QUESTION OF THE MONTH:  What does the Legitimate Leadership Model say about dealing with “victims” in organisations?

ANSWER: The Legitimate Leadership Model makes a few distinctions when it comes to victims:

• Being a victim bears no relationship to age, gender, nationality, culture or life circumstances. Any person can be a victim.
• Being a victim is not a function of life’s circumstances but about one’s response to life’s circumstances.
• Victims behave in a way in which they focus on being here “to get”, which puts them in a position of weakness. It is a position of weakness because when they want something (like significance or recognition) from others, it is out of their control. The control (and strength) then is with the other person.
• Victims behave in ways in which they focus mostly on the past, where they are stuck.
• In their language use, they gripe or blame.
• Victims tend to be driven by their needs as opposed to their values. This makes them immature rather than mature.

The Legitimate Leadership framework is absolutely about holding people appropriately accountable for their attitudes, and we believe that leaders play a big part in enabling a shift in the victim mindset.

• Their attention from past to future.
• Their intention from taking to giving.

This shift is about the person shifting from victim to master, by shifting:

… and for them to be accountable.

This is achieved by our Gripe-to-Goal process, in which the leader enables the victim to shift into a new position of accountability in which she can engage from a position of strength.