Developing a Strategy for Leadership

To develop a strategy for leadership, one must have a goal and a dream.  One cannot wander aimlessly  hoping something will fall into place:

To help you think about your own path, I offer the following questions to think about:
1- Do you have a goal for your life and career for the next 5-10 years?
2- Where do you want to be in 5 (10) years? What do you want to do?
3- What are some intermediate stages to achieve that goal?
4- What pitfalls must be avoided?
5-What challenges are anticipated?
6- What kinds of support do you have to help you achieve the goal?
7- What are your personal strengths that will help you to achieve the goal?

Answering these questions will be a big help to getting you on track to achieve your goals.

Is everyone a leader?

Where have all the leaders gone?   That lament is not infrequent in our society.  On the other hand, the popular literature suggests everyone can be, or is, a leader.   Is this possible?   

Some people do not want to lead.  They would rather follow, or perhaps they have never thought of themselves as leaders.  The whole concept may be alien to them.   

To be a leader requires commitment, intentional behavior, and focus.   These behaviors may not be right for everyone.   

To understand leadership, one also has to understand that not everyone seeks to be a leader

How Crucial Is One Leader?

With the disgrace of Bo Xi Lai in China, there seems to me to be an exaggeration of his significance in the overall Chinese political system.   Yes, it is a blot on the Chinese Communist Party, but, so what?   It does not prevent the party from functioning nor does it disable the rest of the leadership.  

I decided to put myself into the role of a Chinese person analyzing the US in order to point out the significance of the exaggeration.   The situations are not 100% parallel since the the US is not a one-party system, but the point is clear, I believe.

John Edwards, a disgraced American politician, is in President Obama's party.  A Chinese person might well interpret this as a disgrace to the Democratic Party that will handicap the President in his upcoming re-election campaign, in the same that Americans are viewing Bo's disgrace as a problem in the upcoming Chinese succession process.

In reality, does Edwards' disgrace in any way pose an issue for the President, the de facto leader of the Democratic Party?   No.   For most people, John Edwards has become irrelevant in the US political process.

I suggest that the same principle applies to Bo Xi Lai.   With his disgrace, he became irrelevant.  Yes, people may be disillusioned.  But, many Americans were personally disillusioned, when the seemingly idealistic Edwards proved to have clay feet.

Let us not exaggerate the significance of any one leader in our political system or other political systems.

Reflection. crisis avoidance, and Leadership

It is rare to find a book on leadership that does not put forth the virtues of reflection.   The unexamined life seldom leads to good decisions.    If you don't know where you are going, any road will take you there; a famous truism.  
It is important to take time to reflect whether once a day or once a week.   Where am I going?   What am I doing?  Where are my priorities?   What are my must do tasks?   What can I defer and what must I do today?
Some people answer those questions by responding to urgent deadlines, rather than thoughtfully considering what is important in life.  
We all have some deadlines.  Some unintended and urgent necessities and some crises.  But we should not live on the edge, constantly skirting the next crisis.    It is important to think through one's priorities but allow enough flexibility to meet crises or urgent demands when they occur.
Good planning and reflection cannot solve all problems, but it can help us to avoid living in crisis mode.

Exceptional Leadership
May be subtle, may be invisible, and may be present all around us.   There a subtle forms of leadership around us every day that we don't always notice.   We look for the grand-scale leadership and often miss the quiet leaders, unheralded and unrewarded, who live next door, who work in the next cubicle, and who quietly go through life with little tasks of leadership.   Look for signs of leadership nearby rather than the spectacular acts of public leadership.

Some book suggestions on leadership

In recent months, I have read some marvelous books that treat leadership directly or indirectly.

Jeffrey Archer: First among Equals.   A novel about the career path of British political leaders over a 20 year period, from new MPs to the quest to become Prime Minister.

Richard Ben Cramer:  What It Takes:  The Road to the White House.   This is a detailed analysis of the men who sought to become Presidential candidates in 1988.  GHW Bush, Dole, Hart, Gephardt, Dukakis, and Biden are among the featured politicians.   A fascinating retroactive study that has amazing relevance in this political year.

Heileman and Halperin: Game Change.    This study leading up to the 2008 presidential election has become almost iconic in its analysis of each of the candidates.   One section of the book was made into an HBO film in 2012 (the section on Sarah Palin).   Each of the sections is fascinating.  I read it when it came out and re-read sections this winter after the film came out.

P.S.  On a different note, I don't recommend the film, Iron Lady, which portrays Thatcher principally in her declining years.   Leadership is largely lost in this tragic film that views her years as PM through the lens of dementia.

What is Leadership?

It has been a while since I posted on this blog.   In the fall, I had two demanding classes that involved a lot of attention and grading. Also I was immersed in leadership theory in one of the course so the blog did not seem necessary.   In the winter I was finishing up a major research project -- a co-authored book on emerging global powers.    Blogging on leadership went to the back burner.   It's time to think about this again.

I have been thinking lately about the basic question:   What is leadership?   How do we know it when we see it?
How do we know it is missing?
I have been in some situations in recent months when leadership was needed, but absent.   What can one do about it?   It is easy to say: step up and lead.   But, it is harder actually to do it.

I have to think about this issue.... What is leadership?  

Norma