From the life of Rasoolullah

Leadership Lessons

Complete certainty

No compromise

Putting himself on the line

Resilience: Face the facts

+ Absolute faith in success

Goal comes first – before

personal preferences

Living his message

Risk taking

Sacrificing short term for

long term

Magnanimity and

forgiveness

Transiting from Person-

led to Process-driven

Succession planning &

leadership development

Key lessons for anyone who wants to lead

The Lessons

in His Belief and Message

Complete Certainty

Rasoolullah said to them, “O people,

If I told you that there is an army

behind this hill would you believe me?”

They said, “You have never lied to us

and we will believe you.”

He said, “I have come to warn you of

a severe punishment (in the Hereafter, if you

don’t leave polytheism and worship Allah).”

‘Wa Subaha’

With the message

No Compromise

He could have accepted the kingship of

Quraysh and then made changes

He could have compromised and then tried

to gradually make changes

He could have addressed social evils and

become a social reformer first to get some

local support then he could have presented

his theological message.

His Options

The Anbiya never diluted the message

“My Uncle, even if they put the

sun in one of my hands and the

moon in the other, I will still not

give up this message that I have

been charged with.”

Differentiation is critical to leadership

His response

He didn’t accept the Islam of Banu

Thaqeef of Ta’aif when they came with

the condition that they would accept

his Risala and pray but wouldn’t pay

Zakah – even though he needed support

very badly at that time.

No compromising the standard for any reason

No conditions

Because there’s no such thing

as a ‘cowardly leader’

Putting himself on

the line

Willingness to put himself on the line. At no

point did he send others out to do what he was

himself not willing to do.

Have courage of your convictions

In Hunain he went towards the enemy and

rallied the troops when his army was in a total

rout.

No other position is called ‘Leadership’

Leading from the front

At no point in his life did he put any of

his companions in the way of danger or

hide behind them.

His travel to At-Ta’aif is a good

example where he personally took the

risks instead of sending someone else.

Courage

Encouragement can only be done by the courageous

Face the brutal facts + Absolute

faith in eventual success

Resilience

Resilience consists of two apparently

paradoxical positions: facing the facts

about the failure without any attempt at

disguising the reality; simultaneously

having absolute faith in eventual success

even when you can’t see any signs that

your work is succeeding.

Resilience is the most reliable sign of success

What is Resilience?

“O! Allah! I complain to You of my weakness, my scarcity of

resources and the humiliation I have been subjected to by

the people. O! Most Merciful of those who are merciful. You

are the Rabb of the weak and You are my Rabb too.

So long as You are not angry with me, I do not care. Your

favor is most important to me. I seek refuge in the light of

Your Face by which all darkness is dispelled and every affair

of this world and the next is set right, lest Your anger or

Your displeasure descends upon me.

I desire Your pleasure and satisfaction (and will continue to

struggle) until You are pleased. There is no power and no

might except by You.”

Dua in At-Ta’aif

The most logical thing

is to factor Allah into

the equation because

He is in it anyway.

Two critical realities of life

Until 19.8 nothing

will happen

At 20 the

balance will tip

1. Be goal focused

2. Take one step at a time

3. Be consistent & structured

4. Don’t be discouraged by short term

5. Keep focused on the long term

Be prepared to change the method but not the goal

What to do?

Before personal feelings,

likes & dislikes

The Goal comes first

Rasoolullah honored Khalid ibn Al-

Waleed when he came to Madina with

Amr ibn Al-A’as to Madina to accept

Islam

And made him Commander in Chief of the

army

Khalid bin Waleed was younger than all the close Sahaba or Rasoolullah

Dealing with enemies

Walking the talk

Living His Message

Someone asked Sayyida Ayesha(RA) to tell

him something about the life of

Rasoolullah. She asked him, “Don’t you

read the Qur’an?” He replied that he did.

“He was the walking Qur’an”, she said.

His whole life was an example

Walking the talk

He preached the importance of the rights of

neighbors and he was the best to his neighbors.

He preached about the rights of women and he

gave the world a law that gives women rights

that they don’t have in many other modern

legal jurisprudential systems even today, 14

centuries later.

He preached the value of truthfulness and was

himself called ‘Al Sadiq ul Ameen’: the Truthful

& Trustworthy One, even by his enemies, the

Quraysh.

He demonstrated Islam in every aspect of his

life. And he taught his companions to do so,

themselves.

The result was that Islam spread far and wide,

not by warfare and conflict with other religions

but by ordinary Muslims living by the code of

behavior that he taught them.

Applied Islam has more power to convince

people than any other method of preaching or

propagating.

People

‘listen’ with

their eyes.

Differentiation creates Brand

Brand creates loyalty

Loyalty results in influence

Without ‘Brand’ you are a grain of rice in a sack

Why differentiate?

For a leader, the most critical thing is to

differentiate on the basis of his message.

If the leader compromises his message for

the sake of popularity, material gain,

followership or anything else, the

uniqueness of the message will be lost

and it will lose its value as a clear

standard on which to model all actions.

Leaders Differentiate

Leaders stand out – sheep blend in

If you trust Allah

Cut the rope of Dunya

Salah is Asbaabاألسباب األعلى

Taking advantage of the

unexpected

Risk Taking

Take advantage of an emerging

opportunity

Make the best effort that you can make

Then connect to Allah and ask for His

help

Asking Allah is the best of Asbaab

Because there can be no success without the help of Allah

Battle of Badr

O! Allah here are the Quraysh who in

their arrogance seek to deny and speak

lies against Your Messenger. O! Allah

support us with the help You promised

me. O! Allah were this small group of

Muslims to perish, no one in the whole

world would remain to worship You.

