A633.1.2.RB – Leadership Gap

            According to Boyatzis (2012), leadership is a relationship between a leader and the follower.  Excellent leaders work very hard in developing their emotional intelligence and have the ability to make decisions in enhancing a long-term organizational success while preserving the organization’s financial stability.  Good leaders inspire and create a workplace environment that is supportive of innovation or creativity and change.  Yukl (2012) described leadership as the process of influencing others to understand and agree about what and how things are accomplished.

When I met Dr. Trudie Kibbe Reed, the fifth President of Bethune-Cookman University, I view leaders purely on an office management capacity.  I have not met a leader like Dr. Reed.  As a charismatic and compassionate leader, Dr. Reed stimulated the enthusiasm and commitment of the faculty, staff, and students of B-CU.  She did this by enunciating the significance of her vision for the university, its stakeholders, and the community.  Dr. Reed reactivated Dr. Bethune’s vision of eradicating hopelessness and desolation in pursuit of education through community outreach programs and civic engagement.  Through her firm convictions, self-confidence, and excellent public-speaking skills, she rallied the faculty, staff, students and the community to a commitment to excellence, enhancement of academic excellence, service to humanity and placing others need first before their own.

Dr. Reed reminded me of my grandmother and grandfather who owned an abaca and sugar cane plantation in the Philippines.  At that time, plantation owners, treat their planters and harvesters as members of a big family.  Every member of the family of their employees works at the Plantation.  Then, my mother inherited the business when both my grandparents died.  My mother was not cut-off to manage the Plantation so, she had her step-brother took over the management of the abaca and sugar cane plantation.  The plantation flourished, while my mother started her export and import business where she thrived too.  She hired friends that she trusted and of course reliable, skillful, and capable employees.

When my mother decided to retire, not one of her children chose to follow her footsteps.  All of her five children decided to pursue other careers.  My oldest brother became a jeweler, my oldest sister became an architect then turned realtor.  I turned out to be successful human resources professional in the US.  My fourth sister is thrilled to be a healthcare professional, then our youngest sister, who is residing at Basking Ridge, NJ is a very successful realtor and Feng shui practitioner.  We all grew and had our plans and goals.  Life-changing modifications or alterations occur in our lives that do not only hinder us due to the seriousness of the life-event but rather provokes astronomical learning and growth.  Our memorable life events, however bad or good, can be a stimulus to enhancing our behaviors.

That was then, and this is now.  In today’s global organizational workplace environment, we find an apparent gap in the quality of our corporate leaders and of course in ourselves as leaders.  Our leaders of today and us in particular, identify ourselves with a single leadership style but within each of us possesses both competing sides that one can be characterized by polarity that may lead to of significance.  For example, as leaders, we quietly embark on pursuing quests in achieving brilliant things.  But at times, there is an imposter that exist within us who is self-doubting, a silent character that is a major stimulator of an apparent gap with the quality of our leadership.  

To close the quality of our leadership gap, we should not compare ourselves to others.  We need to accept the fact that we will always be unique and different from other leaders.  We have to celebrate our wins and remind ourselves constantly how we achieved it.  And lastly, we have to remember that in this world, no one is perfect.  Perfectionism will only cause us continual frustration since perfectionism is not attainable.  We have to learn who we want to be in our professional career.  Knowing who we are will measure the level of our success.

In summary, a great leader is someone who conditions, selects and influences a follower or followers with different abilities and skills and who aligns the follower or followers’ mission and goals to the organization's goals and mission.  A great leader, validates his/her commitments to the values of a) showing humility, b) displaying mercy and belief to the actions of his/her follower(s), and c) controlled discipline.  A great leader creates and sustains peace in the organization – not lack of conflict but a place where peace grows in the entire duration of a leader-follower relationship (Winston & Patterson, 2006). 

References

Boyatzis, R. (2012). Dr. Richard Boyatzis - Resonant Leadership - UNC Kenan-Flagler [Video

            File). Luana Nascimento Andre. Retrieved from:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=98&v=qxjNu6kSpKc

Boyatzis, R. & McKee, A. (2005). Resonant leadership. Boston, MS: Harvard Business School

            Publishing.

Yukl, G. (2012), Leadership in the organization (8^th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice

Hall

Winston, B. & Patterson, K. (2006). An Integrative Definitions of Leadership.

            

            International Journal of Leadership Studies. Retrieved from:

http://www.regent.edu/acad/global/publications/ijls/new/vol1iss2/winston_patterson.doc/winston_patterson.pdf