Written in Heaven

I’m about an ‘every other season’ American Idol watcher. When I get into the show from day one, I love it. If I don’t come in until halfway through, I can’t get into it. I don’t know why, I just can’t. The reason the beginning episodes are so great is because they feature some of the worst ‘singers’ on the planet. I mean, to use the word singer is disrespectful to singers everywhere, but you’ve seen the show, you know what I mean.

What kills me is that these folks get done butchering ‘I Will Survive’ and stand there shocked that they were terrible. What’s even more amazing is that the family members of this person encourage him or her to go out and audition for this show. Why would you throw your family member to the wolves like that? There are three reasons I can think of: 1. You genuinely think this individual can sing because you’re incredibly tone-deaf or are blinded by some kind of irrational love. 2. You hate this individual and take pleasure in seeing them get berated on national television. Now, I really think both of those situations are as unlikely as the third option: 3. You really don’t think this person can sing, but you don’t have the ‘heart’ to tell them that they can’t. For whatever reason, you can’t pull the trigger to tell this family member they can’t sing and you think that having four strangers laugh in their face is a much better option.

It seems pretty cruel when you look at it that way; that’s because it is! Many times as leaders we operate the same way. We like to think things are going smoothly and people are telling us they are, but they’re really not. Just like the tone deaf auditioners from American Idol, we too must face the brutal facts: things are not ok. We have to look at the organizations or entities we are in charge of and make difficult decisions for the benefit of the organization, rather than for the benefit of our own comfort.

Confronting the brutal facts is hard, but it’s way easier than waking up one day getting blasted by an ornery Englishman.