Charismatic Leaders.Dr Sammy D.James

An Organization's Survival Depends on a Leader's Ability to Manage Change.
A country,an house,Business, etc.
Leading change is a hot topic for the business world and rightfully so. The United States is still an economic powerhouse, but we are no longer the singular giant among the world's nations. This fact makes the need for change an omnipresent requirement for all leaders. It does not matter if you are a Fortune 500 executive, or the owner of a small business. As a leader you have to be a person capable of leading your organization through endeavors requiring change.
Today's leaders have to be experts in leading change. If not, they face a dismal future as does the organization that they are leading. This is because the world is constantly changing. No longer is the United States the economic powerhouse of the world. Instead it is now just a member of an international dynamic comprised of giants like China, India and the European Union. Unilateral decisions regarding industry practices can no longer be made by the United States alone. To survive leaders and their organizations have to be prepared to change at the drop of a hat. That is hard. Everyone knows that people naturally dislike change, that is a given, but change is a key to survival.
Dr Sammy noted that "if the rate of change on the outside exceeds the rate of change on the inside, the end is near." Change is really a tool of survival. It should not be feared, but embraced. Change and the challenges that it presents leaders are not new phenomena. The famous Machiavelli noted that "there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success than to take the lead in introducing a new order of things." Machiavelli paints a portrait with his words that portray the leader required for a change initiative as someone very skilled in the art of leadership. Anything less than the organization's best leader and it may become just another wasted effort. One more nail in the proverbial coffin.
Great minds within the business world have focused on the art of leading change because of its importance. John P. Kotter authored a book titled Leading Change that is an excellent tool for organizations that are changing the way they do business. This is a must read for leaders. There are too many variables acting in concert within an organization for a leader not to learn specifically about the art of leading change. Leaders have to invest in training. John P. Kotter is just one resource. If you do not invest time and energy into education and training you are limiting your knowledge and abilities. Those same limits that you place on yourself automatically become limits for your organization as well. Take a moment and look around at your competitors, are they changing the way they do business? If they are and you are not, you are in trouble.
Dr Sammy D.James provided a great standard to judge an organization's health, "if the rate of change on the outside exceeds the rate of change on the inside, the end is near." It will be a constant race for organizations within the United States to keep up with China and India,haiti,Jamaica,Bahamas etc but a race that we cannot afford not to run well. Leaders are going to have to embrace change as a standard of excellence and success. Organizations are going to have to train future leaders in the art of change. Anything short of an all out effort to master change will result in failure.
One last note on change that should be presented is that it really is insanely unpopular. Leaders have to get past the popularity contest mentality and unite the organization under their vision. Adlai Stevenson correctly stated that "all progress has resulted from people who took unpopular positions." Leaders will face opposition, but it is their job to lead an organization to the finish line. If they cannot then they should not be leading the organization in the first place.
But in reality, it’s all innate. Successful leaders often make this mistake. They feel their confidence is learned from experience since it increases over time, as they achieve more success. When a successful leader is young, he often feels trepidation in front of more senior people, or when confronted with difficult situations, yet later he becomes more confident. So it must be learned, right?
The confusion here is whether you can develop into a confident leader, not whether you're able to inspire confidence from the day you were born. (Did Napoleon command anyone the day he was born?) The ability to develop into a leader over time is what’s innate.
If you are a born leader, you will seek out experiences that help you develop. You will feel energized when things go well in their development, as when your parents support you. Born leaders often remember the energizing feeling when they were at their mother’s knee, assuming that their mother was the one who instilled it, when their mother simply reinforced something that was already there.
