeaderMaker.com is that great leaders are those who can rally people for a cause because it is the right thing to do. People are inspired therefore, not by what we do, rather they are inspired by why we do it.
In the military we know that the army exists to confront and destroy the enemies of the nation. But why do we do it? The better motivating factor for the soldier is not that we are told to destroy the enemy but why the enemy is a threat to us and thus must be destroyed. This may seem a rather obvious point but it is most commonly ignored in literature and academics. It is not ignored however by good leaders in practice.
The most effective leaders know that leaders eat last. They know that only by creating the environment for people to excel, will the organization achieve its mission. That environment is created through communicating what will improve people on our team, organization, country, etc. It is not surprise then that some of our greatest leaders have been able to concisely and consistently communicate ideas.
Leaders do eat last; at least the best leaders eat last.
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