Effective Leaders Live Simply
So what happens when leaders don’t follow the same rules they expect their followers to? Tom Daschle’s fall from nomination as Obama’s secretary of Health and Human Services points out that their ability to lead eventually comes into question.
Juana Bordas highlights the importance of leaders being leaders in all aspects of their lives in her book SALSA, SOUL, AND SPIRIT in the section called “Live Simply So Others Can Simply Live”. She writes, “Because leaders in communities of color are expected to set an example for others, many purposely live in a way that does not create social and economic disparities.” She gives three examples of leaders who led by example.
The first is Bernie Valdez, a well-known community activist and civil rights advocate who lived in Denver. “Leadership as exemplified by Bernie Valdez was not having a big house or the trappings of wealth and influence. It was a lifelong commitment to live in your community, to serve your people, and to remain an ordinary person while accomplishing great things.”
The second example is Martin Luther King Jr. She quotes Andrew Young’s description of Dr. King and his wife’s lifestyles, “Martin and Coretta King lived in an old wooden framed house near Ebenezer Baptist Church. There was nothing fashionable about his neighborhood, it was all but a slum. But Martin viewed living modestly as part of his commitment to social justice.”
And her final example, “César Chávez, who grew up in the migrant camps of California, continued to live humbly throughout his life, never making more then $6000 a year. King and Chávez studied deeply the philosophy of Mahatma Gandhi, who set the standard for living as modestly as one’s followers did.”
She reminds us that, “Although these examples may seem absurd in our materialistic and profit-centered society, there are ethical and practical ways to accomplish a more equitable economic balance. A great economic disparity occurs when some people gobble up more than their share while others scarcely have enough to survive.”
Juana Bordas highlights the importance of leaders being leaders in all aspects of their lives in her book SALSA, SOUL, AND SPIRIT in the section called “Live Simply So Others Can Simply Live”. She writes, “Because leaders in communities of color are expected to set an example for others, many purposely live in a way that does not create social and economic disparities.” She gives three examples of leaders who led by example.
The first is Bernie Valdez, a well-known community activist and civil rights advocate who lived in Denver. “Leadership as exemplified by Bernie Valdez was not having a big house or the trappings of wealth and influence. It was a lifelong commitment to live in your community, to serve your people, and to remain an ordinary person while accomplishing great things.”
The second example is Martin Luther King Jr. She quotes Andrew Young’s description of Dr. King and his wife’s lifestyles, “Martin and Coretta King lived in an old wooden framed house near Ebenezer Baptist Church. There was nothing fashionable about his neighborhood, it was all but a slum. But Martin viewed living modestly as part of his commitment to social justice.”
And her final example, “César Chávez, who grew up in the migrant camps of California, continued to live humbly throughout his life, never making more then $6000 a year. King and Chávez studied deeply the philosophy of Mahatma Gandhi, who set the standard for living as modestly as one’s followers did.”
She reminds us that, “Although these examples may seem absurd in our materialistic and profit-centered society, there are ethical and practical ways to accomplish a more equitable economic balance. A great economic disparity occurs when some people gobble up more than their share while others scarcely have enough to survive.”
posted by Tom Jablonski at 8:49 PM
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