Leaders must carry their charity’s ‘standard’, says Rui Domingues, in both good times and bad.

By the time you read this, my eldest daughter will have carried the flag out for the ICC Champions Trophy cricket match between India and the West Indies at the Oval.

She’s not a big cricket follower, but she is really proud to have been selected to represent her school in this way. I’m not sure which flag she will be carrying, but her role is to be the standard bearer for one of the teams.

It seems to me that there are two things that you need to be a standard bearer. One is to have a standard to bear, and the other is to be prepared to be a bearer.

Challenge for finance leaders

As a finance leader in your organisation, do you know what ‘standard’ you are carrying for your charity? And are you ready and willing to carry it?

A key part of Friends of the Elderly’s strategic direction is to introduce ‘person-centred’ strategies, processes and tools. At first glance, this sounds like one of those many management fads that come and go quicker than batsmen facing the English bowler, James Anderson.

However, this is not about radical new techniques; the change is more in how existing tools (like managing change, and relationship maps) can be focused more on individuals – rather than the organisation or teams – so that consequently services can be delivered with the service user at the centre of everything we do.

At our recent senior team awayday, we were able to get our teeth into some of the big strategic issues and opportunities that Friends of the Elderly is facing in providing services to older people. In particular, we looked at what a person-centred leader would look like and what they would do.

Firstly, there is authentically living the charity’s values, which is something that comes through again and again from various writers and commentators on leadership. This is all about keeping focused on what really matters (vision, mission, purpose and values) and reinforcing them in all your interactions with people.

Secondly, a leader should enthuse others to see what is possible. Key parts of this attribute are sharing knowledge and information.

Thirdly, we should pay attention to relationships, build trust and encourage working together. Active listening, acting decently towards others, watching your use of language, understanding what is poor practice and exploring why it happened, are all parts of this facet of leadership.

Finally, a leader should demonstrate person-centred practices consistently in all their roles.

We came away as a senior team having a much greater appreciation of the ‘standard’ that we should all be carrying. Each of us had to selfassess ourselves against these four aspects, to see which ones we needed to understand better and work on.

Courage in tough times

The next part of the leadership challenge is to be ready to carry the ‘standard’ around the rest of the charity. If our strategy is going to succeed, the key leaders will need to be carrying and waving this standard on a consistent basis.

Standard bearers throughout military history were among the first into the most difficult situations and suffered terribly for this. In fact, official military titles (like ensign) were given to those who carried the flag and there are plenty of examples of the bravery of those men who would have been targeted by the enemy, mainly because they carried the standard in tough situations.

As I write, I know that that my daughter is not going to face any physical intimidation when carrying her flag into the Oval next week. But my colleagues and I, as the senior team carrying our ‘person-centred banner’ out into the rest of the charity, could well face some hostility and opposition.

The example of military flagbearers for all of us to follow, both at Friends of the Elderly and as finance leaders right across the sector, is to know and believe in what ‘standard’ we are carrying, and to be prepared to take it into tough situations. There may sometimes be a personal cost attached; but good leaders have to be prepared to stand firm when necessary and keep their charity’s ‘standard’ flying high.