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DTH-XII-0047

“People are following me because they trust me, and I refuse to waste that.”

DTH · Pillar IV — Death DTH-XII · Build a Legacy That Stands in This Life.

Trust given freely is the heaviest thing a leader carries — and the most fragile. People have handed you their time, their effort, their belief. What you build with that is your legacy as a leader: people who grew under you, or people you used up. Mortality makes the choice clear. Build them.

Your Practice

  1. Ask of each decision: does this build my people or just my position?
  2. Develop someone past their current role this quarter. Growth is the leader's monument.
  3. Take the blame down and push the credit up. That's how trust compounds.
  4. Picture the eulogy your people would give of your leadership. Lead toward that.

The Architects

“Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.”

— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book X (George Long translation)

More under DTH-XII

DTH-XII-0001“I don't know what my purpose is.”DTH-XII-0002“I feel completely alone.”DTH-XII-0003“I'm building something that will outlast me.”DTH-XII-0004“I wrote my values down and I'm living by them.”DTH-XII-0005“I told someone I loved them and meant every word.”DTH-XII-0006“I want to leave something behind for the people who come after me.”
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