What is a leader? That is a question that has puzzled me for a long time, most of my adult life. There seems to be a lot of confusion on the question among the population, and especially among those of us who name themselves or are thought of as "leaders".
Well, it's always good to begin with the definition of the word itself (from dictionary.com)
- a person or thing that leads.
- a guiding or directing head, as of an army, movement, or political group.
Let's look back at history. The leader of a military unit in Sparta (as illustrated in the movie "300", for example) led his troops in a literal sense. He didn't sit back in Sparta (or wherever) and send smoke signals to the troops telling them what to do, and he didn't take a poll to see whom they wanted to attack. He stood in front of his men and literally led them into the fray.
A leader is intelligent and has an understanding of what is going on around him.
A leader listens to advisors, gathers information from various sources, performs studies as appropriate and thus gains even more understanding of the possible directions to go and decisions that might be made.
A leader then makes a decision and directs and engages others as needed to implement that decision.
And most important of all, a leader must have the charisma, the guts and the determination to get those decisions done.
One thing that seems odd about American politics is the way our so-called leaders do poll after poll after poll to see what their constituents want to do. That's all well and good, as information is needed in any good decision makes process, but the methodology strikes me as wrong.
This results in countless studies and evaluations and endless research projects, environmental impact studies and lord knows what else before anything can be done. After all, we wouldn't want to offend or upset anyone, now would we?
A good leader cuts through all that. Yes, the studies are important and the consensus can be critical, but it's not the basis of leadership. It's just a small set of pieces of the puzzle.
So if you are a leader, whether it be of the PTA or the president of the United States, please do what you should be doing: lead us. Get your information, build your consensus, and, for heaven's sake, make a decision and get it done. You don't need to ask if it's "okay"; you are a leader, not a follower.
So, damn it, please do your job, or remove the word "leader" from your vocabulary.
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Unless otherwise noted, all photos and text is Copyright © Richard G Lowe, Jr.