Hosting Guests and Guesting Hosts

(Five Clues to Host Leadership at Work)

Hosting class at Bali Wise (ROLE Foundation) in Kuta Selatan, Nusa Dua— flaleman 2022

All very nice and well, Host Leadership. There are at least four perspectives and at least six actionable behaviors (roles of engagement), and that’s about it. See for yourself.

But wait a minute. When Mark McKergow, who famously wrote the absolutely endearing Host (Solutions Books 2014), calls the framework “simple”, I condone wholeheartedly. But when I am at work, in an organization where Host Leadership is proclaimed the leadership style of choice, and I ask colleagues in leadership positions about leading like a host, and they reply it is simple, then, I am inclined to worry.

I am not implying that worry is the only thing driving me in my ongoing endeavor to develop a pedagogy of host leadership. But worry there is to some degree. Because I really like the idea of all of us leading like hosts and I think it would be a shame if people thought it is merely “simple.”

With Made Hardinata Wijakesuma, Amalya Laleman, and Fena Evans at Bali Wise — July 2022

Take the initial premise. If “true leaders” (this is the denominator used in The Scrum Guide 2020) are hosts, or host/leaders, or leader/hosts, or they lead-like-a-host, then what kind of dynamics are we expected…