Page 197 - Harnessing the Strengths

180 ■ Appendix: Meet the Authors

a couple of very good people working for us who did
not fit into our culture. Then, you can either plod on

or cut your losses and decisively say good-bye to each
other, but in both cases, you lose something. Instead
of that, we chose to reconcile the differences on a
higher level, and these people became freelancers. In
the words of Jim Collins, “they have been kicked off
the bus, but they are bicycling quite enthusiastically
next to it.”
Ed: That also demonstrates that servant-leadership is
defi nitely not a soft model. Like James Autry, a
servant-leader from the beginning, you have to have
the guts to say: I love you, but you’re fi red.
Fons: That’s right. Sometimes you have to be hard because
that is the best way you can serve the others. It is
important that people commit themselves to the cor-
porate culture. Servant-leadership is not gratuitous.
Ed: Even more important, it is something that informs
your whole existence. Servant-leadership is more than
a management style. It is a lifestyle, which means that
it doesn’t stop the moment you step out of the offi ce.
Attitude and behavior must be consistent. You can-
not be someone different at work from who you are
at home.
Fons: Yes you can! There are a lot of people who are popu-
lar, understanding, and wonderful bosses at work,
but when they are home with their wife, they trans-
form into grumpy old men because they used up all
of their energy.
Ed: That is true, but then we are not talking about
servant-leaders. A servant-leader is the same whether
at home or at work, precisely because you can’t, at