Leadership naturally emerges from the environment in which it is needed. No one is born a leader, we are all nurtured and moulded by our experiences, exposure, sensitivity and interest, to ultimately ascend the platform of leadership. Not even in the fallacy of the monarchy, are those who are crowned, born leaders. In fact many who are supposed to be of royalty are as as dumb as a stone. Only that conservatism in the society endows them with the wisdom they will never possess in their lifetime. People rise to positions of leadership due to circumstances of their their environment, its challenges and opportunities, rather than the fact of biology. Leaders come in different forms, and are motivated by a variety of reasons. While others are inspired by personal interest, the most outstanding would have been urged by circumstances beyond the self, and rather inspired by the desperate needs of those around them. However, the line between personal need, and the collective need sometimes becomes blurred, and often disappears when the real need for leadership occurs. This becomes apparent at the apex of the struggle for positions, when leadership has evolved definite material and, or significant influence, especially over resources and their disbursements. In this case, the intensity of leadership for personal reasons, happen to outweigh the collective need paradigm. Where personal material benefits have become the real reason for the desire for leadership, ethics are likely to become the first casualty. The loss of ethical values in readership matters, signals the weakening of societies and their organizations. In that environment, devastative power struggles throttles the development of the society and lead to a paralysis which set development back many years. In contrast, leadership which is inspired in the major by the collective society issues, has a self sustaining capacity, drawn from a firm focus on the vision, the society seeks to achieve. This type of leadership unites and locks the society into a common vision. Even if leadership could be contested in this environment, it becomes legitimate, and its authority would remain uncontested and defended and respected. The leadership drawn from the needs of the society, rather than personal agenda persuasions, as a principle sticks to the vision is always informed by the demands of its service. This type of leadership is often saddled with the need to sacrifice, rather than the allure of material benefits. In its nature, it thrives in challenges and posses a burning desire to achieve its societal vision. Leadership has from time immemorial captured the thinking of the society. It has been studied from the perspective perspective of the organizational structure, of not only human societies, but also from observing the organization of insects, animals and birds. This shows the importance with which human societies view the issue of leadership. Our society should not be an exception in engaging and interrogating issues of leadership. Given our legacy of having fought against colonialism, with more than enough sacrifices made in that process, we have a wealth of experience to inform on the issues and concepts of leadership. We can teach the world while grappling with our own challenges. Leadership is of critical importance in the evolution and development of the society.
Posted on: Sat, 19 Jul 2014 08:32:10 +0000
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