If you are born with raw leadership ability, your early experiences will serve to help you understand it, exercise it, come to terms with it, and “fine tune” it. But your early experiences don’t make you a leader - you are born that way. Recently, however, in the Oct 16, 2006 issue of Business Week magazine, Welch seems to contradict himself when he writes that "charisma ... seems to be inborn. It can't really be trained." How could charisma be innate, when self-confidence is learned, Dr Sammy According to Dr Sammy , leaders must “exude energy” and “be able to inspire confidence” and “be optimistic” and “be comfortable in their own skin”. Yet some people feel stress (instead of energy) when given positions of leadership and they fall apart. Some people have a hard time making eye contact, or smiling when others look at them, and this gets worse as they get older. Some people have no motivation unless rallied by a leader.Leaders fulfill the needs of their employees, who want to be appreciated, acknowledged, and given approval and dignity. Employees need to have their self-confidence built-up by the leader. Yet those traits in employees often limit their ability to be a leader themselves, since the higher you climb in an organization, the fewer people are around to stroke your ego. In order to become a leader, you need to be self-confident and “comfortable in your own skin. I’ve always tried to have an inspirational approach to leadership and the most common style is “charismatic leadership”. Maybe because I employ this style I also respond very well to managers who have always tried to motivate me in this way. Charismatic leaders always develop good communication with their associates. All of them work with the team so that they actively contribute and develop the vision; the vision then becomes a part of not only the leader but of their team. I’ve always been given buy-in from my teams with a charismatic approach to leadership; my teammates are willing to go above and beyond the call of duty to achieve the vision. I feel like the most important part of a charismatic leader is the ability to inspire extraordinary performance from the team.So when you’re applying it to your everyday work life, remember that a charismatic leader should arouse trust, faith and belief in their leadership ability. If we move forward and grow as leaders, we should also move our associates to become leaders in their own right. But most of all, charismatic leaders inspire a deep devotion in their team. The effect these types of leaders have on their associates seems to be their greatest achievement. This is of course the most important way to be effective and achieve your own personal and corporate goals.
A leader has the ability to rally confidence and conviction in his fellow supporters. Leaders are sc
attered throughout history, influencing changes and leading oppressed masses to freedom. Every movem
ent has its leader, its focal point, the one person that leads by example, serving as a role model i
n times of difficulty and hardship. In Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Randle Patrick M
cMurphy is thrust into a leadership role in a psychiatric ward. McMurphy begins to rally support and
initiates a change in the daily lives of the other "patients" in the ward, inching away from the pr
eviously immovable institutionalized oppression. As Kesey demonstrates the essentiality of a leader
to the breaking of oppression, he also shows the dissipation of the patients' confidence and convict
ion once the leader's active participation has ceased. Kesey's implementation of McMurphy as a leade
r in the psychiatric ward demonstrates man's inability to initially buck oppression without a leader
, emphasizing that the leader is only effective if the followers learn to lead themselves.
The fadin
g of the courage and confidence that McMurphy instills in the psychiatric patients during the fishin
g trip shows that a leader is necessary to break free from oppression, an oppression that reclaims i
ts victims once the leader stops leading the way. On the way to the open seas, the patients stop at
the gas station, where their green uniforms are noticed right away. Along with the recognition of th
e mental green color comes disrespect and oppression by way of the gas station attendants. McMurphy
sticks up for everyone and the patients follow perfectly on cue. There was a new sense of confidence
surrounding the patients, and it was because McMurphy had "shown us what a little bravado and coura
ge could accomplish, and we thought he'd taught us how to use it. When people at a stoplight would s
tare at us and our green uniforms we'd do just like he did, sit up straight and strong and tough-loo
king and put a big grin on our face and stare straight back at them till their motors died and their
windows sunstreaked" (203). For countless years, the patients had been oppressed to the point that
they merely accepted the fact. McMurphy is the catalyst in the change that occurs; the patients see
McMurphy get respect from the attendants and they do exactly as he does, as to break free from oppre
ssion. The patients merely follow the example that McMurphy, their leader, has set for them. When fa
ced with glaring eyes on the highway, the patients once again do exactly as McMurphy does, staring s
tereotypes and generalizations right in the eye. Although the patients achieve "freedom" by imitatin
g their leader, their victory isn't achieved by self assertion or self expression, but by mimicry an
d nothing more. Later, as McMurphy steps away, the patients are left with nothing to imitate and the
y succumb to oppression. The men at the dock were making fun of Candy, they "kept leering at her and
leaning close together to whisper things. All our crew, even the doctor, saw this and got to feelin
g ashamed that we didn't do something. We weren't the cocky bunch that was back at the service stati
on" (205). A few miles down the road from their last stand against persecution, the men fold. The sa
me situation arises as dockworkers insult a part of the group from the psychiatric ward just as the
gas station attendants had done no more than a couple hours ago. The men are now put in a position t
o "be McMurphy." They can assert their own leadership and stand up for Candy, except they don't know
how. They "weren't the cocky bunch that was back at the service station." They had merely learned h
ow to imitate an example back at the service station instead of learning how to create an example. I
n doing so, their confidence is solely dependent upon the person that their imitations surround, the
leader. Once their leader so much as leaves the room, all is lost and the men revert back to their
meek and oppressed original states. Men who were liberated from their oppression when a leader asser
ted himself, lose everything the leader brought to the table once he has gone, as they have not yet
learned how to lead themselves.
