 |
|
MRSC has joined with Carl Neu, Director of the Center for the Future of Local Governance, P. Stephen DiJulio, Attorney, Foster Pepper PLLC, and Paul McClintock, Professional Registered Parliamentarian, to bring you the "Council/Commission Advisor." The Council/Commission Advisor will feature a new article each month with timely information and advice you can use.*
Leadership: Awakening the Best in People
(Do
We Measure Up as Leaders?)
October 2006
Carl H. Neu, Jr.
President of Neu and Company and
Director
of the Center for the Future of Local Governance™
As we enter the 21st century, we celebrate not the genius of what John Gardner calls the "American Experiment" and the wisdom and principles of honor, integrity and sacrifice bequeathed to us by our nation’s founders. Instead, "we the people" seem to demonstrate cynicism, confusion, disillusionment, moral irresoluteness and plummeting confidence in many of our institutions, especially the institutions of government.
Brian J. O’Neill, then-president of the National League of Cities (NLC) and council member from Philadelphia, proclaimed in a keynote address delivered at the 75th anniversary of NLC, "we live in the best of times and the worst of times." It is the "worst of times" because, currently (1998), two of the three branches of the federal government have been rendered dysfunctional by corrosive campaign financing practices, personal and special interest agendas, deceptive rhetoric, and a dependency upon popular polls as a substitute for courage and conviction as the basis for policy formulation and leadership. It also is the "best of times" because our local "hometown" governments have never performed better and more responsibly in "doing the people's business" and focusing on building better communities and promising futures for everyone. America, at its grassroots, is alive and vital with the prospect for realizing even greater possibilities within ourselves as "we the people." Over the last 15 years, virtually every innovation in politics and governance has originated at the state and city level. An October 30, 1998, editorial in the Wall Street Journal titled "The State of our Politics," made the following observation: "Washington isn't America -- the politics in the states and in the cities [and counties] has become strikingly productive and forward looking." Thomas Jefferson and Alexis de Tocqueville knew this; Brian O’Neill confirmed for us our rediscovery of this important truth.
Our primary responsibility as local government officials is to keep this local government momentum alive and to realize the fullest potentials of our communities through leadership and stewardship. But, what are leadership and stewardship and what are the attributes required of one who fulfills these roles successfully?
First, leadership. Leadership focuses not upon those who hold public office, but upon the people public officials represent and serve. John Gardner exclaims "Democracy is measured not by leaders doing extraordinary things, but by its citizens doing ordinary things extraordinarily well." To him, the fundamental element of both democracy and leadership is people. What Gardner calls the "American Experiment" is based upon people, ordinary people, and the quality of their vision, values, expectations, and discourse about their communities and their future. Leadership is the dynamic process of awakening and expanding the best in people and their capacity to define and achieve positive and responsible outcomes for themselves and future generations.
Leadership motivates and empowers others to define a vision of the future they wish to attain and to create within themselves the will and capacity to make that vision become a reality. Leadership is not a customer service philosophy of "we make things happen for you." It is the process of evoking a people's passions, imagination, beliefs and capacities to tackle the issues important to them and to accept responsibility for their productive resolution. Leadership focuses intent and will. Management, on the other hand, focuses on well-engineered public services, programs and organizational structures responsive to defined community and public needs. Leaders take people through an adventure of discovery and learning in which views and a sense of responsibility for the future emerge as a prelude to creating the specific services and structures that need to be managed. Leaders use the perceived "needs of the future" as basis for decision making in the present.
Stewardship is recognized as an attendant companion to leadership. Stewardship is ensuring the capacity of the people to preserve their participation in the governing process and to have the means necessary to sustain the future well being and survival of the communities they have created. Our nation’s founders were leaders when they created within the populace’s mind a quest for freedom and democracy; they were stewards when they gave us a republic and the Constitution to preserve its existence.
Local public officials (county commissioners, mayors, council members, administrators) are leaders and stewards at the primary level of the "American Experiment." "We the people" implies a union that results from human interaction and discussion as the basis for healthy communities, responsible decision making and creating what is referred to as "quality of life." It is within our local communities and hometowns where leadership and stewardship originate and then percolate upward to become national norms and role models. It is in our communities where we educate our children, tend to our sick, do our work, walk our streets, raise our families, celebrate life's successes and lessons, and shape our hopes and values that guide how we live out our lives. Leadership, stewardship and the "American Experience" aren't top-down processes originated by a higher authority and power; they are "bottoms up" processes that enrich human existence and potential with home grown wisdom, accountability and experience. Brian O'Neill is right on! Our local communities are the fountainheads of the "best of times" and that which is "best" in and about America.
