Leadership Lessons from Invictus: Mandela and Pienaar

Film Overview and Central Theme

Invictus is a film that follows Nelson Mandela's release from prison and his role as president of South Africa. The central theme is how to inspire the men and women of the nation to set aside their differences and come together as one community so they can heal from the wounds of the past. To help the nation heal, Mandela realizes the country needs something to believe in, something to be inspired by. He turns to the national rugby team, because South Africa is hosting the World Cup that year. He reaches out to the team's captain, Francois Pienaar, and conveys the idea that if the team can win the World Cup, it will help the people of South Africa believe in themselves and set aside the grudges and prejudices they have harbored toward one another for so many years.

The film shows that in the beginning some South Africans root against their own team, seeing it as a relic of the apartheid past. Yet as the team begins to win and beats all expectations, the people of the nation cannot help but join in and begin to root for their home team after all. Mandela helps unite the team with the country by ordering the players to go out and hold clinics for the youth, which helps everyone bond and creates a spirit of goodwill in both the team and the community.

The captain of the rugby team and Mandela share a special bond, for they both hold a vision of uniting the nation — a vision of being part of something larger than themselves. They are both selfless as they commit to this vision and give it everything they have. They seek nothing for their own glory but rather everything for the glory of the people. In the end, the team wins the 1995 Rugby World Cup as underdogs, and the people of South Africa come together as one nation to celebrate the victory. Mandela sees it as a symbolic triumph — a moment of pride, joy, and innocence that he hopes will enable his people to lift up their heads and become captains of their own souls once more, rather than captives to hate and division.

Mandela's Leadership: Forgiveness and Vision

One of Mandela's most effective leadership behaviors is that he challenges people not to fight but to forgive. He sees how angry, suspicious, and bitter the people are toward one another, with each side viewing the other with deep antipathy. First, he challenges the people in his administration and security detail to work together without prejudice. He tells them that if they want to quit because they don't believe in the government, that is their choice; but if they want to quit because they believe someone has the wrong skin color, that is not acceptable. He wants people to see past their prejudices and accept one another as human beings. He challenges his own daughter to do the same — to see white South Africans not as enemies but as fellow citizens. He says this after she complains about a newspaper photograph showing him shaking hands with a white man. She sees only skin color and voices the anger in her own heart. But as a leader, Mandela must address an entire nation and set aside personal feelings. His aim throughout is to get people to see the community first and not their own bitterness and resentment.

The second effective behavior Mandela demonstrates is his recognition that to be strong, people need inspiration, and so he looks for something that could bring the nation together. For him, the inspiration he found in prison was the poem "Invictus." For the nation, he needs something grander and more spectacular — and that is when he settles on the idea that rugby, and the South African team specifically, could be exactly the right vehicle. He invites Pienaar in for a meeting and communicates the idea that it would be greatly inspiring for all South Africans if the team won the World Cup. In other words, he enlists Pienaar to the cause of uniting post-apartheid South Africa — not through politics or speeches, but simply by performing as well as possible on the field. Importantly, he does not tell Pienaar directly that he wants the team to win; instead, he plants the idea like a seed in Pienaar's mind by asking him how one inspires others. He allows Pienaar to arrive at the conclusion on his own.

Pienaar's Leadership Behaviors

Pienaar tells Mandela that he leads by example. Mandela agrees that this is valuable but then asks how one inspires someone to be better than that person believes he can be. Mandela explains that it is by drawing on the work of others — "I found inspiration in a poem," he says to illustrate the point. Pienaar understands immediately. He tells Mandela that before a big match the team is silent on the bus, but then Pienaar asks the bus driver to play a song they all know. The team listens to the words of the song, and it helps prepare them for the match. Thus, one way Pienaar leads is by bringing his men together and using music to inspire and motivate them to perform their best.

Another effective behavior Pienaar demonstrates is taking the team to Robben Island, where Mandela spent the first eighteen years of his imprisonment. There, the players see the cell Mandela occupied. Pienaar shows genuine insight into Mandela's character when he reflects on how extraordinary it is that Mandela could emerge from such a small cell ready to forgive the people who put him there.

The third behavior Pienaar demonstrates is fully buying into the vision Mandela has for the country. He believes that winning the World Cup can help bring the nation together, and he communicates this vision to his team, using it to motivate them. He pushes the players hard in training, calling out, "Let's go again, guys," and showing by his own example the standard of effort required to be great. When the team expresses frustration at being told to put on clinics for the youth, Pienaar tells them, "We've become more than just a rugby team, and you might as well get used to it." He then adds, "Times have changed and we need to change as well." The team goes to the clinic, and in spending time with the children they rediscover the joy and innocence of the game. Where training had felt like hard labor, they now see life in the children's eyes and witness the way those children celebrate them as heroes.