We have just celebrated the 50th Anniversary of Martin Luther King Jrs ‘I have a dream speech’, and I this has gotten me thinking about Inspiring Leaders, and who are the current Inspiring Leaders.
Given what is going on in the world: Financial Crisis, Global Warming, Syria, etc, it really feels like their is a big absence of of Inspirational Leaders in the political arena, and I would go so far as to say a big lack of trust in our political leaders.
There seems to be no one who can tell us how we will solve the Global Economic crisis, and with Syria, all we see is posturing between the US, France, UK, China and Russia, with diametrically opposed views, all focused more on self interest rather than supporting a solution to the problem.
As for Global Warming, governments seem to be doing more to promote it that to reduce it.
I did a search on google “Inspiring Political Leaders”, one of the hits was 10 Most Inspiring PoliticalLeaders which I eagerly clicked on, to see who this site listed.
Interestingly, of the 10 listed I agreed with the majority, sadly 9 of them are dead, and have been for many years, although the list was missing Nelson Mandela 🙂
The only living leader was Aung San Suu Kyi, Since the 1980s, she has led a non-violent resistance against Burma’s repressive military regime, and was 1991 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.
When I googled just Inspiring Leaders, rather than political leaders, it was interesting that the list included names such as Steve Jobs, Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Oprah Winfrey, Richard Branson, and many other CEOs, before it mentioned any politicians.
I think we are all just too jaded with politicians, they say one thing but then do another, they seem more focused on self interest or national interest than bringing positive changes to the world, and very few exhibit what we would call Inspiring Leadership qualities.
It’s interesting that in many democracies we have voted for these leaders that we do not really trust, but we seem to be in a position where we are trying to choose between the lessor of two evils, rather than someone we truly believe in.
Don’t we deserve better?
I know I shy away from politics, it’s not something I want to get involved in, true I would like to have the chance to change the world for the better. However I don’t think I would stand a chance too many powerful groups protecting their self interests, to allow any real good to be done.
Until we can attract Inspiring Leaders into politics, give them the mandate, and power to change things for the better then we will not see much improvement.
So we need to start developing the next generation of Inspiring Leaders today before it’s too late.
Gordon Tredgold