Leadership and stewardship are not bestowed upon public officials at swearing in ceremonies. They are, instead, obligations of one's position as a county commissioner, mayor, council member or public administrator. One can hold power and possess authority without ever being a leader. Conversely, some highly effective leaders hold no formal authority, but command people’s attention and engage their energies toward bringing about constructive change and responses to challenges facing communities. The rise of neighborhood groups and citizens participating directly in community decision making are testimony to the impact of leaders without formal authority. In fact, it has been the primary means by which previously disenfranchised persons such as women, minorities and political outsiders captured people’s attention and affected change. It is at the heart of populist philosophy.
Effective leaders and stewards especially at the local level must learn, exhibit and master at least these seven attributes:
1. Leaders engage people and their energies rather than give them ready answers and "quick-fix" solutions.
Leadership isn't about possessing Herculean strength, Aristotelian brilliance, or the oratorical skills of a Pericles. It isn't about being charismatic, handsome or beautiful. It is about touching someone's imagination and conscience. It can start with no more than a simple question or an invitation to become involved in something. It is a process of "reaching out and touching" someone in a way that incorporates that person into a community of people. Leaders move people beyond preoccupation with self and the mundane elements of everyday life to a heightened sense of awareness and the potential to make a difference about issues that really matter to them and their future. Leaders engage people on issues that matter.
2. Leaders inspire themselves and others to their very best efforts.
Leaders inspire a worthwhile vision, goals and commitment to make desired future happen. Stewards ensure the capacity to keep the process vital, that required resources are made available, that responsible leadership and management succession occurs, and that the institution will survive and prosper. But, first, people must be inspired to see within themselves their inherent potential for "best." Leaders expand the consciousness and capacity of those whose lives they touch toward becoming the best they can be.
Leaders inspire by example. They know one's actions always "speak" louder and more truthfully than one's words. Many who aspire to be leaders fail to grasp this essential concept. They fail as leaders, they fail as persons ethically, and they hurt people and their communities. True leaders never define a people down.
3. Leaders focus on the future and get agreement on common vision, goals, priorities and direction.
Leaders, in the words of Thomas Cronin, "make things happen that might not otherwise happen and prevent things from happening that ordinarily might happen. [Leadership] is a process of getting people working together to achieve common goals and aspirations--a process that helps people transform intentions into positive action, visions into reality."
4. Leaders empower and support, rather than control and direct, people toward achieving desired outcomes.
All too often, people in authority or high office feel a need to control or limit the options of others, especially those with whom they disagree. This is the consequence of untamed ego and self importance which over time, if unchecked, produce forms of tyranny. Leaders help those they engage to discover the leadership capacity within themselves and, when that discovery occurs, they step aside so that these new leaders can act and repeat the process. They know human energy and creativity, once released, are limitless.
Leadership is not just giving people the resources and the authority to act, it also is helping people learn and grow to develop with themselves the capacity to evaluate events and issues, make decisions on how to proceed, to resolve conflicts and build trust, and to achieve the outcomes they desire.
5. Leaders engender a perspective of "we" and partnership.
Leaders work with and through people recognizing that organizations and communities really are teams -- people joined together to achieve outcomes no individual can achieve alone. They build a sense of "we" rather than a sense of "them." They do not divide people against each other into camps or factions. They unite people toward common goals.
Leaders engage people individually because they know one person can make a difference, but they also know that this one person united with others in a sense of partnership process the "power of many" captured in the phrase "we the people" and the term community. Leaders see communities as living entities in which people interact with and mobilize others to bring about change and progress. Healthy communities, successful societies and even harmonious neighborhoods result from diverse groups focusing on working together toward common goals in a sense of collaboration--a sense of "we."
People are capable of so much if they unite. Leaders are the catalysts of union and progress that result from awakening within people the possibilities they possess. In this sense, leaders really are stewards and servants rather than rulers and masters.
