Category: Politics

Thoughts on Leadership

Pandagon this morning pointed to an article about leadership, to which I wanted to add some thoughts.

A personal anecdote – a few years ago, the department I was working in went to have an offsite team-building exercise. This one involved climbing “rock walls” in a warehouse in the Mission District. What was interesting was that the instructor/facilitator who was working with our team thought the wrong person was the manager of our group. The actual manager was no leader, and she picked up on that immediately. It really brought home my understanding of the difference between leading and just being in charge.

Leadership is one of those things that to be really good at it, it has to be inborn. Which is not to say that someone who is not a natural leader cannot lead effectively, but s/he generally has to work long and hard at it, and also should have some other positive attributes to help compensate. (This is pretty rampant in the technology industry – developers with good ideas rarely are good natural leaders, but some can work at it and become effective.) Less so in politics, although Al Gore is a good example of someone who has a lot going for him but is not a natural leader.

I don’t claim to be a stellar natural leader, but I do know how to lead. For me, it’s a feeling almost like being on stage — when you are actively in the process of leading, you need to be putting out that extra energy necessary to carry everyone along with you. Not to get too Biblical, but the phrase “Let your light so shine before men” is pretty apt. You don’t need to always be right or always have the right answer, but you must have a clear picture in your head of where you are going and you must able to effectively communicate why you need to reach that goal.

You don’t need to be a genius to be a leader, although a total moron would have difficulty grasping the issues well enough to lead. You need enough self-confidence to know when you have enough information to make a decision, so that you don’t fall prey to information paralysis. You also need enough humility to realize (and admit) when you’re not right or when someone else’s idea is better than yours. For a really good leader this not even a conscious process, it’s just a part of who they are.

All this is true whether you’re leading a backyard book club or the United States of America.

As if I weren’t depressed enough already

Joe Klein in Time this week:

There is only one significant question left in this presidential election year: Can John Kerry hold George Bush accountable for this mess? My guess is, probably not. The Republicans, with a strong assist from Kerry, have successfully painted the Democrat as a flip-flopping incompetent when it comes to national security. It will be hard for Kerry to change that impression. In fact, he has only one chance remaining, in the presidential debates.

And that won’t be easy: I’ve never seen George Bush lose a debate. He is a brilliant minimalist. Kerry by contrast is all oratorical flab

How Many Are Not Coming Home?

Interesting factoid from this WaPo article … 40% of the troops in Iraq are from the National Guard and Reserves. There is not a doubt in my mind that if Bush is reelected that this will only get worse.

The rest of the article is also interesting, looking at the stresses a Guard unit faces as it prepares to deploy, but I don’t have much to say about it. More on that in another entry.