So, it looks like there will be a job opening — or three — in the town of Dillon soon.

As most readers probably already know, three members of the Dillon Town Council are on the hot seat because some of their constituents who disagreed with the council members’ support of the lakeside development were able to get 17 signatures on a recall petition. Seventeen folks angry enough over those council votes that they’d fire their representatives rather than give them a second chance. While I’m a big believer in accountability at all levels of government, I also believe having a revolving door personnel policy isn’t helpful at all.

As Scott Estill pointed out, while these board members may have angered folks with their signing on to and then promoting the lakeside development, that’s hardly the high crimes and misdemeanors that in a normal society would warrant recall. Those members may have been guilty of being oblivious to some (but not all) citizen input and tone deaf in their pronouncements about it, but given the passage of the referendum to overturn the council’s votes, council members have vowed to “make the best of it” moving forward. It’s apparently too little, too late, though. In today’s age of fragility, where social media echo chambers over-amplify points of view, those well-intentioned votes by council members in favor of the development have become impeachment fodder.

It makes you wonder why anyone would sign on for a leadership role in any organization. Leadership is a difficult thing, and it takes time to learn the proverbial tricks of the trade. But today, it seems voters aren’t very willing to allow elected officials the time needed to suss out their roles and become the most effective representative they can be. How can leaders develop and mature if we remove them from their positions for mistakes made during their growth process? After all, mistakes are part of the honing of the crafts we adopt and can often lead to better results next time around.

One critical lesson for leaders is to learn to “fail fast”. It is important for the growth of any organization, including municipal governments, to allow leaders to take risks in the pursuit of increased efficiency and novel approaches to problem solving. But in this instance, it may be that the council didn’t recognize the depth of feeling residents had about this issue or ignored the signs of discord over it. Had the council the ability to pull the plug on their decision sooner, doing so may have been the wiser course of action rather than allowing discontent to fester to the point that citizens felt a referendum on their leadership was their only recourse.

Effective leadership requires oversight bodies, including constituencies, that understand that nothing worth doing comes without risk, and punishing those who would take those risks is self defeating. After all, who’s gonna take on that job next time once the oversight body’s intolerance for failure and disagreement becomes known? What are the chances that leaders will be willing to make the hard decisions that need to be made when they know it’s “off with their heads” should they fail?

Should voters decide to remove one or more of the council members from office, folks interested in filling those open seats should keep recent history — and what led up to it — in mind before applying. Or, perhaps, they shouldn’t, because were they to be elected, being overly sensitive to public opinion could lead to decisional paralysis. The fear of casting an unpopular vote can stymie the decision-making process, resulting in “analysis paralysis” where individuals become trapped in a cycle of overthinking and inaction. I’m not saying that decisions should be made haphazardly, but spending too much time determining how to proceed can often be as damaging as spending too little time doing so.

Leadership entails being second guessed from all directions for every call you make. It means making judgements that may be unpopular, even if they’re being made for the right reasons. It requires over-communicating with stakeholders about why a decision was made or a vote cast and listening to, considering, and responding to feedback from them. And in the end, it could also mean losing your position due to those difficult choices and the politics of the issue at hand. So, anyone considering applying for these prospective council vacancies needs to keep that in mind because often enough it’s true that no good deed goes unpunished.

Tony Jones' column "Everything in Moderation" publishes biweekly on Thursdays in the Summit Daily News. Jones is a veteran of the IT industry and has worked in the public and private sectors. He lives part-time in Summit County and Denver. Contact him at eimsummit@gmail.com.