Pointers of true leadership: Measuring transformation

The concept of leadership is essentially about critical wellbeing of a group of people; the idea of ensuring sustainable societal stability. Leader­ship is not mere influence; it is the delivery of public good.

True leadership is essentially one without post, without pay, without paid followers, without legacy and among others, without popularity. True leadership is simply good, for its own sake.

A true leader may have a post, pay, paid followers, legacy, and among others, popularity. False leaders may also have all these. How then may a truly true leader be identified?

A true leader is one without post:

By post, position, I mean a man­date given from an external factor, example a president of a country is a leader because he is elected by the people into that office. The position is determined by an external factor. His responsibilities include ensuring that no child dies out of malnutri­tion or malaria, for example.

If there be another person, say in a small community, who has no biological children of her own, and has no post in the community, but he is able to ensure that no child in the community dies out of malaria or malnutrition, he may be a better leader than the president in this limited respect.

Too many people seek to be leaders because we assume that all leadership is only positively when one has a position with an exter­nal mandate. This is because the mandate comes along with available resources. Is anyone ready to be in a position of responsibility without available resources, except for hu­man and raw materials?

Many seek the post of political leadership because the mandate gives them access to resources in the context of poor accountability framework. Even for the available human and other natural resources, there is no consistently rigorous framework of motivational (not just punitive) accountability.

My contention is that one can be a public leader without post; mean­ing without external mandate and without bestowed resources. With­out external mandate means that you don’t act merely because people are asking you to do something or you don’t refuse to act because peo­ple will be unhappy if you act.

You act because acting at that time is a good thing, the right thing to do. This means you have the wisdom to determine what is good. You have the intellectual, social, spiritual and experiential capacity and capability to determine what is good; without a post. Can’t we work towards producing such leaders in our country, continent and genera­tion? This is my understanding of godly leadership: inspired, convict­ed, empowered and equipped from within by God.

A true leader is without pay:

By this I mean a leader who does not insist on an external reward to meet his responsibilities. Of course, a labourer is due his wages. The argument is that a true leader is a “self-imposed” labourer who there­fore should pay himself. And what pay is more fulfilling that achieving the results the people you lead hope for?

A God-sent leader is one upon whom the responsibility of seeking public good is generated from with­in him. An important indicator for anyone who claims to be a leader is to not insist on a salary.

Political leaders are paid by politics. Judicial leaders are paid by justice. Civil society leaders are paid by civility. We don’t have to do these payments in cash. The nothing money is not the paper cash it is the human value. Leadership is not a mere job; it is mere life.

Leadership is of life; not for a living.

Those who work for pay are not leaders they are workers. A true leader is essentially a labourer for himself not merely a worker for the people because when he seeks the wellbeing of people it is because he cannot live without it.

Those who work for the people live on what the people “should” pay them not necessarily on what they do. The wages of a true leader comes from within, not without. His satisfaction is not his pay slip or material gain. His satisfaction’s the well being of the people; the public good.

Certainly this is not too difficult for us to appreciate because we all experience this when we do things for those we love. True love does not work for pay. True love eats love, literally.

A true leader will surely be paid by the good public because he produces public good. He does not insist on his pay it will be given without asking, by a good public. Our challenge is that leaders may not be producing enough public good so there may not be enough good public.

A true leader is without paid followers:

By this I mean, a leader does not pay his followers before they follow him. The followers of a true leader are purely voluntary. A church that pays its church members is a tricky place to serve. The CEO of a company whose workers are there because there is “good” salary is not necessarily a good leader. They are there because of the money. So if he is getting the money from a wrong source, money laundry, washed crime, unhealthy compe­tition in business etc, they don’t really mind. All their privation is the “good” salary. Is such a CEO a true leader?

When followers are trained to generate their own resources to pay themselves, then we understand leadership. That’s why a country with low shared-productivity but a high GDP may still lag in develop­ment because of inequality, poor distribution of rights, responsibili­ties and resources.

When politician have to use direct and indirect means to buy the votes of the electorate, they are paying for followers. That’s not leadership. Such politicians should not be voted for because they are politicians and we are voting for leaders.

Politicians are not necessarily leaders. Followers should under­stand this! Why do you follow the pastor of your church? Why don’t you follow NPP or NDC or any other political party?

Lookout for their leadership, not their politics. You don’t go to a hos­pital because of the politics of the medical staff. If you did that, you will die from your sickness. We go there because of their competence to get us back to good health.

Development is the health of a people: public good. Politicians do politics not development. Leaders do development. There is a gulf of difference between the two concepts. Development is not the reward politicians give to followers it is the outcome of good leader­ship. Anyone paying for followers is not a leader; that’s politics.

True leaders do not seek for a legacy:

The pursuit of legacy can lead to very erroneous decisions at the ex­pense of followers. A legacy is not determined by the leader; perhaps not even by followers of the time. Legacy is determined by posterity. Times change; and our times seem to be changing very fast. Therefore what a person may see as a legacy for the next generation may not be so at all. Moreover, one legacy may be at the expense of another. Therefore the pursuit of a legacy can be a very misleading quest for a leader. True leaders don’t seek to be remembered. They merely seek to do well.

Also, true leaders do not pursue publicity. They don’t seek to be popular. They may become well known because of the good results they produce. But if one does good because one seeks to be popular, the good is a personal gain (or loss), not a public good.

Only public good produces a good public therefore private pop­ularity, is not for the good of the public. When the public is famous, e.g. Ghanaians become globally famous because they have a leader who is achieving massive public good, the fame is not private popu­larity. It is a good global image that adds to the public good.

But many leaders, so-called, seem to be pursuing fame and popular­ity. Some are even bold enough to communicate themselves as religious leaders. For the Christians, I concede Jesus was famous, but to what end. He was crucified by the verdict of the masses. His popular­ity got him crucified. Perhaps this was essentially because his enemies, the opposition, misrepresented him to the public for their own selfish interest.

If a leader produces sufficient public good, net public gain, he may become popular because he will be famous. People would like him. Good is attractive. No one prefers bad to good. But the majority may not follow a good leader.

This is why a good leader does not seek popularity. Without seeking fame, one can be famous. With­out seeking popularity one can be popular.

When leaders begin to harness publicity infrastructure with enor­mous investments in billboards and other advertising mechanisms to the extent that it distracts from the in­vestment required to produce better public good, we may have a crisis in our development: window dressing.

May the following be thus presented as few suggestions for measuring true leadership, begin­ning with factors for quality human resource as we all understand that as the fundamental resource of every society.

Qualitative development of a critical mass of Human Resources begins with the mind culture of a people. Mind culture refers to the context of population mind set. This is a function of informa­tion, knowledge and the education process.

Fruits of true leadership: transformation

“When you call it sin, it sounds religious, when you call it corrup­tion it sounds political, when you call it wrong it sounds moralistic, so let’s call it nothing so it becomes meaningless.”

Transformation is the process of moving a people away from mean­inglessness to meaningful living. It is the product of true leader: enduring endeavours of labouring for public good to produce a good public. It is not a difficult endeavour for responsible human beings; but it is impossible for godless men.

The writer is with Cross-Cut­ting Excellence (CCE)

BY EMMANUEL KWAME MENSAH