SAIL

Roger Dean and myself attended the leadership dialogue with the President last week and I wanted to post about the article we read. You can find it here “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” By Martin Luther King Jr

This was the article that was provided and discussed with the university president. To talk about the “white moderate” and intense issues involving the civil rights movement with the university president is amazing. Let me tell you, Alan Merten our old university president would never talk about leadership in this manner. Anyways, I have a quote that really spoke to me. Read it below.

One may well ask: “How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?” The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that “an unjust law is no law at all.”

This is some powerful stuff here. I would like to see what people think about this.

What is a just law and an unjust law?
At what point is a law “just”?
Do we have just laws that protect all citizens?

Are leaders born or can anyone become a leader?

That is the big question! Some say that leaders are born and that there is a natural selection. The distinction between two groups; the leaders and the followers. Nevertheless, one cannot exist without the other. Both aspects are equally important.

Anyone with the necessary tools can become a leader. Yeah there are some who are naturally gifted and have the charisma of dealing with people, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that those that don’t have it are exempt from the art of leadership.

The greatest or most vital part of leaders and their authority are their FOLLOWERS. I believe that the best leader actually had to be once in their life time in the shoes of his or her followers to truly capture the essence of what the particular group wants and needs to accomplish. Anyone has the potential to become a great leader and that is why there is NO SET FORMULA to become a successful and outstanding leader. Of course there are the born leaders that have it all going, but even if an individual has no sign of leadership, he or she can become the greatest leader. That is the beauty of Leadership!

Many ask themselves, “To try or not try?” or in my opinion “To be or not to be?” 

NO ONE should be discouraged to try to become a leader if they want to. I believe that one can learn through endless ways to become a successful leader that has an audience. Tools, such as classes, desperate times, group identity, speech training and not to forget personal experiences, can push anyone towards leadership.

I want to reiterate that especially personal experiences can push anyone who is passionate about a topic towards leadership! I personally was the shyest girl in High School and if anyone told me that I would have been the Senior Class President giving a speech at graduation, I would have called you crazy. However, I was a follower and saw that the leadership of my class was not reflecting upon our needs, I took the matter to my own hands. Leadership didn’t come to me, but I came towards Leadership. I believe that I am a leader and a good follower as well.

The Motto is: “Follow, Lead or Get Out of the Way!”

Do you agree or disagree? Are leaders only born or can anyone with necessary tools become a leader? Are leaders who sometimes follow better leaders than others?

Give your input! Love to discuss! 

When news surfaced that our LCE LCC class would be beginning a blog on leadership I went where any normal college student goes for inspiration, the internet. However, this didn’t necessarily help narrow my thoughts on such a broad topic. In fact, it did quite the opposite. The third page I came across began with a heading stating that there are modestly 1,983,980 definitions on the topic of leadership on the internet alone. At this point I had hit some sort of a roadblock. But there’s more to the story.

After skimming the surface of the topic of leadership, both in and outside of the classroom, my perspective on leadership began to breach new dimensions and horizons. I began to learn more about the unique qualities which characterize each type of leadership as well as the means through which the individual discerns how he/she will lead. I learned that the individual, the community, and leadership each have a symbiotic relationship in which neither can exist without the other. This logic gave me a sort of hope, in addition to the widening perspective I had just began to attain. These key ideas and thoughts led me to the ideology discussed by Dr. James Farr.

Farr approaches leadership through an abstract dimension of perception. He argues that there is not necessarily a ‘correct leadership style’ rather that leadership styles and approaches vary and change according to the context of the situation at hand. This idea is described as ‘conscious leadership’ which blends an art and science of ascertaining how to decipher the context of a situation, further leading to the needs which need to be met in a given situation or scenario. This principle advocates acute self-awareness as well as an acute insight into the perspectives of others. “The conscious leader walks in the spiritual and physical domains concurrently, remaining simultaneously grounded and comfortable in both”. The key idea to be associated with Farr’s approach is balance. Balance in terms of Farr’s approach is to establish a means of thought that is conscious of oneself as well as the physical realms around him/her.

There are millions of theories, definitions and perceptions of leadership which have been developed throughout the past several hundred years. Nonetheless, theories will continue to be put forth. Definitions will continue to seek truth and understanding. And perceptions will continue to differ from one individual to the next. To reach consensus on such a subjective term as leadership is nearly impossible. However, just as I began discovering the topic of leadership and the broad spectrum of theories, definitions and perspectives it entails, it is vital to perceive this not as a roadblock or as any form of discouragement. The diversity of leadership is what makes it possible. The subjectivity is what empowers each of us to persevere, to continue to seek understanding of both ourselves and our communities, and most importantly to apply these theories within the realms of our daily lives.

Do you know what the formal definition of Leadership is? Probably not. So go on and look it up in the dictionary. Ok, well at least Google it. Webster’s Dictionary defines leadership as, “the office or position of a leader,” while dictionary.com says leadership is, “the ability to lead.” So, why are these definitions so vague? It is because leadership is arbitrary. We all come from different backgrounds and are equipped with our own personal experiences and ideas. This allows us to view leadership from different perspectives, thus hinting at why it is so hard for any one person to form a definition of leadership that everyone agrees with.

