Volume XXII, Number 48 (Issue 1104) | November 25, 2024
A Lesson for Emerging Leaders
Born in 1803, Leon Faucher, a French politician who began life during the final decade of the Age of Enlightenment (c. 1685-1815), proposed that the power to effect change and lead people is the product of two forces: enlightenment and hard work. Since the term “enlightenment” can be a bit nebulous, let me offer a working definition that may help Faucher’s assertion make more sense. According to a couple of sources, “enlightenment” as it was understood in Faucher’s era, held that through human reasoning, humanity could discover and understand great truths about the world. Furthermore, such basic truths were ours to be had in an appreciation of science and the application of logic, not an unquestioning and unrelenting adherence to religious beliefs and tradition.
I think the point Faucher in his day and I are seeking to make is that logic combined with hard work is more suited to making things better than are strict adherence to an existing set of rules and inaction or action that is driven solely by those rules. Early in my consulting career one of the observations my colleagues and I sometimes made to characterize some individual’s approach to their job was “rather than having twenty years’ experience, they had one year’s experience twenty times.” In other words, we were faulting them for having done nothing to grow their knowledge base or skill set beyond the lessons of the first year.
Apart from our biological progression from birth through adolescence into adulthood, most of the growth that you and I experience – be it of a personal nature or in the context of an organization requires study, reflection, and hard work. That is never truer than in the case of those who would lead others. Thus, if you are learning and growing today, that is impressive. Conversely, if you are stuck, it is time to change the tune.
Soli Deo Gloria
“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters” Colossians 3:23
J. Keith Hughey
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E-mail: keith@jkeithhughey.com
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