On Enduring Leadership and Legacy: What Will Be Left on the Roof?
As I stood there taking it all in, I couldn't help but think about legacy. Not because I was having some profound spiritual moment, but because I was thinking of their now-timeless legacy, and philosophically, what do the rest of us bring?
My wife took this photo of me (unbeknownst to me) in St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City.
She then asked what I was doing, as I stood gazing up for several minutes! Well, to be honest, I found myself staring up at the 140 statues that line Bernini's colonnade. They've stood there for centuries, looking down on pilgrims, tourists, world leaders, and probably more selfie sticks than their creators could ever have imagined.
Those statues have survived wars, political upheaval, changing generations, and countless leaders who were once convinced they were the most important people in the world. Today, most visitors couldn't name the sculptors. (I had to Google!). Yet their work remains. And it made me wonder...
What will be left on the roof?
In business, we spend a lot of time chasing things that feel urgent. Quarterly targets. Transformation milestones. Project plans. Steering committees. And the occasional PowerPoint deck that requires so many revisions it should probably qualify as a living organism. But decades from now, nobody is going to remember our KPI dashboard.
Nobody is going to say, "Remember Steve's Q3 review from 2026? Absolute masterpiece."
What people do remember are the things that endure.
The leader who believed in them before they believed in themselves.
The culture that outlasted its founders.
The process that made thousands of people's jobs easier.
The decision that prioritized doing the right thing over getting the credit.
The team that became stronger because of how they were led.
The sculptors who created those statues never saw the millions of people who would eventually admire their work. Likewise, we rarely get to see the full impact of the people we develop, the cultures we create, or the decisions we make today.
The older I get, the more I think leadership isn't about the things that have your name on them. It's about the things that no longer need your name attached.
The things that continue long after you've moved on. So as leaders, maybe the question isn't, "What can I accomplish this quarter?” Maybe it's:
"What am I building that will still matter when I'm no longer standing in the square?"
Because one day all of us leave. The real question is:
What will be left on the roof?
