Congratulations, you clicked on this article. You must really want to know if there’s some deep leadership wisdom you can gain from an obscure dragon drawing. Well, if you’ve gone to the trouble to click, then I better deliver. Here it goes.

Before I get too deep, I better explain Trogdor. I’m guessing you probably already get the reference, since you clicked on the article, but just in case you have no idea who Trogdor is, and you just click on everything I post, I will pause to explain.

“Trogdor was a man. I mean, he was a dragon-man. Or, maybe, he was just a dragon!”

Long before YouTube, and long before Facebook, we all needed a good way to waste time on the internet, and Homestar Runner delivered. Circa 2003, it was the most popular Flash cartoon on the Internet. This is what I watched when I wasn’t watching All Your Base Are Belong To Us on repeat.

The best character on Homestar Runner is Strong Bad. The best Strong Bad episode is #58: “Dragon.” Do yourself a favor and watch it again if it has been a while:

What on earth does this have to do with leadership?

I’m glad you asked. Homestar Runner is awesome because it’s weird. It’s really weird and really awesome. I love every little detail, like the retro text-based email app running on Compy 386 and the dot-matrix printer that pumps out the green-bar tractor-feed paper at the end.

As I’ve covered time and time again on this blog, IT professionals are geeks, and geeks are weird. In the enterprise corporate environment, we often feel the need to cover-up our weirdness. If you can get away with it as an engineer, then you at least need to figure out a way to bury it when you are leader. Obviously, no one is going to take you seriously as a leader when you have one of those beefy arms coming out of the back of your neck.

…Or so you thought. What if letting your weirdness show itself is a good thing? What if it actually makes you a more effective leader? Guess what? It does. I recently read an Inc Magazine article entitled, “Want to Be a Great Leader? Start Acting Weirder.” The article goes on to explain that leading with weirdness creates a culture where employees are free and safe to be themselves. Then they are able to innovate and create. You even find yourself attracting better talent when you show your weirdness to the outside world. The world needs more authenticity and fewer corporate stiffs. Weirdness is a gateway to that outcome.

Leaders set the tone for the whole team. If you are uncomfortable, formal, rigid, and unemotional, that sends a message to the team that they should be too. They all look to you, whether you know it or not. Be your weird self, even if it doesn’t fit the prototype of a traditional corporate executive. You won’t lose respect, you’ll gain it. All of this takes courage on your part. That’s why this is hard. Fitting the mold, while unnatural, feels safe. Doing your own weird thing feels natural, but risky. It’s actually the very thing that makes your team feel the safest.

You are a technology leader. Do you need more chiaroscuro shading on your business suit or more spineties made out of consummate V’s? Get weird. Let your geek flag fly. Follow this advice and your team will be freshly engaged in the innovative pursuits of your organization’s mission. Strong Bad will look upon your burninating leadership skills, exclaiming, “Oh yeah. Check out all that majesty.”

And the Trogdor comes in the NIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT!!!!!!