A New Theory of Teams: Everyone On The Team is a Leader

By Herb Rubenstein

Introduction

There are many theories and best practices about how to create successful teams. There are books on why teams fail.  This article presents a new and radical theory about teams.  My life’s work has been about teams, and I notice a huge difference between those who have gone through life benefitting from being on teams and those who have not had much experience with teams.

In my books on leadership, I have outlined many leadership theories and best practices.  Now with my work on Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Anti-Racism, I am learning how important each person’s participation is in making a successful team.  What is clear is that most people think a team is comprised of leaders and followers.  What is also clear is that most people are wrong when it comes to building a successful team.  If every person on the team is not a leader on that team, there is not only a spark plug missing, there is a tire missing.

In America and countries all over the world, we are “controlled” by leaders.  They capture our minds, tell us what to think, how to act, who to attack, and how to attack them, and worst of all, they stifle the leadership capabilities that exist in each one of us.  But this article is not about the negative impacts of terrible leaders as we approach the second quarter of the twenty-first century.  This article is about one example of a “team that could” when, for 45 years, it was a team that had failed.  The team was successful because everyone on the team acted as a leader from the start of the project to its successful victory on October 5, 2022.

The Story and The Team

The story is simple.  The main character, Jeff Black, had a phobia of flying and could not get into an airplane at the age of 45.  This phobia was completely controlling his life, even costing him a potentially great relationship with a fine woman who loved to fly and travel.  This phobia cost him any possibility of knowing that he could do what he wanted to do in life.  Jeff Black wanted to fly in a plane.  He just couldn’t.

Then, while Jeff Black was working for me as a personal trainer, I invited him as my guest to fly over the Shenandoah Valley in the fall of 2022 to see the colors of the Blue Ridge Mountains.  As he explained that he could not fly, I was determined that he would fly.  So, I made a referral and added to Jeff Black’s team.  I referred him to Holly Byerly, a hypnotherapist. Jeff Black was strong enough to hire her and attended many sessions with her.  While Jeff and the hypnotherapist made amazing progress, both of them realized we needed to add more people to Jeff Black’s team to make this first flight happen for him. 

 The first thing I added to the team was an airport, the Shenandoah Regional Airport at Weyers Cave.  Jeff and I went to visit the Airport on October 5th just to look around.

On the same day, I added Blue Ridge Aviation to Jeff’s team.  That was the company at the airport I had selected to fly us over the Blue Ridge Mountains.  I had been in contact with both the airport and the aviation company weeks in advance to set up Jeff’s first visit ever to an airport.  I let the aviation company know through a series of emails exactly what Jeff’s situation was and what my goal was.

Blue Ridge Aviation added three key staff members to the team. First was Sarah Grefe, Office Manager.  When we walked into the office, she was Jeff Black’s greeter and the person who would schedule and make arrangements for the flight.  Blue Ridge Aviation immediately added Melissa Smiley, who was working at the office that day.  Melissa was a student pilot and is now certified as a commercial flight pilot.  Upon meeting Jeff and myself, on her own initiative, Melissa took Jeff Black and me on a walk where the planes are parked and taxi, and showed us planes taking off and landing at close, but a safe range.  As we walked back to the office, Melissa walked up to a parked plane, opened the door to the pilot’s seat, and invited (directed) Jeff Black to get in the plane where the pilot sits, buckle the seat belt, and sit there for a while. This was before we even had scheduled our October 27th flight.  Blue Ridge Aviation, on the day of the flight, added Colton Landes, our great, calm, empathetic and professional pilot.

 Soon after we had started talking about Jeff flying, he added Jeff Goldstein to the team.  He calls Jeff Goldstein “Bro” and is his best friend.  Jeff and Jeff had many conversations about this flight, and Jeff Goldstein was the person who kept telling Jeff Black that he could do this, drove Jeff Black to and from the airport and flew in the plane with us as Jeff Black’s guest on his discovery flight lesson, his inaugural flight.

