Recently, I got to watch the Tamil movie Indian 2, which stars one of my favourite actors ever – Kamal Hassan. The movie is supposed to be a sequel to a hit Tamil movie released in 1996 with the same name.
While the premise of the movie remains the same (it’s the story of an anti corruption crusade of one man by becoming a vigilante), the treatment in the sequel is, let’s just say different.
Whether we like the movie or not is our subjective opinion. So, to each our own.
However, I think there are a few lessons that we can take away from the movie on Leadership.
Here are my lessons in leadership that I took away from the movie:
1. Respect the Intelligence of our People: You need to expect and respect the intelligence of the people that we lead and engage. So, anything that might need them to suspend their intelligence should be cut out (unless that is the whole point).
2. Doing the right thing: Right Being honest and doing the right thing is never easy. So, we need to be prepared to pay the price if that is the path we want to walk.
3. Making Hard Choices: Before we expect our teams to make hard choices, we need to be transparent about the costs of these choices and only after we have made them ourselves.
4. Change is consequential, Plan for them: Every change that we make in our part of the system has some consequences somewhere else. We need to be prepared for intended consequences and open to the unintended one’s.
5. Readiness for tough decisions: Sometimes, asking teams to make tough decisions, when they are not ready for facing the consequences, can create more problems than we solve.
6. Super-Hero Syndrome: No job is a one-man job. Anything worth pursuing, is better pursued as a team.
7. Importance of Humour and Sarcasm: The combination of Humour and Sarcasm is both entertaining and educational. As leaders, we need to always look for the combination to keep us grounded and humble.
In conclusion, no amount of super stars / heroes can save the day if we lack depth of content, high quality thinking, creativity and flawless execution.
