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If you want a great lesson in leadership, look to mom...
Andy Murray won Wimbledon on Sunday, and was the first Brit to do so in seventy-seven years. Britain went crazy. He earned that.
After the match Murray leapt up into the stands to embrace everyone in his box. First he hugged his coach, then some guy, then his girlfriend (though he did not linger there as long as one might expect), and then some other guys.
Arriving at the end of the box, he began making his way back the other way giving high-fives to those in the second row, collecting a few more hugs along the way.
Standing, beaming and applauding, tucked away in the third row...was his mom. Seemingly without giving her a thought or without noticing her, forgetting to look for her I suppose, he turned and started his way back down toward the court for the trophy ceremony.
His mom had been there through every point of the match. The television cameras caught her often grimacing, cheering, aching, almost never smiling. Living and dying with each point, the edge on her face revealing the stress underneath...the deep desire to see her son win...the deep desire to see her son achieve his greatest goal.
Forget Sunday for a moment. She had been with him since the day he was born. Hugs after falls, food on the table, playing psychologist, hauling him from match to match, ponying-up so her son could play.
And there she was-her son forgetting her in the biggest moment of his life. And yet she smiled. There wasn't a twitch of concern betrayed on her face. She didn't yell for him to come back. She cheered and glowed as he turned his back to her and began to head back to his fans.
You see, she's a mom. A parent's job is to set up their children, to give them opportunity, to hope they do better than we ever did. The greatest joy for a parent is to be surpassed by their children...and then to recede into the background and let them take their bow in their own light...and out of the parent's shadow.
Give me the leaders who do the same; who let their people shine; who don't steal credit, hog lime-lights, horn in on pats on the back.
Give me the leaders who can recede into the background so that employees can bask in their own success, feel good about what they've accomplished, become motivated to achieve more.
Give me the gracious leaders who get their big heads out of the way; who share success with their employees; who spread credit to their teams.
Your best leaders do this. To moms it comes naturally.
Somehow, just as Andy was heading back down the stands, he caught himself. Maybe he remembered, maybe someone shouted out to him, I don't know.
But he stopped himself just in time. It was as if an invisible hand plucked the back of his collar and spun him around, like a mom catching a child before they go outside without galoshes on a rainy day.
He clambered back up the stands, found his mom and gave a huge embrace...the biggest and longest embrace of all.
As it should be.
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