A Team Analysis

Every person on the team played a key leadership role.  Every person was needed.  Every person, including Jeff Black, took charge of the situation when it was their turn.  I was the person who might have been the instigator of all of this, but Jeff Black is the hero of this story. 

Immediately after Jeff Black took his discovery flight lesson, his first airplane ride, and left his phobia of flying in the rearview mirror permanently, he told me he wanted to take his thirteen-year-old daughter on a flight, and his parents.  Neither his daughter nor his parents have ever flown in an airplane.  Jeff Black grew as a human being because of this discovery flight lesson from a person with an intractable phobia preventing him from flying to a person who was immediately after his first flight eager to take others on flights who themselves have never flown, including not only his daughter but also his parents. 

Sarah Grefe was the leader at Blue Aviation.  With her calm and gracious demeanor, she took charge both when Jeff and I walked in the door of the office and when Melissa brought us back to the Hanger after our walk on the runways and parking areas for planes at the airport.  Sarah said just after we walked in, “How was that?” and when Jeff said, “It was good,” Sarah immediately asked, “Do you want to schedule your discovery flight lesson?” And we did.  Sarah, from the moment we walked into Blue Ridge Aviation’s office, made sure Jeff Black and I knew we were in good hands with their pilots and planes.

Melissa Smiley took charge of Jeff within minutes of us arriving at the aviation office at the airport.  As soon as we were introduced to her, she told us she would take us to the area where the planes park so that we could see take-offs and landings and look at the planes where they were parked.  She knew exactly what she was doing and was the first person who ever opened an airplane door for Jeff Black, telling him authoritatively to “get in the pilot’s seat of the plane and buckle that seat belt.”

Colton Landes was not only our pilot for the discovery flight lesson but also our guide for the experience.  As we walked to the plane, Colton began to let Jeff Black know the things on Colton’s checklist.  When we got to the plane, Colton showed Jeff everything he was doing to make sure the plane was perfectly safe.  Colton handed us headphones and explained how the radio. When we got in the plane, he showed Jeff how to buckle the seatbelt, how the flight would start and progress, and commented on the great weather and visibility we had that day.  Throughout the discovery flight lesson, Colton was the narrator and asked Jeff questions and got Jeff to engage in give and take, looking out the windows and commenting on what he saw.  Just as we leveled off, Colton turned to Jeff and asked the best question of all, “Where would you like to go today.”  Colton guided Jeff Black’s flying experience in his discovery flight lesson with confidence, with care, and with professionalism.

Jeff Goldstein was the soul brother who had Jeff Black’s back every time he got scared or nervous about the flight. Jeff Goldstein was very sure, much more sure than Jeff Black himself, that Jeff Black would be on that discovery flight lesson and would learn “that in an instant, after hard work for months, he could overcome his lifelong phobia about flying in an airplane.”

Holly Byerly and I never talked about the work she did with Jeff regarding his phobia of flying, but clearly, she led him to new ways of thinking, new views of himself that made Jeff Black’s first flight, his “discovery flight lesson, possible.  Her role was instrumental, and her leadership was essential to the success of Jeff Black and his team.

Conclusion

If you think teams are successful because a few people lead and others follow, you better hope your teams do not come up against a team where everyone is a leader.  They will beat your team most every time.  Teams have positions like CEO, tackle or quarterback, point guard, and pitcher, but in every position, the person in that position must be an effective leader all the time in that position. 

When you put together a team, focus on how to get the best leadership qualities and leadership effort out of every person on your team, and your team will reach success.  The new “team theory” is simple.  Every person on the team must perform as a leader from whatever “position” they have on the team.

Those leaders who demand that others merely follow them must be pushed aside, and all future leaders must be, in James MacGregor Burns’ words, a transformational leader.  The job of a transformational leader is to nurture current leaders and help create future leaders.  This theory goes beyond even this great idea.  Leaders must demand that everyone on the team step up and be a leader.  If that is too much for a “leader” to take on, either replace that leader or work with that leader to help become a “leader of leaders” where the “leader” encourages, and even demands, that every person on the team act as a leader.