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November 27, 2005
We Need New Leaders
Posted at November 27, 2005 08:19 AM in Race Relations .
Having been a manager for many years or, in some capacity, serving in leadership roles and/or positions, I have learned many things over the years. As such, I created a rule for myself and that rule is to keep smart people around me. I like having people around me who challenge me, argue with me, or disagree with me. I like those who will support me when I’m right and will challenge me when I’m wrong. No, I am not a sadist. What I love about strong-willed and opinionated individuals is their ability to shed light in areas or on issues that may be unfamiliar to me and they provide me with a 360 degree view where my vision may only be 130 or 200.
Unfortunately, many of today’s leaders or managers tend toward the path of least resistance. They surround themselves with yes-men or yes-women who will not challenge them, help them see another way, shed light on other avenues and thus, they lead with partial vision—their own—while failing to see opportunities or potential elsewhere. I’ve termed these the managers/leaders with pansies on their tails—one giant ego out to serve no one but themselves.
It is no wonder many of the movements of the day go nowhere fast and, as for business, instead of discovering new ways to earn our money, they steal our money or look for handouts, a form of corporate welfare, while continuing with the dangerous, stagnant, and destructive relationships with very bad managers.
Our President and his cabinet is a perfect example of this. He has surrounded himself with weak and inept people. He is weak and so he has surrounded himself with equally weak or weaker people. Anyone who disagrees with him is relegated to the out house, they are criticized, dismissed, or their credibility is damaged by insider leaks. If you are outside of the administration, you are subjected to attacks on your credibility, your wife may be outed by insider leaks, or somehow they’ll find a way to ruin your ability to earn a living. I think we still call this retribution.
I, unfortunately, have seen the same played out in business, personal relationships, and in leadership.
During the Civil Rights movement of the 60’s, people were willing to
die for the cause. When folks really started dying—Mark Clark, Fred
Hampton, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King, Jr.—Black folks began doing
just enough to keep themselves out of the cross-hairs. They continued
with the same old marches, the same old speeches, the same old do
nothing attitude while failing to effect change on any level. I’ve
called this leadership by fear. This, unfortunately, created a crop of equally
ineffective leaders and as such, we now have what I call designer
leaders—they do nothing but look good doing nothing. The failings of the teachers created hopelessly ineffective students.
Katrina was a prime example of Black leadership standing up to only look for the nearest camera and lights to be—as my grandmother would say—seen, heard and smelled while doing nothing to lift a hand for those in need. At least I can say Jesse Jackson, another one of our famed leaders who is equally guilty of lights, camera, no action, went to Louisiana to get busses into New Orleans. Al Sharpton? Don’t know where he was, there were probably not enough lights and cameras to go around for him to be seen. And, the Republican turned Democrat just so he could run for mayor of New Orleans while still thinking, sleeping and funding Republican causes, did little to help his own. They all kind of make me want to run for the porcelain god so I can throw up.
We call ourselves African Americans yet we cannot speak of things in Darfur, the Congo, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Somalia, or can name the new president of Liberia. How African is that?
And why do I bring all of this up? While talking with a friend the other day who is out doing things in the community, he has found so much hopelessness and no one seems to care about their plight. Black people on the streets, Black folks without home or shelter, Black folks who are barely making ends meet.
Yeah, the leaders have surrounded themselves with so many pansies they don’t know shit from Shinola. They believe their own press, hype, and they’re following behind issues that, to the average Joe, mean nothing.
I look forward to being drug free and cleared from my medical issues. There is much to do with and for real people, the ones that really matter. I’ll leave the impotent managers and leaders to their own devices, surrounded by equally inept people. In a few years, when we awaken from our deep slumber, we’ll realize we in fact screwed ourselves over with our own ineptness and try as they might to point fingers, the crap will be on their faces, no one else.
I will also pray for the day real leaders rise from under the oppressive feet of the existing ones—unseen and unheard of until the day they rise. This is what is needed to get the existing ones out of the way. Real issues need addressing and real people need real representation. The day of recyling old tactics, ad nauseam, is over.
Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf was declared the winner of Liberia's presidential poll, making her Africa's first elected female head of state.Mrs Johnson-Sirleaf, a former World Bank economist and veteran politician, says she hopes it is also a day that will serve as an inspiration for women across Africa.
She is nicknamed The Iron Lady, but has promised to show a new, softer side as president.
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Comments
I didn't know that you were this deep! Why is this way over here anyway?
You are probably the one who could come with new ways and methods to address the madness.
You think that We will wake up in a few years?
I wish.
Well, I'll dream about that one, back to work!
Posted by denise at November 28, 2005 08:13 AM