Who will rule the World (or at least part of it)?
Are we really any more civilised in the 21st Century than we were in the first? What do you think?
As we approach the US Presidential elections next month it is a time to reflect on leadership, particularly from a global perspective. In the US alone there are 2 million prisoners incarcerated, which is 25% of the world’s prison population, and this has risen from 300,000 inmates in 1972 to 2.3 million in 2009 and 7.2 million adults are in correctional supervision (probation, parole, jail).
According to the website ‘Foreign Policy’ (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/02/22/planet_war) in February 2010 there were 33 conflicts raging around the world, and it’s often innocent civilians who suffer the most, as we witness nightly on television news. In 2008, for example, $1200 billion was spent on military expenditures and only $60 billion invested towards development assistance.
This last point also echo’s William Glasser’s concern about the human addiction to power.
“Human beings have a need no other living creatures share, and if we don’t learn to deal with that need, we’ll become extinct: our need for power. If we don’t learn how to deal with our need for power, we’re not ever going to have a mentally healthy society.”
Leaders need to demonstrate that these tragedies are not to be tolerated. This intolerance is threatening our planet as a whole and all its life forms including human life itself.
The need for a greater ‘connectivity’ between nations and individuals is needed. Could spirituality produce better organisations and thus benefit society as a whole? My approach to the subject of leadership and spirituality is not from a religious standpoint; although for many, religious faith plays a significant role being, for them, where spirituality lies. My position on spirituality is more from a sense of connectivity, a relationship, such as what James Lovelock calls ‘Gaia’, a metaphor for the living earth, an ecological relationship.
A spiritual leadership approach asks fundamentally different questions about what it means to be human, what we really mean by growth, and what values and power distributions are needed to enhance both organisations and society as a whole.
As a play on words I have used the following as a narrative metaphor with groups on discussions on leadership. It is meant as a dialogue comparing the competing images of the future concerning business and the future.
CEO
Leadership
Growth
This is the current CEO mantra. But could it be:
CEO
Courageously Engaging Others
Leading to
LEADERSHIP
Let Employees Adapt Developments that are Ethically Responsible Sustaining Hope Inspiration and Purpose
Leading to
GROWTH
Greed Reduction therefore Opportunities are Widened which is Triumphing Humanity
This is taken from an article I wrote some time ago called ‘Leadership and Spirituality’. The full article can be found on this website at:
/publications-articles/category/leadership?currentPage=4