6. Leaders are principled persons possessing moral behavior, character, values and integrity.
A leader’s main strength is the ability to operate close enough to people (followers) to draw them to the leader's level of moral development and maturity. If leaders are to elevate people’s capacities and awareness, they, fist, must elevate within others their standards and sense of equity, fairness, prudence, honor, courage and civility. Values define personality, behavior and one’s character. Values allow one to operate with integrity even in the absence of incentives or sanctions. They give one the courage of conviction, respect for the rules that bind people together, and the ability to act responsibly even in times of chaos and conflicting opinions and choices. When integrity and values flee, people flounder, "we" degenerates into "them," harsh conflict results, and communities experience that which is referred to as "crises in leadership."
Leadership is never values free or values loose. Leaders know that their private values and character always impact their public character and behavior. To believe otherwise is self-deception and sophistry. Leadership that lacks personal integrity spawns disingenuousness, perfidy, irresoluteness and incivility as preludes to decadence and community disintegration. These are the very antithesis of the leader’s purpose. For this reason, real leaders never engage in campaigns of deception, manipulation and agendas of self-promotion.
7. Leaders promote mutual respect and civility in all relationships.
With increasing frequency, attendees at conferences and workshops I conduct for local government officials complain about the increasing amount of coarseness and lack of civility they are experiencing within their councils and in their community's public discourse especially when controversy arises.
Controversy, conflict and disagreement are natural occurrences in all meaningful relationships.
The issue is not that disagreement occurs, but how one deals with that disagreement without being disagreeable, rudely hostile and, in extreme cases, irrationally immature. We witness all too often coarseness and incivility in national debates and on many TV talk shows. We've seen it reach inane proportions in the presidential impeachment, and more recently, the 2000 presidential elections scream fests and proceedings. The cutting edges of coarseness and incivility destroy relationships, productive communications, and reason as the basis for resolving disagreements constructively. Ultimately, they destroy communities and become a major disincentive for entering public office. Leaders understand that community is achieved and sustained through relationships nurtured and maintained by courtesy, respect, personal maturity and civility. All of these essential elements can be preserved even in instances of controversy and disagreement by discussing the issues rather than attacking and belittling those with whom we disagree or whose opinions differ from ours.
In America, today, we as a people see ourselves disconnected from, "spun," and manipulated by many in positions of political authority and power. Mass communications and the media don't bring clarity; they just contribute to the pettifoggery and distortion that disillusion us. The result, people feel alienated, become cynical, and drop out of the process of being part of "we the people."
It is to us, our nation’s local government and community leaders, that hope for our nation's future and sustaining the "American Experiment" lies. We are where the people are; we are part of the people. We live among and interact with them. We are capable of talking with them directly. It is in our daily "place and time" where communities as "hometowns" exist. Leaders at the national, and even at the state level, are abstract beings disconnected from the people because the average person seldom, if ever, interacts or talks with them. Most people just see them as a face on television or a name they read about. These national and state "leaders" practice, all too often, a haughty and misguided concept that leadership is a top-down phenomenon that creates the illusion that they are our "rulers." Leadership, in reality, is a bottoms-up, grassroots phenomenon. It is this type of leadership, leadership from the people at the local and hometown level, that made America, more than two centuries ago, burst upon vestige of human imagination and experience as an alternative to tyranny and domination by absentee lords, kings and others who saw themselves as rulers. This alternative, the "American Experiment," shall not perish if we nourish and nurture it constantly with a rededication to leadership that motivates ordinary people to do things extraordinarily well. That is our call as leaders in America’s counties, cities, and hometowns. It is incumbent upon us to answer this call with a sense of purpose, honor, and skill--to be leaders in the truest meaning of the world. Our local communities are evidence of "the best of times" because that is where the very "best" in leadership flourishes in America. The caliber of leadership we, as local government officials, provide is a preeminent factor in the very success of our communities and the "American Experiment."
P. Stephen DiJulio, a partner at Foster Pepper & Shefelman PLLC, focuses on litigation involving state and local governments, and land use and environmental law. Particular experience includes representation of jurisdictions on eminent domain, utilities (water, wastewater, storm water, solid waste systems), local improvement districts, facility siting and contractor litigation. More.
Carl Neu, author and consultant, is recognized nationally as an authority on, and an experienced practitioner of, the theory and application of governance and leadership to city councils and county boards, local government managers, and community leaders. More.
Paul McClintock is a Professional Registered Parliamentarian and Certified Parliamentarian, professionally serving organizations as parliamentarian at meetings, teaching workshops, and writing parliamentary opinions. He also is an active leader in the National Association of Parliamentarians and the American Institute of Parliamentarians at several levels. More.
*The Articles appearing in the "Council/Commission" column represent the opinions of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Municipal Research & Services Center.