Quality Leadership

Each one of us occupies a “sphere of leadership.” It may be only one person outside ourself. It may be as vast as a nation or even worldwide. We all influence someone with our decisions, our attitudes, and our actions.

So what guidelines undergird our role as leader? What dictates our conscience?

There is a very sad, but telling, article in today’s New York Times about the Attorney General of Connecticut running for the Senate seat occupied by Christopher Dodd, who has chosen to retire. It seems Mr. Blumenthal has repeatedly voiced an enhanced military record, which includes active duty in Vietnam. It is something he states when addressing veteran’s groups around the state or gatherings with a patriotic theme. Yet the evidence points at such assertions as blatantly false.

This is not an individual with a dubious resume. So why did Mr. Blumenthal reinvent his past? (He says he is guilty of “misplaced words.”) Why does anyone choose to do so?

There was a very seedy lawyer in a small town in Alabama. (Yes, I realize there are many seedy lawyers in many small towns, and also large towns, in Alabama and elsewhere.) We will call him Charlie. His principal source of wealth came from marriage into a prosperous family. His work as a lawyer merely got him out of the house and from underfoot. He was a laughably ordinary attorney. However, he did utter one profound thing once, when the heavens opened and a glimmer of respectability pierced his thoughts: “If you think you can please everybody, you might as well resign from the human race.” It was probably not even original, but it was for him, profound. Contradictory (you had to know his “modus operandi”), but profound.

The “need to please” dominates our actions, our words. However, our decision concerning the “whom we wish to please and why” becomes the trap. A child’s first manipulations of the truth surround the need to please a parent. This need to please merely escalates with time. And with this passage of time the results of this need impacts a greater sphere.

Mr. Blumenthal wanted to please his audience in Norwalk in 2008, so he “served time in Vietnam.”

The most damning “need to please” of course surrounds ourself. Our jails are overrun with those who failed at curbing their personal appetites for some form of gratification. They are the ones whose need became so egregious as to force an arrest and trial.

But consider the area between the innocence of childhood and the gallows.

It has many names depending upon the path we choose. For the purpose of discussion, let’s call this area teaching, career politics, public service, ministry, or some other noble calling. Any one of which impacts the lives of countless others.

And while we are setting the stage, let’s populate the sidelines with lobbyists, populous groups with an agenda, soul-mates, finances, low self-esteem, news polls, the NRA, comfort zones, and with Charlie’s “modus operandi” – which translates “the way I like to handle things.”

Now, throw into the mix a gross abuse of Joseph Fletcher’s “situation ethics” and we have a mess called Working for the Good 2010.

To begin with, I believe most people enter public service or ministry or some noble calling with the highest of intentions. With Sarah Palin I think it has more to do with the need to be adored. Seriously!

Back to Joseph Fletcher.

Fletcher, an Episcopal theologian, gave us the term, “situation ethics” in his book of the same name back in the mid-sixties. It sought to explain decisions made based upon a given situation rather than a moral absolute. Paul Tillich codified the concept as “love is the absolute law.” But you knew that.

Enter a bright young soul who discovers an avenue to serve others in local government. The path of service was rough, but with determination and a real desire to make a difference, our candidate made progress toward their goal. As they increased their sphere of influence, campaigns became more and more dependent upon media coverage – that proved expensive. Donations also proved to be a challenge. Along comes a “special interest group.” You know the scenario, it has been played out in dozens of books and movies.

Situational compromise becomes more tolerable because the dream still has some validity. Eventually, however, even the dream becomes clouded and it is now a matter of sustaining a public lifestyle that an oversized ego demands.

One day our bright young soul, now older but far less wiser, finds they are without any ideals proposing a law that allows people to carry firearms into the airport. And to think I once admired Charlton Heston. They even got to Moses.

Think of the number of fallen leaders - parents, priests, teachers, ministers, elected officials, and yes, members of our Congress. Think of the lurking conflicts on the sidelines of their intended goals that proved to be too great to resist. For some, even the prayer meetings on C-Street were not enough to thwart their personal needs. More importantly, think of the number of people who were in their “sphere of influence.” This is the greater tragedy.

I propose each leader, no matter their sphere, resolve:

“I promise to keep a clean heart and a right spirit and to constantly question the reasons behind each decision I make. I promise that my work will always be about the people I serve and never about me and my needs.”