A Lesson from the Presidential Campaign
I recently came across an
online article from the New York Times about the presidential political campaign of Sen. Barack Obama. The article quotes several Democrats voicing concerns about Obama's "hope and change" approach to the campaign thus far:
Mr. Obama has run for the last 18 months as the candidate of hope. Yet party leaders--while enthusiastic about Mr. Obama and his state-by-state campaign operations--say he must do more to convince the many undecided Democrats and independents that he would address their financial anxieties rather than run, by and large, as an agent of change--given that change, they note, is not an issue.
"I particularly hope he strengthens his economic message --even Senator Obama can speak more clearly and specifically about the kitchen-table, bread-and-butter issues like high energy costs," said Gov. Ted Strickland of Ohio. "It's fine to tell people about hope and change, but you have to have plenty of concrete, pragmatic ideas that bring hope and change to life."
Or, in the blunter words of Gov. Phil Bredesen, Democrat of Tennessee: "Instead of giving big speeches at big stadiums, he needs to give straight-up 10-word answers to people at Wal-Mart about how he would improve their lives."
This blog post isn't about presidential politics, so rest easy on that score. But it occurred to me that these observations are as germane to the issue of leadership in the area of medical transcription networking and advocacy as they are to the presidential campaign. As I've stated in a previous post, it's my belief that the vast majority of MTs fall into the "Wal-Mart crowd"--a demographic to which I'm perfectly happy to belong. It is also, in my opinion, a group whose interests need to be better represented in the realm of MT advocacy. But in order to effectively engage these folks, leaders must heed the advice offered by Governors Strickland and Bredesen.
Certainly it's worth noting that there's a big difference between giving "10-word answers" about how to improve people's lives and actually improving their lives. (These comments did come from a political campaign, after all!) Still (with apologies to Otto von Bismarck), "Leadership is the art of the possible." A key facet of leadership, in my view, is the ability to succinctly articulate what is possible in a way that motivates others to pursue that possibility with passion and hope. In my opinion, the ability to communicate clearly is the most important difference between a technically competent manager and a truly effective leader. And clear communication means getting to the point and making the point relevant to the listener.
Of course, pithy sound bites don't mean much unless we communicatees are convinced that the communicators are espousing a vision we actually believe in AND that's actually doable; we also want to know that those in leadership have our best interests at heart. I don't believe we can overemphasize the importance of these crucial factors. Talking about a big dream is important, no question, but it needs to be OUR dream. The older I get the more I come to believe that true leadership is less about telling folks what their dream ought to be and more about helping them discover their own dream, and then identify the interim practical steps that must be taken in order to make that dream come true. Not only that, but we need to believe that leadership is willing to go to the mat for us on issues that WE--not they--feel are of critical importance.
In workplace advocacy-as in politics-rhetoric only goes so far before folks want to know "Where's the beef?" We want leaders who will give us credit for enough intelligence and common sense to know what issues WE believe are the most important, and be willing to aggressively represent OUR interests. Yes, "we the people" may get it wrong sometimes, but more often than not we'll get it right.