“Leadership is not magnetic
personality — that can just as well be a glib tongue. It is not 'making friends
and influencing people' — that is flattery. Leadership is lifting a person's
vision to high sights, the raising of a person's performance to a higher
standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations.” ―Peter
Drucker
When you look at leaders like Mahatma
Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr, Mother Teresa, Nelson Mandela, Lee Kuan Yew, Henry
Ford, John Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, Thomas Edison, Sam Walton, and Steve
Jobs, they are all visionary leaders who showed the right direction to the
world in their spheres. The world transformed from Stone Age to space age due
to the contribution of several visionary leaders. Human progress and prosperity
is not possible without visionary leaders.
Visionary
Leadership
Visionary leadership is the process of
creating an idea, building a team, communicating with them and inspiring them
with stories to convert ideas into realities. It transforms the lives of people
to make a difference to the societies. The
leaders’ vision comes from their convictions.
It comes from their passion. It
comes from their values. It comes from
their ethics and etiquette. Vision makes
things easier and clearer for others. It
clears the clutter and makes the path free from obstacles.
Visionary leadership is not
conventional leadership. It is different
and unique from normal leadership. The
primary focus of visionary leadership is to emphasize on passion and vision and
subsequently on mission followed by execution to achieve organizational goals
and objectives. It links from present to
future. Succinctly, visionary leadership
is all about looking into the future and predicting the future. It is all about seeing the invisible. It is being enthusiastic about uncertainty
and complexity.
Hallmarks
of Visionary Leaders
Walt Disney once remarked, “You can
dream, create, design, and build the most wonderful place in the world, but it
requires people to make the dream a reality.” Visionary leaders are farsighted
who always look at the implications and complications while making
decisions. They go by the road less
traveled. They don’t indulge in
continuous firefighting as it diverts their attention from their goals. They are clearly focused on their goals and
objectives. They constantly change their strategies, styles and approaches but
not their goals. They take more time in
fixing their goals. Once goals are fixed
they commit to them and work towards accomplishing them. They have gut feelings and follow intuition. They inspire others. They are attentive listeners. They facilitate teams successfully. They
mobilize people towards their dreams successfully. They have the ability to connect their dots
and charisma to connect with their people. They focus keenly on the journey to
reach their destination. They endeavor to be within the track so that they
don’t lose sight of their destination. They have vision and vigor and focus on
long-term results, not short-term setbacks.
They are highly focused on their goals. They lead from front. They inspire their people and take them
forward energetically. They are imaginative at heart. They have ideas and insights and are bold to
take their people forward successfully. They believe in themselves. They know
where they are going. They are
undeterred by shocks and setbacks. They are prepared to risk their lives for
the sake of their people. They are born optimists and radiate positive energy
and enthusiasm. They take the blame in case of failure and spread the fame in
case of success. They show visual
pictures to their followers to accomplish organizational goals and objectives.
Vision gives kick to the people. It moves the people forward with energy and
enthusiasm. Visionary leaders are path
makers and destiny makers. They combine emotions to convey and communicate
their goals. Above all, they are moral
leaders who walk their talk.
How
to Craft Your Vision Statement?
Vision statement must preferably be
below 100 words and in present tense to have effectiveness. It requires imaginative mind to craft
one. Here are some tools to craft a
better vision statement:
- Vision must spell out a clear and compelling picture so that there is a strong reason to pursue and persevere. It must be audacious and SMART where SMART is the acronym for specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and time bound.
- It should be simple and straight, and challenging and inspiring.
- It must convey company’s value system, culture, ethics and etiquette. It should never be a mere rhetoric but must be realistic.
- It must be challenging enough to enable the people to put in their energies and efforts aggressively.
- It must neither be too short nor too big. It must convey the ideals and ideas of the organization for which it stands and aspires to achieve.
Conclusion
Political visionary leaders such as
Theodore Roosevelt and Martin Luther King Jr have provided direction to America
when needed. Additionally, John F
Kennedy envisioned putting a man on the moon with his visionary
leadership. To conclude, there should
not be any gap between preaching and practicing to make vision meaningful and
realistic. Companies must mobilize their
people around a common cause by crafting better vision statements. The success
of any company depends on its right presentation of vision statement and
execution of mission statement and that is possible only through visionary
leadership.
"Leadership is the ability to
translate vision into reality." ―Warren G. Bennis
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