The rest is history

Dua at Badr

1. The ability to see the potential advantage in a high

risk situation: The leader must have the judgment

to assess the risk to see if it is worth facing.

There has to be a balance between getting overly

extended on the one hand and losing out on major

potential gains by being risk averse on the other.

The ability to see the advantage and correctly assess

the chance of success is the first major requirement

of the leader.

3 – Major lessons

Judgment is a factor of experience and faith

2. Consultative decision making: It is essential to

take people into confidence if you want their

commitment to your cause.

The leader must share all relevant information, must

trust his people and must be prepared to put his own

credibility on the line.

Focus on the certainty of success and the potential

gains from it. Without that, positive energy will

drain away and be replaced by fear.

Excitement is fear that anticipates success

Lesson – 2

3. Internal faith and connection with Allah:

Ultimately leadership is about the ability to stand

alone before your Rabb and ask for His Mercy for

the mission.

It needs enough of a connection with Him to enable

the leader to do this with the confidence that He

hears and will answer.

It is necessary to work to build this connection

because only in it lies ultimate success

That connection comes from Taqwa & Tahajjud

Lesson – 3

Sacrificing short term

In favor of long term

By agreeing to the unequal terms,

Rasoolullah opened the door for the

peaceful propagation of Islam.

When hostilities ceased, Muslims were able

to move about freely to preach their

message.

The result was that most of Arabia accepted

Islam.

Hudaybiyya

Was a triumph of Islam over self

For the leader it is essential to always keep

the goal in sight and be willing to make

everything, especially his own ego

subservient to the accomplishment of the

goal.

If the leader insists on his own esteem needs

often the long term needs of the mission are

compromised.

3 – Key lessons

Ego is the shackle in your mind

Followers must be willing to trust the

leader and stand by him even if he

does something that they don’t like at

the time or don’t understand fully.

Once the leader has been elected,

then he must be trusted implicitly.

Lesson – 2

Constantly doubting debilitates leadership

In order to win in the long term it is

often necessary to sacrifice temporary

or short term gains.

This may be painful especially as this

may require sacrificing one’s ego needs

in the process.

For the arrow to travel far, you have to pull it back

Lesson – 3

& Forgiveness

Magnanimity

He forgave his worst enemies – Abu

Sufyan and Hinda and didn’t extract

revenge as was the norm of conquerors

He forgave Al-Washi who killed Hamza

bin Abdul Muttalib

He forgave all the inhabitants of Makkah

Who are you willing to forgive right now?

Fatah Makkah

Forgiveness takes the wind out of the sails

Benefits Shut down all future vendettas in a people

who were famous for taking revenge

He had the high moral ground and people

were grateful

His enemies lost all ability to raise support

against him

He enemies were defeated and became his

supporters

Transitioning from

Person-led to

Process-driven

3 – critical requirements

Core Ideology

Central Funding

CentralAuthority

Global Influence

Forming the Ummah

Faith based brotherhood

Tawheed was-Sunnah

Obedience to an Ameer

Ita’at wa Ittiba

Contributing towards the cause

Infaaq wa Khurooj fee Sabeelillah

3 – criteria of Global Movements

System of Judging

Seek in the Book of Allah

Seek in the Sunnah of His Messenger

Consult with others & agree

Use your own judgment subject to the

conditions of the Book of Allah and

the Sunnah of His Messenger

He asked Mu’ad bin Jabal how he would judge

Succession planning

Developing leadership

Kutab al Wahi

Ali Ibn Abi Talib

Abu Ad Darda

Ubadah Ibn al-Samit

Abu Ayub al-Ansari

Ubay ibn Kaab

Muadh ibn Jabal

Teachers of Qur’an

“Learn the Qur’an from four persons: Abd-Allah

ibn Mas'ud, Salim Mawla Abu-Hudhayfah, Ubayy

ibn Kab and Muadh ibn Jabal.” Bukhari 6:61:525

Narrated Qatada: I asked Anas bin Malik: “Who

collected the Qur’an at the time of the

Prophet?" He replied, “Four, all of whom were

from the Ansar: Ubai bin Ka'b, Mu'adh bin Jabal,

Zaid bin Thabit and Abu Zaid.” Bukhari, 6:61:525

Rasoolullah listened to the Qur’an from others

Ask Abu Bakr Rasoolullah built leaders right from the

beginning. He sent Mus’ab ibn Umair to

present Islam in Madina

He sent Mu’ad bin Jabal to Yemen

He told people to refer to Abu Bakr and Umar

ibn al-Khattab for rulings

He delegated teaching of Islam to the Ashaab-

us-Suffah and to Ummahatul Mu’mineen

He developed a cadre of leaders to take the message to the ends of the earth

He chose wisely He chose people for tasks which they were

competent to do – not for any other reason

He appointed Khalid ibn Al-Waleed as

commander of the army

He sent Mu’ad bin Jabal – one of the

youngest Ansaar – to Yemen as governor

He appointed Usama bin Zayd in command

over Abu Bakr & Umar

And Abu Bakr honored this choice

Today, 14 centuries

later, His message is

taken all over the world

by people who didn’t

see him but love him

more than anything or

anyone else