Leadership

The Trial and Errors of Leadership
By Dr. Richard C. Baiz, D. B. A.

There are pundits in the leadership arena who are quite critical of other leadership pundits, writers, educators, scholars and/or leadership practitioners about: that it has all been said before; or that is nothing really new, nothing interesting or exciting is being revealed. There are also new corporate sought out seeking trends in leadership development with a twist of terms to arouse the conscious mind, such as: quantum leadership, millennium leadership, generalization leadership and futuristic leadership, just to mention a few. And, there are even those who are quite critical from a negative perspective that a good portion of what is written in leadership is a waste of time and that it is a field saturated with aspiring authors with nothing new to share and to some extend preying on the hopes of the uninformed. Well from my view, if we begin to think we have already learned all there is to learn from literature that is being written and that we could only learn what we think is going to transpire centuries from now; then I think we are in real trouble. First of all, we never stop learning unless we are dead and secondly the minute we stop evaluating our past then we are setting ourselves up for repeating historical mistakes, which could be real troublesome.

Imagine what would have happen had Thomas Edison given up with his trials and errors in his pursuit to finding the solution of the electric light bulb, the manifestation of bringing light to the world as we know it could have been delayed for years. But Thomas Edison had tested the process about two thousand times before he got it right, now that to me are trials and errors and ultimately reaching success through trial and errors. So one may say, so what? What does this have to do with anything or what a simplistic thought to explain the trial and errors of leadership? Well it is not and it is historical and it is a matter of fact and my point is that Thomas Edison after each trial, after each error, he along with his assistances documented what they were doing and learned every time they would go through another experiment, making changes as they went along modifying formulas and testing again and again until they got it right and reached the success they were looking for. All of us have an opportunity to learn from our own trials and errors and we also have the benefit of learning from others trial and errors, which allows the opportunity to grow and succeed at the expense of others whom, have failed.

Anyone who writes about personal and leadership development usually has a fairly solid background in history, politics, economics, management, public administration and other related fields such as psychology. Such writers of this subject matter often times enjoy reflecting on past historical events to form their theories or hypothesis in order to benefit clients that they are working with to make analogies about the mistakes of others in search for victory, success and excellence. There is a reason why typically one will probably observe a picture or a facial statute of our sixteenth President Abraham Lincoln when one visits a law office; the revered President probably more so with him than any other was expose extensively to trials and errors from the very beginning of his presidency.

I find it appropriate as we recognize his two-hundredth anniversary to examine some of the trials and errors of a phenomenal leader and perhaps Americas greatest president. This is a man who from day one was challenged with keeping the country whole/one and his drive to forgive in order to start the healing process of a country that was exposed to abundances of trials and errors on both sides of the American Civil War. This is a man whose powerful words continue to leave us at awe today with the geniuses of his perceptions of his day and the future of America, he just never gets old and there is always something to be learned from his defeats and his victories. President Lincoln is a classic study in the trials and errors as few presidents have been exposed as much as he was with individuals who constantly undermined his orders. No one was better at undermining President Lincoln than his General George McClellan who at every opportunity was insubordinate. The President plainly taught himself military tactics and started to literally take charge out on the field to command in order to execute battle plans the way he directed them. He in deed was going through the trials and errors of the ongoing saga of leadership development as a President in the midst of a brutal war. There are few men before or since Lincoln who have been in a position to live by the leadership theme of trials and errors.

If you would like more from Dr. Richard C. Baiz, D.B.A. on Personal and Leadership Development and his Leadership Institute click on the the link provided: http://www.leadershipinstituteofsuccess.com Dr. Baiz is a Doctorate in Business Administration. He is a College and Corporate Personal and Leadership Development Instructor and Coach. Dr. Baiz is also an expert in the field of Organizational Development and Management and gets his clients top notch successful results.

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