Screw courage to the sticking place

It often takes tremendous external pressure before leaders see no choice but to act courageously, rather than out of fear. The recent public statements by and behaviour of individuals from all segments of society in response to South Africa's downgrade are testament to this.

We are living in a rare time when some politicians are actually being honest in their reactions, instead of defaulting to the official statements issued by their political parties. Their response has moved the nation because their level of influence is significantly more powerful when they act with courage.

In the business world there are many examples of leaders whose influence increased tremendously when they chose to act courageously in the face of a crisis. This is when CEOs defy their public relations team and, instead of textbook responses, opt to be honest with the public.

Leaders being courageous ought to be the status quo. However, we live in a world where merely thinking of acting with courage is enough to scare people away . Courage is associated with being brave and unconventional - behaviours reserved for a select few.

All these courage-averse perceptions are driven by fear - the fear of being shamed, challenged, embarrassed and exposed. Taking courageous action is associated with personally detrimental outcomes.

This is even more evident in South Africa, where our default stance is to act in a friendly, diplomatic manner in the normal course of everyday interactions, resulting in most of us avoiding the tough conversations we need to have. Long-standing issues remain unaddressed, eventually bubbling to the surface and demanding our attention at the trickiest of times.

We need to start challenging ourselves to be more courageous. The benefits of acting courageously are tremendous - from standing up for the right decisions to being a more human and compassionate person. Most people understand these benefits because they are reflected by leaders we admire.

Yet when I facilitate courageous-leadership workshops, business leaders - despite recognising the benefits - still find it difficult to act courageously.

The reason it is so hard to be courageous, even when the benefits are obvious, is that doing so requires a high level of self-awareness.

When you truly know yourself - your strengths, weaknesses and value system - it becomes much easier to act with courage.

Self-awareness reduces the extent to which our fears influence our behaviour. We become less fearful of reactions to our actions because we have developed the maturity needed to discount the external forces trying to define who we are.

We tend to notice courageous leadership within a subset of truly effective leaders whom we admire because often they have undertaken the journey of developing self-knowledge and awareness.

By the time their ability to lead effectively becomes apparent, they have already gone through their own process of eradicating the fears that hinder their ability to be courageous.

Nelson Mandela is one of the greatest examples of courageous leadership, defying the status quo and consistently acting from a place of courage when many leaders would have been frozen into inaction.

Mandela said: "I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it."

We can all start reaping the benefits of courageous leadership merely by increasing our levels of self-awareness, thereby taking control of the fears that cripple us.

The defiant stance adopted by the born-free generation and some of our politicians in response to recent political and economic events is an encouraging example of the courage that comes with growing self-awareness - all to the benefit of South Africa.

zipho@ziphosikhakhane.com

Sikhakhane is an international speaker, business executive and investor, with a business honours degree from the University of Cape Town and an MBA from Stanford University