Leadership Is Not a Popularity Contest

Posted on October 22nd, 2024

Why Professional Distance Is Often Underrated

Over the past years, leadership has increasingly become emotionalized.
In many organizations, leadership is almost being sold as a kind of emotional wellness zone — conflict-free, permanently empathetic, endlessly harmonious, and constantly “on eye level.”

Everywhere we hear about “New Leadership,” “People First,” “flat hierarchies,” and the idea that modern leadership above all needs to be pleasant.

The reality of successful organizations, however, is usually far more pragmatic.

I often remember a very specific paradigm shift that took place within myself when I was brought into a company to support profound transformation processes.

To be honest, I initially expected the usual resistance:
territorial thinking, fear of change, internal politics, and defensive power structures.

The exact opposite happened.

The leadership team operated with remarkable intrinsic motivation. Decisions were made quickly. Responsibility was accepted. Problems were solved instead of delegated.

At first, I was genuinely surprised by this dynamic.

Until I understood why it existed.

The executives possessed real decision-making authority.
Not symbolic. Not theoretical. Operationally real.

At the same time, there was a direct participation component tied to company performance. Management did not merely benefit from titles or hierarchy — they participated in results and accountability.

And that is where one of the central truths of leadership begins:

People develop ownership when responsibility and consequences are directly connected.

Many companies today speak endlessly about “ownership,” while simultaneously creating structures in which almost nobody is actually allowed to decide anything.

The result is often a culture of self-protection instead of a culture of responsibility.

Leadership does not mean navigating organizations without friction.

Leadership also means being capable of making unpopular decisions.

One thing I always told my leadership teams was this:

“Friends are not made inside companies.”

Not because organizations should become cold or inhumane.
But because professionalism requires clear roles.

A professional environment requires the ability to accept criticism, evaluate performance objectively, and make difficult decisions — even when they are uncomfortable.

Especially in the German context, another aspect is frequently underestimated:

Language creates hierarchy.

The inflationary use of first-name culture may function in certain international environments. Yet within German corporate culture, it often contributes to a problematic erosion of professional boundaries.

Distance is not automatically disrespectful.

Quite the opposite:
Professional distance can create stability, clarity, and authority.

Leadership does not require artificial buddy culture.

It requires orientation.

And sometimes leadership also requires the willingness not to be liked by everybody.

As I always told my executive teams:

“Don’t be everybody’s darling — because everybody’s darling is everybody’s fool.”

Deliberately provocative, of course.

But the core remains true:
The moment leaders become obsessed with pleasing everybody, they often lose exactly those qualities that make leadership effective in the first place — clarity, consistency, and decisiveness.

Interestingly, I later observed very similar patterns in international environments.

Particularly among expatriate executives, the real test rarely takes place during the first few weeks. It usually begins somewhere between month three and month six.

The initial excitement slowly gives way to reality:
cultural differences, operational pressure, distance from home, unfamiliar communication patterns, and the psychological strain of constant adaptation.

Not everybody who wants to work internationally is automatically capable of sustaining international leadership responsibility.

And it is precisely there that true leadership often reveals itself:
under uncertainty, under foreign conditions, and outside one’s personal comfort zone.

The best leaders I have encountered throughout my career were rarely the loudest people in the room.

But they possessed something else:

They could make decisions.
They could carry responsibility.
And they were willing to live with the consequences.

Perhaps that is the real definition of leadership.