top of page
Search

The Shadow of the Leader


Your leadership shadow says a lot about your organization

The number one thing that holds fly anglers back from catching a lot more trout is an aversion to changing their leaders. There are very few situations where one leader setup does the trick all day long. Taking the middle of the road approach leaves you average at both ends. ~ Domenick Swentosky

One day, I guided a very keen angler on a highly productive river, but the fishing was awful. We changed flies repeatedly, but no luck. I knew this river well, and there are plenty of fish, some of them good-sized. Even though my client was a competent angler, we still could not get a take.

Eventually, I suggested the problem might lie in the leader, particularly its length. The fish were rising but refusing our fly. I lengthened the leader, reasoning that the fly line landing on the water was causing a slight disturbance and making the trout more wary. By increasing the distance between the fly and the fly line, we reduced the chance of spooking the fish. He hooked up immediately and had excellent fishing for the rest of the day.

Lengthening the fly fishing leader is a lot like a business leader spending additional time with an employee who is having a hard time being successful at their job. Taking the extra time for a longer, more accurate conversation can make all the difference to that employee's confidence and performance. ~ Pete Tylas 

The Right Leader Changes Everything

Choosing the right fly fishing leader takes considerable thought. The wrong-sized leader can spook fish as it lands or cast an unnatural shadow in the water. Length matters too, both in getting the fly to swim properly and in reaching the zone where the fish are holding.

I'd personally rather fish the wrong fly on the right leader than the other way around.~ Louis Cahill

The same logic applies in business. With the wrong leader in place, it becomes nearly impossible to deliver quality products or services, no matter how capable the rest of the organization may be. The leader sets the conditions for everything downstream.

Alan Mulally and the Power of Presence

Shortly before Alan Mulally became CEO of Ford Motor Company in 2006, Ford was losing $17.2 billion. Up to that point, executives at Ford were inaccessible and rarely wandered around talking to staff. Mulally cast a different shadow. Instead of responding to email in kind, which was standard Ford practice, he would walk into a person's office or pick up the phone, even for lower-level employees. Stories circulated quickly about the new boss's open communication style and his genuine interest in listening to ideas.


Through individual acts of reaching out and connecting with people, Mulally rebuilt a tired and insecure organization's morale. He became the unofficial Chief Engagement Officer, and employees responded to his openness, optimism, and directness. His behavior was the message, and the organization became a reflection of it.

Fly line leaders either catch fish or spook them. Business leaders either grow people or suppress them.

You Are Always Casting a Shadow

Whether you know it or not, you cast a powerful shadow across your organization through your everyday actions. And actions speak louder than words. People watch their leaders' behavior for clues about what is accepted and what is not. When a leader says one thing and then behaves differently, employees quickly figure out the real story.


When you come into the building and head straight for your office, go down without interacting with anyone; that is the story that gets talked about in the canteen and the hallways, not the speech you gave on employee engagement and openness.

A leader doesn't just get the message across. A leader is the message. ~ Dr. Warren Bennis

The senior team and how they interact with each other cast another powerful shadow. If you want teamwork as a core value across the organization, it must start at the top; otherwise, you will not achieve it anywhere in the company, even with the best team-building workshops. If two senior executives undermine each other, cooperation between departments will quickly follow suit. This kind of poor leadership shadow contributed to the nuclear accident at Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant and has played a role in countless examples of sub-optimal organizational performance.

Looking in the Cultural Mirror

Want to understand the leadership shadow in your organization? Listen to the company jokes. Look at the cartoons posted in cubicles. Ask your suppliers. Ask your customers. Ask middle management. The cultural mirror of your company reflects everything if you are willing to look.

As COO of a brewing company when COVID-19 hit, our CEO made it clear: your number one priority, above all else, is our employees' health and safety. Solve that first, then worry about the rest. That statement cast a huge positive shadow over our entire management team, helped keep our people safe, and rallied us together through uncertainty. ~ Sean Monahan

There Is No Strategy Without Execution

One of the most impactful shadows a leader casts is whether they are fully engaged in executing the company's strategy. Too often, the handoff between senior leadership and middle management resembles a dropped baton in a relay race. A Towers Perrin study of over 400 companies found that 49% of leaders reported a gap between their organization's ability to formulate a strategy and actually deliver results. Even more concerning: only 36% of leaders in companies with an execution gap expressed confidence in their ability to close it.


Yet the turnarounds led by Alan Mulally at Ford and Gordon Bethune at Continental Airlines demonstrate what is possible when senior leaders stay embedded in execution. Continental went from $2.5 billion in default and ten consecutive years of losses to a $200 million profit in a single year, 1994 to 1995, and held the top position in global airline rankings for a decade afterward.

I can get you to a fish, but the last 50 feet is up to you! ~ Capt. Skip Zink

The lesson? Leadership presence in execution is not micromanagement. It is the final stretch of the cast, the part that actually lands the fly. 

Trim the Fat: Execute, Don't Over-Think

One leadership principle I have learned directly from the river is what I call "Trimming the Fat": stop overthinking and overdesigning, and just execute. I see many fly anglers carrying too many flies and spending so much time strategizing about which one to use that they fail to keep their fly in the water. The more your fly is in the water, the higher the probability of catching a fish.

The same pattern appears across organizations. Leaders who spend more time perfecting PowerPoint presentations than executing plans are designing to fail. Leading meetings is not the same as leading execution.

No matter how expensive your rod is and how big your fly box, you won't catch fish unless your fly is in the water.

What is the shadow you are casting right now in your organization? Is it building confidence and inspiring action, or is it creating caution and distance? The river does not lie, and neither does your culture. Both reflect exactly what has been happening upstream.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

John R. Childress is a leadership advisor, corporate culture consultant, and author with four decades of experience advising boards and executive teams across Fortune 500 and FTSE 250 organizations. He is co-founder of Senn-Delaney Leadership Consulting Group and Chairman of Pyxis Culture Technologies, whose data-driven platform helps organizations identify, map, and mitigate hidden risks in cybersecurity, safety, and conduct. He is also the author of Culture 4.0: The Future of Corporate Culture (LID Publishing, 2026) and co-author of Fly Fishing for Leadership. 

SEO Keywords: leadership shadow, leadership behavior, corporate culture, executive leadership, leadership development, fly fishing leadership, organizational culture, leadership execution, CEO behavior, leadership lessons

 


 
 
 

Comments

bottom of page