EDITORIAL

Leadership Categories

by Ronquillo C. Tolentino

I still relish the days when I was active with the Jaycee movement. Jayceeism is a leadership organization for young people. Starting as a charter member at the age of 30 in 1973, I became chapter secretary, chapter president, editor-in-chief of the Aklan Jaycees’ first publication. Our concern, regional development officer for Western Visayas secretary-general for Western Visayas and finally as Philippine Jaycees parliamentarian for the Visayas.

From some of my lectures, the copies of which were mostly destroyed by typhoon "Frank" on June 21, 2008, I managed to save a few.　I remember to have lectured on leadership when in 1979 the Leadership Development Commission headed by Atty. Santiago Regalado and myself as chair of the Membership and Extension Commission prepared some lectures on leadership.

This topic, "The leader that you are" may not be original as I found so many notes on leadership in my files but this one is a simple understanding of leadership categories which may be essential reading for our young leaders, especially young men and women who were elected in the May 10, 2010 local elections.

The leader that you are, please find out whether you are within the following categories, to wit:

A leader that fights change. He struggles to maintain the status quo, to defend what is, to oppose the new. He strives to repeat the past.

A leader that is defensive. He guards against attack of any kind. He wants not to be questioned or challenged. He never moves forward or sticks his neck out.

A leader who is "fixed" or inflexible. He takes a position.. refuses to move. He will not bend.　 He is incapable of compromise.

A leader without team spirit. He wants to "do it by himself". He wants no suggestions, no critism, no help of any kind. Even a helper is a threat to him.

A leader who is disorganized. He jumps irrationally from job to job and is fragmented, wasted. He begins a job at the middle, work on two jobs at the same time. Does unimportant work first.

A leader who flies into rages. Fails to exercise emotional control. He rants and raves and insults his subordinates. He intimidates his superiors. He is himself upset and unproductive.

A leader with a personal problems. He drinks to excess, he has a "family problem,"　has developed a neurosis, has come up with a secret problem about which he will say nothing.

A leader who is fat and lazy. He has "arrived." He is secure confident of his corporation and its complete willingness to "carry him" for the rest of time.

A leader who won’t take a risk. To enter into competition of any kind, to suggest a new product, a new system.. those actions present hazards too great to bear.

A leader without imagination. He cannot or will not think creatively.He refuses to reach out and stretch his mind to the broad horizons.

A leader who passes the buck. Whether it’s a minor mistake or a colossal catastrophe, he either can’t or won’t accept responsibility or even casual involvement in it.

A leader who has poor understanding of people. He lacks the ability to listen and to hear the people with whom he works. He can’t be sympathetic. . . or kind and, therefore, is rarely helpful.

Mostly of the military and police officers or members who aspired for elective positions in the May 10, 2010 national and local elections went down in defeat.　 From Danny Lim to Quirubin in the senate race to the congressional and local government positions in the provinces, and municipalities, it would seem that the attractions that military and police officers or members for local and national elective positions have faded unlike Biazon, Gringo Honasan and Trillanes. /MP