Sheriff Taylor on Leadership

One of these days I’m going to get around to writing a book. My first book will be entitled The Leadership Secrets of Sheriff Andy Taylor. Like most red-blooded Americans, I’m a huge fan of The Andy Griffith Show. One of the things I love about the show is the fact that Andy demonstrates many of the qualities of a great leader.

The first episode that comes to mind is Barney and the Cave Rescue. Deputy Barney Fife starts his day off by mistakenly trying to arrest the bank president going into the bank. Fortunately the town picnic is later that day so Barney can forget this embarrassing mistake.

At the picnic, Andy takes his girlfriend, Helen, to explore an old abandoned mine. Barney and his girlfriend, Thelma Lou, follow some time later. When they enter the cave, Barney and Thelma Lou hear the rumbling of a slide and escape just in time. Then they realize that Andy and Helen must be trapped inside. Barney immediately organizes the town into a huge rescue effort.

Unbeknownst to Barney, Andy and Helen are able to escape through another opening and head home to change out of their dirty clothes. While at home, Andy turns on the radio and finds out that the town is frantically trying to rescue them from the cave.

Here’s where the leadership starts. If I were Andy in this situation, I probably would have returned to the picnic and announced that I was able to save myself and my damsel in distress.
Instead, Andy and Helen crawl back in the cave and allow Barney to rescue them. Andy helps Barney be successful. In my mind, this is one of the most important things leaders do. Leaders should help followers be successful.

Some may argue that Barney doesn’t deserve to be successful in this situation. Barney was wrong, just like he was wrong earlier that day. On the other hand, in both situations, Barney was acting on the only information he had. He saw a problem and took action.

So what do leaders gain by helping followers be successful? In this case, Barney was able to recover credibility in the eyes of those who saw him mess up earlier in the day. Both leaders and followers are better off when the followers are respected by others.

Another thing that Andy gains by helping Barney succeed is a more confident follower. Barney’s confidence had taken a hit earlier in the day. Discovering that Andy didn’t really need to be rescued would have been an even bigger hit. There’s actually a fair amount of research showing that confidence raises the level of future job performance.

Yes, this is just a TV show and cave rescues are dangerous and expensive. So I’m not recommending that anyone should stage such an elaborate emergency. But I think leaders have similar kinds of opportunities every day.

Why don’t more leaders “crawl back in the cave”? Crawling back in the cave means that leaders will receive less credit. Crawling back in the cave means that leaders will have to humble themselves a bit. Crawling back in the cave means that leaders must realize that their followers are also critical to their success. That’s also the kind of leader that most of us would gladly follow.