Re: Leadership can be Taught? LO1515

JOHN N. WARFIELD (jwarfiel@osf1.gmu.edu)
Mon, 5 Jun 1995 19:28:40 -0400 (EDT)

In reply to L01506, I believe that leadership is very frequently thought
to be focused upon "which direction should we be pursuing, and how we
should be pursuing it." From a perspective of issue complexity, the
better part of leadership is not oriented toward organizational-related
content (cars for Ford, steel for Bethlehem, courses for universities),
but rather toward process aimed at extracting and integrating knowledge
from various sources. In that sense, the personal responsibility of the
leader may be to focus upon personal definition of context (detail and
limits) and, within that focus, to concentrate on enabling the creation of
integrated content within that context, by providing the infrastructure
and methodology that is adequate for yielding that result.

This is different style of leadership than most organizations practice,
wherein top management focuses upon extolling their own creative thoughts
in areas where they are really naive infants: e.g., the use of a process
created by the CEO of a major US corporation, which is sorely lacking in
fundamental behavioral and technical bases, but which can hardly be
rejected by those under his dominion; instead of surveying material that
is much more appropriate. Re-creating Deming 15 years too late and
claiming this as a new invention is hardly a manifestation of leadership,
yet it is in full force at one of the Fortune 25.

--
John N. Warfield
Jwarfiel@osf1.gmu.edu