FollowtheLeader.indd

FOLLOW THE LEADER

Principle:

“Eff ective leadership is based upon eff ective

communication. A person who can’t communicate,

can’t lead.”

There must be a positive and passionate presentation of the purpose by the
leader. The more persuasive it is, the easier it is to promote with others.
An effective leader is always aware that it often takes positive, passionate –
and persistent – persuasion to prod and provoke people into action. Sedate
and sedentary human inertia is not easily overcome! Many people are
like frozen ice cubes that have become crystallized and solidified. Or they
are like water contained and confined in a glass. Just like a liquid always
runs down to the lowest level, human nature almost always settles down
to the lowest level of living! Only when it is “heated up” will it “move
up!” It is only when H2O is heated that it is transformed from a solid to a
liquid. Then when it is boiled, it will be transformed from a liquid to a gas.
Only when it is changed into steam will it permeate its surroundings. Like
frozen ice, or confined water, people naturally stay within their “comfort
zones” unless something or someone “heats them up” with a passionate
vision! Mustering and motivating mankind is always one of the perennial
challenges of leadership. Fred Smith explains and illustrates this
motivational issue as follows:

Everyone is motivated...Those who are doing nothing are

motivated to do nothing. Those who are active are motivated to be

active.To motivate people who are motivated to do nothing, we have

to overcome the first motivation in order to get them in a forward

movement. I was told by a corporate president who manufactured

railroad engines that the biggest problem was harnessing enough

power to start the train rolling. Aircraft designers have to build

enough power into plane engines to break the pull of gravity before

they can power the flight itself. As leaders we need to recognize that

inertia is a motivation, not simply the lack of it.^2

We can see that everyone is motivated. However, everyone is not positively
motivated. Far too many people are negatively motivated – to do as little as
possible in life! It is the call and challenge of leadership to arouse people
out of their apathy and lethargy through the promotion of a great cause.