Several years ago I spent ten days with my family vacationing in the Bahamas in a condo literally steps from the beach. The snorkeling was dazzling. I saw over two dozen varieties of fish, excluding the nurse sharks, dolphins, and a giant starfish I found. My experience with three specific fish reminded me that we leaders must keep certain principles in mind when selecting leaders to serve with us.

One day while on that vacation we took a powerboat trip to a private island in the Exumas, a collection of islands in the Bahamas. The experience included feeding grapes to threatened iguanas and fish slivers to giant stingrays. The highlight was when the tour guides fed grouper carcasses to lemon sharks and reef sharks as we stood a mere ten feet away.

What Snorkeling Taught me About Selecting Leaders

Schools of triangular-shaped silver fish about the size of saucers also swam a few feet from the shore and after our broiled grouper lunch, I decided to try an experiment. I put on my goggles, took two hotdog buns, and waded out into the water. I pinched off small bits of the bun and dropped them a foot in front of me while I was under water. A feeding frenzy ensued reminiscent of a piranhas’ attack.

As long as I gave these fish hotdog buns, they stuck around. But once I ran out, they scattered. Here’s the principle I learned from these fish.

1. Shy away from prospective leaders who just want a piece of you. 

I often snorkeled in a reef about two hundred yards east of the beach in front of our condo. One day as I swam there the reef shelf suddenly dropped from a depth of four feet to over ten feet into a horseshoe-shaped mini-lagoon. I looked to my left and saw the most beautiful fish I had ever seen, a fish about a foot long with huge feather-like fins. Unlike most fish when I dove down toward it, this one wasn’t frightened. For ten minutes I snorkeled about two feet away from this magnificent fish.