We Become Whom We Watch — Mirror Neurons and Leading by Back

That showing beats telling is not mere folk wisdom; it is partly a matter of how the brain is built. Neuroscience has reported neurons that respond while watching another's action much as they do when performing it — the mirror neuron system.

Its scope is debated, but the direction, that people trace inwardly what they see, is supported by much research and by daily experience. If so, the greatest teaching material a leader gives is not the instruction memo but the back: how the boss sounds on the phone, what face he makes when things go wrong.

Subordinates trace it inwardly every day. Admiral Yamamoto's famous line — show them, tell them, let them try, praise them, or people will not move — placed "show them" first, over eighty years ago.

That is why I keep standing on the front line: how I laugh in front of a customer travels far further than any memo from the chairman's office. Whose mind traced your back today?

What do you work for?