Where have all the leaders gone?  It’s a question I find myself asking more often these days as the economy swoons and our favorite titans of industry are defamed.   I’m not referring specifically to the CEOs or beltway politicians or ordinary citizens, but to all of the above.  I’m referring to the leaders of men.

In business, I’ve sat at the roundtable with “creatives” with beautiful minds who don’t quite appreciate financial implications, with brilliant accountants who can’t quite communicate their point, and with executive sages who aren’t quite respected.  Each holds a handful of the necessary puzzle pieces, but the missing parts erode each party’s intended message, leaving a portion of their audience unmoved.  While the experts can baffle by talking over people, the multifaceted can resonate by talking to people.

What surprised me most in my work experience is not how many experts there are, but how few handymen exist.   I fear that we’ve put too much emphasis on siloed specialists, at the expense of the multifaceted.  The result has been the establishment of opposing cadres of ideologues when what we really need are mitigators and critical thinkers who operate in the gray areas where solutions are most likely to be found.  That is, if it truly is progress we seek. 

These days I encounter mostly finger-pointers with backwards-looking tendencies.  For them, it’s about problem propagating rather than problem solving.  Following finger-pointers will only breed stagnation.  It’s what I call, in a sort of backhanded homage to The Donald and his TV show, “The Apprentice Syndrome” where supposed team members actually act as saboteurs, allowing mistakes to be made so that they can benefit from the “I told you so” approach.  These people will gladly sacrifice the greater good for the sake of self-betterment.

If the 1920s brought America economic isolationism, then this decade has brought it social isolationism.  Many of us have blinders on.  Oblivious to others, we focus on the self while ignoring the group.  As economic borders disappear and the global marketplace expands, social and cultural differences will only become more apparent.  The world is shrinking and our lives are overlapping more and more with those of strangers.  It simply will not do to ignore our differences or automatically assume the unknown to be inferior to the familiar. 

The sentiments of Elvis Costello, John Lennon and Rodney King are often thought but rarely voiced.  So at the risk of sounding ridiculous I ask, what is so funny about peace, love and understanding?  Why can’t we imagine?  Why can’t we all just get along? 

I realize that you are probably already rolling your eyes, but that’s just my point: we’ve reached a stage where such thoughts are viewed as sappy fantasy.  Community is disintegrating.  People seem concerned solely with themselves.  Just the other day somebody said hello to me in an elevator and I was so utterly startled, that I jerked and doused the person with a cup of Starbucks’ finest.  We urbanites have become programmed to go about our daily routine while ignoring everyone we pass.  I hate to ask, but do we really require murderous assaults on civilians in skyscrapers to quell the infighting and to come together as a people?

We can still be inspired to change the world, but we require genuine leadership.  In reality we’re looking for a fairly simple package: people of honesty and integrity, void of hypocrisy.  We are looking for people to speak to the issues instead of around them; people who speak to us, not down to us; people who are trustworthy and promote accountability.

It’s very possible that the time has come to trade in the American Way for the Human Way, but it’s a frightening thought and it will take capable leaders to place the emphasis back on humanity.  You see, we are all on the same ship at sea – all with our hands on an oar – but we keep going in circles because all of us are steering in different directions, and we don’t even realize it because nobody can find the captain.

 Posted by Andrew Deutschmann, MBA Consultant

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