The Leadership We Often Miss
By Sophie Makonnen
As the year ends, we often focus on significant achievements, but the reality was more complex. Plans slipped, timelines shifted, information arrived later than expected, and decisions were sometimes made with less clarity than we would have liked. A lot of work still moved forward thanks to small, steady actions that rarely get named. As the year ends, these quieter forms of leadership deserve recognition.
What Quiet Leadership Looks Like in Everyday Work
Quiet leadership shows up in the steady, practical choices people make to keep work moving when things are unclear or unsettled. It often looks like:
Clarifying a process so others can focus instead of circling the same questions.
Helping a colleague regroup when they were overwhelmed, even if you were carrying a heavy load yourself.
Handling a tense moment with calm as tempers rose, allowing the conversation to move forward rather than escalate.
Asking one precise question in a meeting that shifted the conversation or brought needed clarity.
Holding a team together during periods of uncertainty, keeping people informed, calm, and oriented while decisions were still pending.
Raising a concern once, at the right time, when staying silent would have created more confusion down the line.
Taking responsibility for a task no one else could take on, not for visibility, but because the work required it.
Supporting a colleague navigating an unclear environment, helping them make sense of expectations that were never spelled out.
These actions don’t come with applause. They sit between the lines of day-to-day work, yet they make the difference between a team that holds together and one that slowly unravels. They are leadership in practice, steady and respectful, carried out with the collective in mind.
Why These Acts Matter More Than We Think
When we look back on the year, what stands out isn’t the list of tasks completed but the effect these small actions had on how work felt. They reduced friction, brought steadiness on difficult days, and helped people regain their footing when uncertainty made everything heavier. Most of the time, these moments passed quickly, yet they often shaped whether a day moved forward smoothly or stalled under its own weight.
These gestures matter because they ease the strain that long periods of uncertainty create. They remind us we’re not carrying everything alone. Even one person bringing clarity or calm can shift the tone of a whole team. Trust grows in these small ways. So does a sense of belonging, especially when systems around us feel stretched or unpredictable.
Quiet leadership doesn’t fix every challenge. It doesn’t remove pressure or fill in the gaps created by the broader environment. But it keeps people connected to the work. It keeps things moving when they could easily slow down. And it’s usually done without any expectation of credit, which is precisely why it deserves to be seen.
The Cost of Being Invisible
The more challenging part of quiet leadership is that it often goes unnoticed. People step in, smooth things out, and keep work on track, but the effort behind it rarely appears in any official space. It quickly becomes part of the background, relied on but seldom acknowledged. Over time, that can feel heavy.
There is the practical cost: the extra energy spent keeping everyone aligned, the hours lost to solving problems that were never really yours, the emotional labour of supporting colleagues while managing your own workload. And there is the more subtle cost: the sense that what you contribute doesn’t fully register because it isn’t tied to a deliverable or a title.
Many professionals sit in this space. They hold teams together, but their work is described as “helpful” rather than essential. They absorb uncertainty so others can move forward, yet the pressure of doing so stays mostly with them. They become the dependable one, which is a compliment, but also a role that can quietly stretch someone.
Invisibility doesn’t mean the contribution is negligible. It means it blends into everyday life in a way that makes it easy to overlook, even by the person offering it. But what it is, is leadership, practiced consistently and with care by colleagues who made things easier, kept work moving, or provided calm at the right time. These gestures often fade into the background, but they were not insignificant. Naming them now matters.
What These Moments Reveal About Leadership
Most of the time, it isn’t about formal authority or big decisions. It’s the judgment people use in the middle of a busy day: choosing to clarify something instead of letting confusion spread, or stepping in gently when they sense a colleague is about to hit a wall.
These moments rarely feel grand. They often feel like “just doing your job.” But if you look at how teams function, these small choices shape the tone and the rhythm of the work far more than we admit. They are the quiet ways people hold things together. And in that sense, they are leaders in their most everyday form.
It isn’t about a title. It’s about the way small, ordinary actions reveal how someone thinks, observes, and chooses to act. They may look trivial from the outside, yet they often make a real difference in how work unfolds and how people around them experience the day.
The article "Small Actions Make Great Leaders" by Hitendra Wadhwa makes a similar point. Indicating that leadership doesn’t come from mastering long lists of behaviors, but from simple actions practiced consistently. I find that framing is useful here. When people show clarity, steadiness, or care in ordinary moments, others learn they can rely on them, no matter the situation. Over time, that reliability is often what makes the real difference.
This also echoes an idea I explored in an earlier piece, Leading From Where You Are where I explored the idea that leadership doesn’t suddenly begin with a title; It develops through these everyday choices long before any formal recognition appears. Indeed, when someone consistently brings clarity, steadiness, or support, people begin to rely on them. That reliability, built quietly over time, is often the earliest form of leadership.
Let’s take a moment to recognize the support that such action gave us throughout the year. Sometimes what deserves attention are the simple actions that kept things moving, eased someone’s load, or brought clarity when it was needed. As we step into the end of the year and the new one, I hope you give yourself a bit of space to appreciate the quiet steadiness you brought or received to a year that wasn’t always simple for many of us.
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