Leadership Lessons: Moth Effect

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From James Dodwell - Hammers of Hope

Good Morning,

Recently, I read about a phenomenon called the “moth effect”. There have been studies stating that drivers may inadvertently steer toward warning lights at night due to an “attentional” preoccupation that affects their ability to maintain direction in which they were previously heading. It goes on to say that people may unconsciously move in the direction of their distracted gaze, whether the object is lit or not and whether they are driving or walking. Sound familiar? In a crazy way it explains why it is so easy to get off our life path when we lose focus on what is right and true. We see it too often, as we “sometime” allow the “eyes of our heart” to look away and then steer our life in another direction.

This reminded me of a story about a distracted driver, Over lunch in a fast-food restaurant, a woman was telling her friend about a recent accident in which a teenage boy had driven into the back of her car as he was distracted when texting. "The young man driving the car blamed me and called me every rude, dirty name in the book!” stated the woman. Inconspicuously seated at the next table two small boys had been listening and one turned to the other and said wide-eyed: "You mean there’s a book?"

I know a silly story to illustrate a point of awareness. The young man driving the car was distracted and unaware he was about to plow into the back of a stopped vehicle, and the woman was unaware of young ears taking in everything she said. This reminded me of the four levels of awareness. As leaders, we need understand leadership has many facets, respect, experience, emotional strength, people skills, disciple, vision, momentum, and so forth and so on. Nearly all these skills can be learned but we must understand growing and stretching our leadership skills doesn’t happen overnight. Thus the levels of awareness:

The first level Unconscious, Incompetence – We don’t know what we don’t know. Everyone starts out in a state of ignorance. For example, when I started working with wood and building construction, I could not read a ruler. The big numbers on the tape were easy, but the little lines between the numbers meant nothing to me. I would count the lines and announce to person running the saw 15 inches and 7 little lines. I did this until someone took the time to explain these were in 1/16” increments and 7 little lines is 7/16^th”. Once we are on the other side of the learning curve we slowly moved along to the second level Conscious, Incompetence – We know what we don’t know. I knew what I didn’t know so now it was just a matter of taking the instruction I was provided by a knowledgeable carpenter mentor, ask questions, study and read, work with it daily gaining experience to improve my skill level.

Once we begin to master this part, we are moving onto the third level Conscious Competence – We know and grow and it starts to show. We find leaders, who show great skill, when opportunities arise, shine only because they have paid the price of preparation. This is when we as leaders become more aware of our abilities and gifts. We are determined to continue developing our skill set until our actions become a habit, an automatic response to circumstances that come our way. We move onto the fourth level Unconscious Competence. We simply go because we know. This is where as stated before, our reactions and actions are based on our experience and knowledge gained as we progress into better more qualified leaders. We execute our leadership plan with greater skill. We see and reward the efforts of others. We remain teachable, we teach others, encourage them guide them and help them to reach their potential all the while keenly aware of our walk or position in this process.

This level of leadership experience allows us to feed our followers, to cast vision, communicate the importance of teamwork, share our faith, show our love unconditionally, celebrate joy, and offer hope. Every effective leader needs time to develop. It’s similar to raising a baby into adulthood, nurturing, teaching, guiding, guarding, filling them with experience and knowledge and opportunity to learn more. But time alone cannot make an effective leader. It takes a willingness to want to learn and to lead. Also, we need to be aware that if we decide not to work at growing and stretching ourselves we will remain at level one. Where’s the fun in that, just saying.

I encourage each of us to do something, anything to challenge us each day to help us continue to grow our skills, stretch our level of awareness and make a difference in other’s lives. It’s all about adding value to us and to others. Genesis 39:21-23