Leadership Begins When You Go First

I recently listened to Simon Sinek talk about leadership, and one idea immediately connected with me. He argued that leaders have the courage to go first. They risk first. And perhaps most importantly, they trust first.

This perfectly describes what effective leadership looks like in a startup community.

The challenge is that startup communities don't look anything like traditional organizations. There isn't an organizational chart. Nobody appoints the leader of the entrepreneurial ecosystem. There isn't a promotion, an election, or a title (VP, Mayor, Czar) that suddenly makes someone a community leader. 

Leadership emerges because someone decides to take the first step.

That's very different from the leadership most of us experience in corporations or government. There, authority is assigned from above. People often follow because the organization tells them who is in charge. Startup communities don't work that way. Nobody has to follow you, which means leadership has to be earned through action.

Over the years, I've worked with hundreds of startup communities, and I've noticed that the healthiest ones all have something in common. They aren't waiting for someone else to create momentum. Instead, individuals continually choose to go first. Someone starts a monthly coffee meetup. Someone convenes a group of founders to have lunch. Someone volunteers to mentor entrepreneurs or begins telling founder stories that deserve to be heard. None of these people waited for permission. They simply acted.

Of course, going first isn't easy.

Whenever you're first, there's uncertainty. You don't know if anyone will show up. You don't know if your idea will work. You don't know if people will appreciate the effort or quietly ignore it. That's exactly why so many people wait. They are looking for all the right signals to tell them it is alright to do this.

The problem is that, as with a startup, there are never enough perfect signals to eliminate the risk. 

Communities rarely struggle because they lack ideas. They struggle because too few people are willing to take the first risk.

Sinek's third point may be even more important. Great leaders trust first.

Healthy startup communities are built on trust far more than transactions. Every introduction is an act of trust. Every mentoring conversation begins with trust. Every founder who openly shares their successes and failures is trusting the community with experiences that are often deeply personal.

Traditional organizations often teach us to verify first and trust later. Startup communities require almost the opposite. If everyone waits until trust has been earned, relationships never form. Networks remain disconnected, and entrepreneurs continue trying to solve problems on their own.

Someone has to trust first.

As I reflected on Sinek's comments, I also found myself thinking about the Give First philosophy that has shaped so much of my own thinking. Maybe Give First isn't just about generosity. Maybe it's also about leadership.

When you make an introduction without expecting anything in return, you're going first. When you announce on social media that you will be hosting a meetup, you’re going first. When you volunteer your time to help another community event, you're taking on their risk. When you open your network to someone new, you're choosing trust before certainty.

Those individual actions may seem small, but they're contagious. Others begin to copy what they see, and over time, those behaviors become the community's culture.

Leadership belongs to the people who host the first meeting, make the first introduction, celebrate someone else's success, or simply welcome the newest entrepreneur into the room.

Leadership begins the moment you decide to go first.