You've heard the old phrase "eyes bigger than my stomach," for people who stagger out of restaurants with one too many pancakes, chicken wings or scoops of ice cream in their bellies.
What catchy new phrase could I invent? How about "vision bigger than my seat." By that I mean the ambitious tendency to do so much that we end up doing not only our own work but that of the guy next to us. That can drain the life out of an organization, or out of the person with vision... not to mention that the person in the next seat may be a little miffed about being squeezed.
These visions often sneak up with the best intentions at heart. When I was a member of a band years ago, I tried to be vocalist, guitarist, membership recruiter, song-chooser, and on-stage speaker. Could I have pulled it off? Could the vision of a packed house have become reality? Probably, for a while. But who would follow? Even in the short run, it created some teamwork friction, and didn't end well.
Sometimes today my vision for Leadership McLean County starts to swell, causing me to think about (and occasionally do) advancing ideas to help people in other roles like alumni, marketing, even chairing the steering committee. But that not only dilutes focus, but walks a fine line between usefulness and interference. Those lessons of past life come in pretty handy, keeping me in my seat and letting others thrive as they're destined to do.
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