I believe that there are numerous characteristics that contribute to the effectiveness of a leader, but I think they are pointless unless you know when to use them. One of the discussions we had in class centered on group roles. A few of the roles include: motivator/encourager, organizer/planner, physical doer, mediator, listener, and follower. I believe that the best of the best out there in Leadership Land are able to successfully preform all of these roles. I’m not saying that they are perfect at them all, but they at least know how to perform them with an adequate level of proficiency. And by no means should a leader try to perform them all at once, yet the real key in effective leadership is being able to sense which role the group is lacking the most and to tackle that role.

Therefore, my definition of leadership is the ability to know which role your group most needs you to play and to be able to adapt to that role. This is just one of the (how many people are there in the world?) 7 billion definitions of leadership that exists. No single definition is any more right or wrong than any other, and why? Because, leadership is arbitrary.

As humans, we have an innate ability to judge everyone even if we don’t mean to. It is a conscious decision we have to make in order to not judge people. In everyday situations, we do it all the times. When we are ordering in a restaurant, we judge the server. We look at the gender, the quality of the service and, at least for me, the hygiene. We see a movie we judge the actors acting. We judge the movie; therefore, judging the director, the producer, and all other backstage people. I would say we don’t have a choice, but I would be lying if I said that. We always have a choice. We can choose to be different and try to not judge with a conscious decision. The moment we do that something has changed. We have become different. We have become an innovator. We have officially become a leader.

Easy right? Wrong. Now that we are a leader. The very thing we decided to change is not haunting us. Let me be clear being a leader is not a easy. We have to be constantly judged. We are put on a pedestal to be watched at all times; even though, there are people who climb to be in this position at the center of the pedestal. For the people who don’t, we are still judged by the way we get there. The way we survive the rise to “stardom” for a lack of better words. We are judged on how we carry ourselves at the top. Contrarily, if it happens, we are also judged on our descent from the pedestal.

People always used to ask me: “Roger, how do you always put yourself in the spot light? How do you always become the leader of a group?” My response is always the same. I love it. I love the feeling of being in the spotlight but not only that. I love the feeling of helping people. I love the feeling that I get in my heart when I have done something good for someone else that I chose to do. Recognition is important yet, but even then that is being judged.

There is good judging such as that of recognition. There is bad judging in the sense people criticizing you. My main point is that if you don’t want to be judged, don’t be a leader. Because if you do become one, people are always going to judge you no matter what you do. No matter how good or how bad of a leader you are, people will judge you.

I am done for now. I wrote this because I was having some issues with judging, but I realized this. I became an innovator because of a passage I read in a really good book. Everybody should check it out.

Matthew 7:1-5

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. ² For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. ³“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? ⁴ How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? ⁵ You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

             Even though in class we have talked about leadership on a relatively small, community oriented scale I think it is interesting to look at the leadership of our country as a whole: namely the 2012 presidential race. This race is extremely polarized without much in the way of a middle ground even in comparison to the Obama/ McCain match up only four short years ago. One issue that was a key issue for both sides in ’08 was the threat that Climate Change poses to the Untied States and the world at large. Although both sides might not have agreed on how to treat the problem they both saw it as such and made the issue a key component of the campaign.

            This election cycle is quite different. There has been little to no attention paid to the issue of climate change or even to the environment as a whole.

Read the rest of this entry »

My first post is from Howard Zinn’s article entitled “Optimism of Uncertainty”
Feel free to be a super blogger and read it here->(http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1108-21.htm)

I would like some responses to this quote in which Zinn opens up the article.

“In this awful world where the efforts of caring people often pale in comparison to what is done by those who have power, how do I manage to stay involved and seemingly happy? I am totally confident not that the world will get better, but that we should not give up the game before all the cards have been played. The metaphor is deliberate; life is a gamble. Not to play is to foreclose any chance of winning.”

This is something that I think every person goes through. It is something that I constantly find challenging because I am always looking at the bigger issue. Sometimes all you can do is act as a individual which can be very draining. This is because as one person you can only do so much. You can work your hardest toward fixing an issue but nothing could change.

How do you measure change?

How do you continue to take actions on any issue you care about when they are so many bigger stakeholders that try to do everything they can to suppress your issue?

What actions can you take in your everyday life to combat this?

Welcome to the blog for the Center for Leadership and Community Engagement at George Mason University.  Our mission is to promote transformative student learning through engagement in service and leadership in the community.

We have created this space to serve as a forum for Mason students to discuss their perspectives on community engagement and leadership issues.  If you have a perspective you would like to share, please contact me to be added as a blog contributor (wwagner4@gmu.edu).

Thank you and I look forward to seeing your thoughts here.

Wendy Wagner

Director, Center for Leadership and Community Engagement

Assistant Professor, New Century College

George Mason University