Once the men learn how to lead themselves and take responsibility fo
r bravery, they gain a lasting sense of confidence and cockiness, a permanent version of that which
they had at the service station. As the men leave the docks, they leave the events that took place t
here as well. On the way back, it looks as if a storm is brewing, however there are enough for every
one onboard, save three, who would have to brave the risk of drowning without a lifevest. They "were
three jackets short, and there was a fuss as to who'd be the three that braved that bar without jac
kets. It finally turned out to be Billy Bibbit and Harding and George. Everybody was surprised that
Billy had volunteered, he took his lifejacket and helped the girl into it, but everybody was even mo
re surprised that McMurphy hadn't insisted to be one of the heroes"(214). McMurphy had always been t
he one person to be the "hero", to take the burden off of the other men and put it upon himslef. Jus
t as on the docks, McMurphy is removed from the situation, forcing the men to fend for themselves. H
owever, on the ship, McMurphy is removed voluntarily, perhaps as he realizes that true bravery must
be self-induced, not mimicked. At first, the men act as they did on the docks, with no one assuming
leadership and the men completely aloof as to how to lead themselves. After a short fuss, some patie
nts step forward, patients who are ready to use the confidence and bravery of the service station fo
r themselves. None of the heroes is forced into his position, rather, each does so willingly, puttin
g his respective life at risk for a reason. For Bibbit it was Candy and for George it was the dirtin
ess of it all, reasons that the patients believed in. The patients move past sheer mimicry and lear
n the value of initiative, as they do what they want and for their own reasons. Once these men learn
to lead themselves past their own obstacles, they take their newfound confidence and conviction, us
ing it to hurdle every barrier that comes in their way. The men make it back to the docks unaffected
by the stormy waters, but completely influenced by their newfound sense of confidence. They encount
er the very same dockworkers that had proved their mimicked bravery false; however, the dockworkers
didn't meet the same group of men the second time around. This group was confident and they wanted a
chance to express themselves, as "the loafers stood on the upper deck, watching, smoking pipes they
'd carved themselves. We were waiting for them to say something about the girl again, hoping for it
(215). In the same situation they were before, the men are begging for a chance for retribution. Th
ey want to show these men who saw them as spineless imitators that they're not what they seem to be.
The lessons that the men learn on the boat follow them ashore, as the men readily welcome oppressio
n instead of dreading it. The patients' new sense of conviction shines off of their beings as the do
ckworkers (now called loafers) leave them alone. They see that this bunch of men isn't the same grou
p that buckled under the taunts earlier and they realize that these sailors will no longer fold unde
r oppression. They can see it in the way the men carry themselves and in the way that they stare opp
ression down. In seeking to conquer oppression before it is levied upon them, the men express their
own desires, and in doing so, they defeat oppression before it manifests itself. McMurphy's example
of bravery is only temporary when mimicry is relied upon. However, once self-leadership is realized,
the bravery and confidence of the service station gain permanence in the patients' lives. The mimic
ry of a leader in order to buck oppression brings only false and temporary freedom from oppression;
however, once the oppressed learn how to lead themselves past their own obstacles, the confidence be
comes true, transcending individual events and time, following the self-leaders through life.
The pa
tients' collective defiance of the Nurse and their subsequent destruction of her power displays thei
r final conquest of oppression through the continued realization of their self-leadership. After the
fishing trip, the men return to the ward and have an all-out party filled with chaos. The following
morning, the nurse finds out that Billy Bibbit is missing. Nurse Ratched interrogated the patients
and "darted the eyes out with every word, stabbing at the men's faces, but the men were immune to he
r poison. Their eyes met hers; their grins mocked the old confident smile she had lost" (262). Befor
e, the nurse was able to dissect the men apart with her stares and her glances; she was able to get
the men to tell her whatever she wanted. Nurse Ratched had been the figure of oppression for the maj
ority of the patients' lives, as previously they succumbed to her poisons time and time again. It's
different now, the patients know how to break free from oppression by themselves. Although it seems
that the men are merely imitating McMurphy, each set of eyes staring back at the nurse is independen
t of what their leader is doing. Each patient has decided that he will no longer allow this woman to
bend him to her will. The nurse's stranglehold of oppression is broken, as these men who used to be
nd and fold to her every command have rallied around a leader, and in doing so, have learned to lead
themselves. The patients are no longer a collective mass to be molded and ordered around, rather, e
ach patient has come into his own as an expressive individual. Through learning how to apply the les
sons that a leader has taught, the oppressed learn how to lead themselves, and although the leader.