I co-founded a community for tutors. In the beginning, I’m pretty confident of how knowledgeable and competent I am as a tutor within the community. I shared my knowledge easily and felt confident in our discussions.

As we grow, we have high-achieving tutors joining us. Multiple centre owners, international tuition business owners, many highly qualified ex-MOE teachers… The line up gets more and more impressive.

It should be something worth celebrating. However, increasingly I also feel out of depth to share anything in the community. I feel inadequate and under-achieving to lead the community.

It’s like trying to lead the Avengers when I am just Hawkeye. Don’t even have superpower.

How to lead the community when I’m not the most capable, most profitable, or the most talented? There is no point trying to prove that I’m the best among all. Cos that will just take me away from serving the community.

How can I serve, when in my heart I’m trying to outshine or outperform those I want to serve?

If a tennis coach spends all his time perfecting his own game, he might as well be called the opponent of his coachee, and not the coach.

I’ll strike out the word “Leader” from my roles, instead I’ll think of myself as the Chief Servant or the Chief Steward.

I may not be able to outshine or outperform those in my community, but I can always out-serve.

Let the superheroes in my community shine. Let them do their wonders. I’ll be happy for them. And I’ll do my best to help them find value in the community, in fellowship with other superheroes.