🐟 A Fish Rots From the Head: Leadership Is the Issue. Full Stop.

There’s an old saying: “A fish rots from the head first.” It’s not just a salty idiom—it’s a profound truth for anyone entrusted with leadership oversight.

Whether you're sitting on a board, serving as an elder, chairing a committee, or simply voting at the ballot box, here’s the hard, holy truth: everything rises and falls on leadership. Culture, strategy, and tactics are all downstream of the person at the top. If something stinks, check the head.

🐟 A Fish Rots from the Head: What It Really Means

The phrase “A fish rots from the head down” is a blunt and timeless proverb that reminds us of a critical leadership truth: when an organization is in decline, the problem usually starts at the top—not with the staff, not with the systems, not with external conditions. The rot begins at the head.

The expression is often attributed to a Turkish proverb—“Balık baştan kokar”—meaning “a fish smells from the head first.” It dates back centuries and shows up in various cultures, from ancient China to Greece. No matter the origin, the sentiment remains universally understood: leaders are responsible for the health—or decay—of the organizations they lead.

This isn’t just about moral corruption (though that’s certainly part of it). It’s about patterns of poor decision-making, toxic culture creation, unethical behavior, vision drift, or emotional immaturity. It’s about leaders who dominate instead of develop, hide instead of communicate, and react instead of respond.

If a culture smells off, check the tone at the top. If trust is eroding, ask who’s stirring the waters. If decisions feel murky, look to the head—not the tail. If you're seeing repeated turnover, mission confusion, financial irregularities, or follower fatigue—don’t just manage the symptoms.

Check the head.

Boards and trustees, this phrase is more than colorful language. It’s your lens for accountability. It calls us to discern not just what is happening, but *who* is causing it—and why the same problems persist despite surface-level change. It challenges us to ask, “Is the leader setting the tone for life—or for rot?”

·       Culture rot? Check the CEO.

·       Church decline? Check the pastor.

·       Campus chaos? Check the president.

·       Organizational malaise? Check the leader.

·       Family dysfunction? Check the parents.

This isn’t scapegoating. It’s source-seeking. Because if the head is sick, the body can’t heal.

Stop Blaming the Wind

Several years ago, I sat in a board meeting discussing ongoing institutional issues. As expected, the usual list of external scapegoats made their appearance: COVID, the economy, funding challenges, shifting demographics—you name it. These factors may be real, but they are not revelatory.

I calmly said, “The problems we are experiencing are leadership-related. Full stop.”

External conditions will always exist. We can’t control the weather, but we can evaluate how our captain is steering the ship. And if that captain is blaming the waves instead of owning the rudder, we’ve got a bigger storm on our hands.

The Culture Is a Mirror

Peter Drucker famously said, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” True. But leadership is the chef. If your leader's team is demoralized, toxic, apathetic, or disengaged—and they’ve been that way for more than a fiscal quarter—look up, not down.

As goes the leader, so goes the team. Always.

A leader’s attitude will infect or invigorate the ranks. Their ethics become the organization’s baseline. Their humility, or lack thereof, becomes the organizational posture. They model what “right” looks like—or they model something else.

Leaders don’t just set the tone. They are the tone.

Liquid Leadership

Think of an organization like a liquid: it takes the shape of its container. And that container is the leader. Their beliefs, emotional intelligence, vision, and follow-through all determine the shape and flow of the culture.

If the culture is fearful, sloppy, combative, or confused, that form didn’t appear by accident. It was poured that way. Leadership precedes culture. Always. So, let’s stop acting shocked when we see recurring issues and start tracing them to their source.

What Now?

If you're on a board, committee, family unit, or team responsible for evaluating a leader, here's your litmus test:

·       Is the team healthy? If not, ask why—and more importantly, ask who. Who is creating the roadblocks, obfuscating communication, or stalling decisions? Toxic cultures often trace directly to enabling or controlling leaders.

·       Are we hearing more excuses than execution? Who is framing the narrative?

·       Are we using tools like 360-degree feedback, external evaluations, and formal reviews to assess leadership honestly?

·       Is the culture reflecting the character we expect from the leader?

·       Do followers feel safe to follow? Or are they stuck in survival mode, burned out, or walking on eggshells?

·       Are we seeing senior members resign unexpectedly? If so, we must ask why. When a seasoned team member exits without clear succession or visible preparation, it often signals alienation. They may smile at the exit interview, but rest assured—they're not just leaving the job. They're quitting their leader. Senior transitions should never come as a surprise.

Just as important as respecting the chain of command is ensuring the transparent flow of truth. It’s a delicate balance—but a humble leader will honor open channels of communication between evaluators and their team members. When truth is welcome, transformation is possible.

Let’s bring it full circle: if it smells fishy, something’s amissy. Leadership isn’t about appearing clean on the surface while decay festers underneath. We all hold a sacred duty to evaluate our leaders, and we must be willing to look beneath the waterline. Because when leadership rots, the whole organization is at risk of going belly-up.