Organizations need more people with leadership skills than you think

I would like to take issue with a point made in Why do we persist in trying to turn ourselves (and other people) into what we and they plainly are not?

The writer believes that only one or two leaders are needed to work with a very large number (tens or hundreds) of people. The following are counter-examples and counter-arguments.

• A committee typically has between 5-10 members. It needs a leader to function effectively.
• When an emergency, such as fire, earthquake or serious equipment malfunction occurs, there is not always time to bring the leader (assuming that the leader is not already busy putting out a fire elsewhere). At least one of the people dealing with the emergency needs to have leadership skills and be able to organize his colleagues as necessary to deal with the emergency.
• People with leadership skills have also better team membership skills. They would support the current endeavor’s leader and make him more effective.
• It is easier to restructure and expand the organization if external circumstances so require, if it already has high percentage of people with leadership skills.
• People with genuine leadership skills would not indulge in petty politicizing to the detriment of themselves and their fellows.

Author: Omer Zak

I am deaf since birth. I played with big computers which eat punched cards and spew out printouts since age 12. Ever since they became available, I work and play with desktop size computers which eat keyboard keypresses and spew out display pixels. Among other things, I developed software which helped the deaf in Israel use the telephone network, by means of home computers equipped with modems. Several years later, I developed Hebrew localizations for some cellular phones, which helped the deaf in Israel utilize the cellular phone networks. I am interested in entrepreneurship, Science Fiction and making the world more accessible to people with disabilities. View all posts by Omer Zak