Old concepts of individual, top-down, imposed leadership are giving way to new concepts of shared, bottom-up, empowering leadership. Understanding the possibility and need for this new type of leadership
requires differentiating between authority, leadership and power. Authority is
vested in the decisions made by elected governors, while power is the ability
of the broader community to implement those decisions.
Leadership, then, is the ability to cultivate the community's power to take individual and collective initiatives through inspiration, accompaniment and encouragement. Anyone can do this, and specific people can also be named to institutions whose purpose is to ensure that this empowerment occurs on a large enough scale to free the people's potential in service to the whole.
When innovative initiatives give fruit and produce positive learning experiences, the authority can then use the lessons learned from that experience to guide others in a similar direction, which in turn requires more leadership to release new powers and generate new lessons learned, in an ongoing collective learning cycle of consultation, planning, action and reflection.
Leadership, then, is the ability to cultivate the community's power to take individual and collective initiatives through inspiration, accompaniment and encouragement. Anyone can do this, and specific people can also be named to institutions whose purpose is to ensure that this empowerment occurs on a large enough scale to free the people's potential in service to the whole.
When innovative initiatives give fruit and produce positive learning experiences, the authority can then use the lessons learned from that experience to guide others in a similar direction, which in turn requires more leadership to release new powers and generate new lessons learned, in an ongoing collective learning cycle of consultation, planning, action and reflection.
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