Leadership and What it Means and What it Must Be

quantified and the understanding regarding what constitutes the subject can be considered ‘hard’. To be effective and know what is really going on a Leader needs to be well versed in his technical discipline.

Important in this aspect is the application of innovative thought. The ability to change or add more value to the technical area by using common sense to solve problems or change some technical feature of the topic at hand elevates the prestige of the Leader. Innovation is then another key component of intelligence. Capitalism as a theory is founded upon innovative destruction. Creative chaos breeds challenges, changes and chance. People can then add to their speciality some form of applied innovation to solve some issues or create opportunities. Innovation however is rather difficult to quantify. Some innovations are achieved by sheer dogged courage, others by a combination of sweat and luck, others by circumstance and collaboration across time and people. How are we to measure the creative creatures who are building electronic commerce systems for internet shopping, against the local garage engineer who cheaply and efficiently finds, fixes and tests a novel solution to your car engine’s trouble ?

A Leader must have the technical and innovational skills demanded by his environment or the same skills to create his environment. However, I would submit that this is not enough. A Leader must also understand history and people. This is a completely different interpretation of intelligence, utilising different spheres of the brain and neo-cortex, yet vital for a Leader. I mean not just the history and people of his chosen area of professionalism, but a Leader must have in general an appreciation of history, culture

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