Confucius on leadership: Book 1 of the Analects

Leadership wasn’t a theoretical concept to Confucius. It was rather a set of qualities and behaviors that you as a leader (君子/jūnzǐ) should cultivate in order to guide your thoughts and actions.

In Book 1 of the Analects, he sets about the monumental task of identifying and explaining them with this famous question that he asks (and answers) in the very first chapter:

「人不知而不慍，不亦君子乎？」
“To remain unconcerned when others don’t recognize your talents: isn’t this the mark of a leader?”

His point, of course, is that as a leader you should persevere with your mission no matter what other people think of you and without any expectation of receiving any financial rewards or social recognition for it. Like one of Malcolm Gladwell’s outliers you should be willing to toil away in obscurity because you passionately believe in the value of your work and refuse to be discouraged by criticism from others.

With this comment Confucius is possibly also referring to his own failure to achieve his lifelong dream of securing a senior official position that would enable him to restore China to the glory days of the early Zhou Dynasty. For all his great intelligence and learning, none of the feudal rulers Confucius visited in search of employment ever saw fit to recognize his talents by hiring him. Even his teachings only became popular hundreds of years after his death.

In Chapter VIII of Book 1, Confucius goes on to identify seriousness as another key quality of a leader. It’s not enough for you to have seriousness of purpose; you also need to be able to project this sense to others in order to inspire them to follow you.

「君子不重，則不威，學則不固。」
“If a leader isn’t serious he will inspire no awe and lack a solid foundation for learning.

In the same passage, Confucius adds loyalty and trustworthiness into the mix as well as the ability to surround himself with the right people who are not afraid to challenge you rather than “yes men”. Recognizing that even the best leaders are only human, he finishes off this exhaustive list with strong advice that you shouldn’t be afraid to correct your mistakes.

「主忠信，無友不如己者，過則勿憚改。」
“Hold loyalty and trustworthiness as your highest principles; don’t make friends with people who are not your equal; and when you make a mistake, don’t be afraid to correct yourself.”

Confucius reprises these two latter themes in Chapter XIV when he says that a leader “keeps the company of others who possess the Way so that he can be corrected by them.” He also adds that a leader should be decisive and discrete: “quick to act but careful in what he says.”

「君子食無求飽，居無求安，敏於事而慎於言，就有道而正焉，可謂好學也已。」
 “A leader eats without stuffing his belly; chooses a home without demanding comfort; is quick to act but careful in what he says; and keeps the company of others who possess the Way so that he can be corrected by them. This is what it means to truly love learning.”

Last, but certainly not least, Confucius cautions that as a leader you should stay humble and keep your feet on the ground especially if success does arrive. As he so eloquently puts it, a leader “eats without stuffing his belly” and “chooses a home without demanding comfort”. Although he was by no means a member of the hair-short brigade, Confucius heartily detested the wanton extravagance of his era’s 1%!

Boiled down to much plainer bullet-point language, Confucius’s advice for aspiring leaders from Book 1 can be summarized as follows: 
 Persevere with your mission through thick and thin
 Don’t expect recognition or rewards 
 Take your work seriously 
 Project gravitas
 Be loyal 
 Be trustworthy
 Surround yourself with the right people
 Recognize and correct your mistakes
 Be decisive 
 Be discrete 
 Stay humble

You can read more about the Analects on my blog at www.brownbeat.net