A Dull Leadership

Avoid getting lost in the illusion of a reality which doesn't meet the expectations of others.

I reached a stunning conclusion based on facts. Namely that, today, anyone knows leadership. Anyone can be invited to a conference to express their views, their own vision and philosophy concerning leadership. You don't need to have a sound knowledge of leadership in order to support a presentation, but a drop of last minute inspiration and the fortune to be invited to a conference.

The room was shrouded in cold silence, that uncomplaining silence that the spectators seized by disappointment and the feeling that they were misled. They surely told to themselves that "there's nothing more to ask of him", because the speaker delivering the lecture, considered to be an expert in leadership, was constantly juggling with words, ideas and interpretations, trying with a lot of afflatus and enthusiasm to point some elements concerning the impact of leadership on modern society – just as a football player juggles with the ball, then passes it on.

I find admirable the speaker's effort to expose his views. But the meaning he attributed to leadership was not at all one coated with strong values, it didn't hide surprising things, it didn't meet the public's requirements and expectations. He failed to give his presentation that special outline of a well-done work, which only professionals manage to convey. It's no wonder that the public's impression was that of a barren wilderness.

Does the undertakings of giving people your view of things make it easier to assimilate defined impact indicators in line with their potential to exploit your potential to the fullest?

It was a matter of consistency: what remains fixed in people's minds and what didn't.

If he were really an expert, then the speaker would have amazed the audience with innovation and the consistency of his ideas, just as a painter stuns eyes through expressiveness and plasticity. And, as a painter manages to charge his creation with deep feelings and meanings, the speaker of the lecture should have charged his presentation with so much "spell", as to arouse in the public a boundless thirst for knowledge, wakening their feelings and mood.

The lack of perspective, consistency and continuity in ideas were some of the things that inconvenienced those present in the hall. The night seemed to wrap around them. A feeling of discontinuance reigned everywhere, the vast silence in every corner of the room kept the appearance that the speaker is carefully listened to. He passed from one idea to another, without making any connections between them, without keeping a certain flow of the discourse, without giving anyone the opportunity to better focus on a certain idea. Because when you say a thousand unrelated things, without a logical connection between them, people just listen, but they don't understand you.

Impact indicators that trigger a series of expectations for others are measured through the characterization you make to your transformation produced during your own driving experience.

Indicators such as: Energy invested in a form of gain or popularity. Income and its ability to ensure adequate satisfaction of all individual needs. Your volume of obligations with positive social impact. The risk assumed for freedom of expression. Self-satisfaction in a living context where the rules of an art or artistic stream dominate. The strong feeling of optimism that you give yourself at the risk of your own banalization.

Do you allow yourself to focus on sharing a particular perceptual experience that is not always relevant in the context of an evolution law that changes the world view or a particular field of activity?

A simple Google search confirmed my suspicion. Well, the speaker of that presentation really had a long experience in employment – the ace up his sleeve. The problem was that he didn't have an important position in leadership, he didn't publish throughout his career a single article concerning leadership, he didn't have even a book written about leadership. Nothing tangible that could confirm his experience or expertise in leadership.

No wonder that his presentation was a total failure, summarized in some fantastic ideas, as, I quote: "For me, leadership means to be happy, to be with my family, to watch the news on TV in order to be informed, and to help my work fellows" – ideas correlated in the strangest possible way with leadership.

Let's be honest and admit. You don't have to own any related experience or leadership knowledge in order to say such "extraordinary" things. It's no wonder that more and more individuals get to teach, to issue numerous judgments and provide many opinions about leadership. It is worse that they always fail to write anything about what they know.

True experts express their leadership in the form of laws or principles.

A thing must be very well understood. The mere fact that someone has a long experience doesn't mean that he has leadership skills and knowledge. That's a clear thing.

A true professional has hundreds of articles and dozens of books written on the subject. How does he succeed? Well, he has solid knowledge. You have the possibility to get an idea about what he knows and whether it's worth-while going to one of his lectures by simply accessing his personal blog. If you don't like the themes that he deals there, you're not going to like his presentations either, rest assured.

And if you don't form an idea of what he knows, if the man didn't write a blog, articles, books, etc, will you adventure yourself to pull out of your pocket tens or even hundreds of euros to listen to him at a conference? Someone passed a good remark on the Web: "A bunch of experts spring up like mushrooms after the rain…" Take note of it.

Your value, as a leader, issues from the power of your influence which, in turn, follows from the principles that you've acquired over time. And these principles, in turn, reflect the level of your leadership. The more you know about leadership, the more it's likely to make a more energetic and inspiring presentation. On the other hand, the less knowledge you have, the more your presentation will be dull, lacking that spark able to ignite the flame of enthusiasm in people's hearts.

Leadership is the value given to one’s own person in the presentation that you make on the correct reflection of reality that has endowed you with special skills.

A Dull Leadership designs that no quality-oriented approach, too little creative or poorly developed, that some leaders focus on in their attempts to relate to people's expectations and needs. It designates the ineffectiveness of their set of knowledge, which constitutes the essence of their leadership.

People judge you by what you are and what you know, by the way you express your points of view concerning the way you understand and approach leadership. You must reflect more on your point of view regarding the quality of your leadership before you advertise it. And avoid getting lost in the illusion of a reality that doesn't meet the expectations of others.