Hope or hopelessness?

I have been thinking a lot about leadership recently. I read about a study that found when groups are assigned a task, the people who speak up early and often are thought of as the group leaders whether or not their ideas help the group, or are even factually correct.

It took me back to Guyana and Jim Jones. At the time, we were amazed that he could brainwash hundreds of people into drinking poison just because he, as their leader, told them to do it. I think those people got so used to following his leadership, never bothering to critically evaluate whether his decisions were in the best interests of the group, that they were so unsure of what to do that they did the easy thing and followed his direction to drink the poison.

I often hear people say they voted for someone because he or she was willing to speak up. Was there an evaluation to see if the things they spoke up about built something, or just knocked down and destroyed, and made a lot of noise? It is far more work to build something than the reverse. So you can take a wild guess which path most “leaders” take.

Leadership in difficult times is where you see true leaders emerge. Almost anyone can step out front when things are going well. It’s when there are difficult decisions that need to be made that you find real leaders who are able to move people to turn in a new direction.

During difficult times a good leader offers hope and a plan to a better future because a good leader has vision. A less than good leader will have excuses like “there’s nothing we can do,” or “they are doing (fill in your favorite) to us,” without a plan on what we are going to do.

Some find opportunity in people’s pain. Others work to bring us together in order to help each other as we work to build a path toward positive results. Who do you want to be with? It’s your choice. Just listen to who talks about what can be done, and who talks about what can’t be done. Hope or hopelessness.