I have a confession to make: sometimes when I read articles about leadership I roll my eyes. It happens mostly when I’m faced with the assumption that everyone is (or can be) a leader. I’ve always disagreed. Not everyone is a leader, not everyone should be a leader and not everyone wants to be a leader. After all, leaders need someone to lead and that necessitates the existence of people who aren’t leaders, right? So when Millennial leader Marvin Mathew began to talk to me about the concept of leadership he almost lost me. Can I be frank? I was just about to roll my eyes.
But boy, am I glad I kept listening. I can truthfully say that my discussion with Mathew got me thinking differently and may even prevent future eye rolling incidents. He convinced me that it is time to redefine leadership. He explains, “We define leadership in a very binary way. Many of us define leadership as the person who takes the reigns and makes the calls. And I don’t think everyone wants to be a leader in that way. For me leadership isn’t just about the person who stands in front or the person who is the loudest, it’s about living a life of purpose.”
Mathew argues that leadership redefined is executing ideas that impact the world. It’s developing a thought from concept to reality. Leadership isn’t merely a role but instead it combines what a person accomplishes and how and why s/he accomplishes it. For Mathew leadership is recognizing your purpose, recognizing how that purpose can impact the world around you and following through. And it just so happens that Marvin Mathew embodies that brand of leadership.
Mathew is a social entrepreneur. He helps create businesses that solve social problems. In his words, “I want to help dreamers do.” While he seems to be an encourager by nature, he shies away from the moniker of motivational speaker. But he will gladly self-identify as a doer. “I lend myself to companies and help them grow,” Mathew explains, “It’s cool to see ideas move from concept to reality.” He wants his clients to do good and do well. He aims to create business models that allow companies to use profits to pay their employees well while doing good things in their communities. But for each client that looks a bit different. There is no one-size-fits-all recipe for sustainable success. That’s a lesson he learned when he launched his passion project, BridgeSport.
BridgeSport empowers students studying abroad to provide athletic programming for children in the local community. It was launched while Mathew himself was studying abroad in Rome. The organization was born as a result of two divorced ideas, a random opportunity and a handful of good people who wanted to help.
3 Ideas from Marvin Mathew to Give You Momentum
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It is time to Redefine Leadership
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You can Do Good and still Do Well
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Everybody has the Potential to Lead
When Mathew’s apartment was burglarized just a few days into his time in Rome he and his friends were immediately wary about both the city and its people. According to Mathew, “We chose to study abroad because we wanted to have an immersion experience but that’s impossible to do if you have no trust for the community.”
After the robbery a guidance counselor who knew of his love of basketball suggested that he and his friends reach out to a neighborhood church to find a place to play. When they did, the priest welcomed the friends and invited them to share the gym with local youth who played there after school. In a short time they had forged relationships with the kids, the parents and eventually much of the community. It was a beneficial experience for everyone involved and one that they wanted others to experience. They recognized it to be a scalable idea, expanded into other markets and BridgeSport was born. And while basketball worked in Rome, in Barcelona students play soccer. Mathew explains, “For us it’s about the end user. The experience needs to be tailored to the students.” BridgeSport is a great idea realized and executed in several different, community specific ways.
I’ve felt the impact that sports can have on people’s lives. And now we’re focused on quantifying those results and building partnerships with people who believe in using sports as a tool. There are a lot of opportunities out there, especially in places that are conflict ridden.
BridgeSport is just one idea that Marvin Mathew has taken from concept to reality. It’s just one way he’s grown a simple thought into a community changing program. It’s just one way he’s exhibited leadership redefined. But he looks forward to helping many others find their own success in years to come. When asked how our world might be different if we all embrace this redefinition of leadership his voice lights up as he imagines us all making an impact on our communities. He explains, “We’re living in a world that is hemorrhaging possibilities.”
His redefinition of leadership has me wondering if I’ve been wrong all along. If we’re defining leadership as living a life of purpose while impacting the world, maybe everyone really can be a leader! And you better believe I typed that without rolling my eyes.
I’m always impressed with what Marvin manages to accomplish, and yes, he really does embody his understanding of leadership.
Do we need to redefine leadership? Maybe. Is Marvin’s new definition of leadership flawless? No.
I would like to see recognition of the importance of sustained efforts. Actualization is terrific, but it’s harder to continue to work when the work is hard, uneventful, ugly stuff.
This is a great point, Zach.
I agree that perhaps Marvin’s re-definition (or better yet, my interpretation of it) isn’t flawless. But, he got me thinking differently about Leadership, which is huge.
Your suggestion re: sustained effort is key too. More to think about!
Marvin sounds like a man with a mission and that is laudatory. But redefining leadership? I admit that leadership is wildly misunderstood and that the number of opinions out there almost matches the number of people having opinions. But opinions are a dime a dozen.
Leadership is what followers follow and that being the value standards they experience. So leadership is simply the transmission of value standards, no more and no less. Those standards can reflect disrespect or great respect, dishonesty or honesty, hubris or humility, etc, etc.
http://www.bensimonton.com/onleadership/what-is-leadership/
Thank you, Ben, for your your perspective. I agree that leadership is what followers follow. It seems at times leaders need to place a stake in the ground on a new initiative and then see who shows up, if you will. Granted, people will not follow this person if their values are not worthy. If the values align, then the new initiative may unfold successfully.
I agree that spending time to understand followers is essential. To move big missions forward, it also seems we need to define what we want to accomplish and why, along with how (the values). And then, hopefully, people will lend their talents to the initiative. Does this match your perspective?
Thanks again for adding your insights to the conversation. Jon
Great to read Marvin’s story. To me, being in the arena — trying and doing — rings through in his story. Out of a circumstance springs a new way to try to make a difference in people’s life and then moving an idea into other areas, other places. Marvin is delivering an example of moving beyond intention and putting ideas into action — trying and doing.
Thanks, Molly, for capturing Marvin’s story!
Jon
My pleasure, Jon. Thank you for providing a space and opportunity to share it.
I know Marvin, and he’s a great guy, but this article is both contrived and self-congratulatory. It also smacks of extreme privilege that is not acknowledged.
Kids who study abroad, help the communities they vacation in by playing sports with local kids. Study abroad kids go back to their fancy college/university and gets to feel good about themselves, while the local folks stay in their communities. Maybe the local folks get another privileged American to play sports with, maybe they don’t… bottom line though, in what measurable way is the life of the person in the home country better?
Study abroad experiences typically range from 3-6 months, which – if you look through the literature – is not enough time to set-up a meaningful mentoring relationship… actually, the literature reports out that those types of temporary relationships can be more damaging to kids then having no contact at all, since they oftentimes end up with feelings of abandonment.
All this is to say, good intentions are awesome, and taking something from idea to reality is both rewarding and difficult… but… simply being a “social entrepreneur” is not enough to make someone a leader.
Nothing new here.
I’m sorry to hear you didn’t like the profile. You make some interesting points and this is clearly a topic about which you have some strongly held opinions, Baws.
Thank you for taking time to stop by and read the article. I appreciate your feedback and at least we can agree on one thing, Marvin is a great guy.
Awesome stuff Marvin! Keep it up
Thanks for stopping by Thin Difference, Kuldip!
I’m glad you enjoyed the article.
Awesome article, continue to keep doing great things Marvin.
Thanks for the kind words, George!
We’re cheering Marvin on too.
Wow, he really is a man with a plan
He is, isn’t he, Shelbin? It was a pleasure getting to know Marvin.