Have you noticed the number of people who have taken up cycling lately? It seems like armies of middle-aged, over-weight men have squeezed into spandex and hit the streets.  What a sight!

I have seen all manner of shapes and sizes on high-end bikes, dressed like they’re on the Tour de France, with both feet firmly clamped into their high-tech cycle shoes pedaling hard on both pedals. What I haven’t seen is anyone riding a bike with one pedal. In fact, I have never seen anyone riding a bike with one pedal. A bike with one pedal really defeats the entire mechanical advantage a bike provides.

What I have seen a lot of are leaders riding the bike of leadership with one pedal. The bicycle is a great metaphor for good leadership: it’s about the both/and, not the either/or. Good leaders always use 2 pedals.

For example: good leaders understand the need to balance the ideal and the real, being proactive and being reactive, vision with strategy, convergent thinking with divergent thinking, and all manner of other elements of leadership that seems to be diametrically opposed to each other.

The 2 pedals on a bike seem opposed to each other. One is right and the other is left; one is up when the other is down. However, it is that complementary opposition that gives the bike its mechanical advantage. Likewise in leadership, it’s a leaders ability to facilitate and harness what appear to be diametrically opposed elements into a both/and scenario, instead of an either/or scenario, that creates organizational advantage.

Leaders need to keep an eye on the ideal when addressing the needs of ‘reality’. If they always insist on the ideal many initiatives will go unimplemented because they are never good enough. Likewise if they do not keep their eye on the ideal and only deal with the real they will never lead their organization into the next level of success – the organization is destined to be an underachiever.

Let me give you a great example of a leader who was able to balance the ideal and the real: A charitable organization working with recovering addicts had set aside funds to send all their clients to a unique transformational weekend conference. They were hit with a last minute financial crisis that ate up the funds they had allocated for the conference. They couldn’t go. They were heart-broken.

A leader heard about the plight of this organization and decided to do something about it. He hatched a plan to connect with dozens of leaders in his network to raise the funds necessary for the weekend conference. Sadly though, the plan he hatched revolved around him meeting with each of the other leaders personally, and the time required to do that would be beyond the time frame the organization needed to register for the event.

His ideal plan was unimplementable.

So, he adapted to the reality of the situation and hatched a less-than-ideal plan to raise the funds. He sent a group email out to his network outlining the need, painted a picture of the benefit to the organization and to the contributors, then provided a clear call to action.

In less than 24 hours all the funds came in and the organization was able to participate in the life-changing weekend for their clients. Awesome!

My leader friend demonstrated fabulous 2-pedaled leadership: he balanced the ideal with the real. He realized a less-than-ideal plan implemented trumps an ideal plan unimplemented every day of the week.

He also demonstrated a wealth of other great leadership: he understands leadership is about helping people be better – investing your time, talent and treasure for the benefit of others. He clearly identified his constituents for communication; he effectively outlined the reason for his communication, both the outstanding need and the potential benefit; then he provided a clear call to action with a simple response mechanism.

Good results. Good success. Good leadership.

A one-pedaled bike is inefficient and ineffective – so is one-pedaled leadership.   Good leaders understand the need for both/and, and do not insist on either/or. They utilize both pedals on the bike to maximize the efficiency and the effectiveness of their organizations.

Yes, good leaders understand the advantage of 2 pedals.