Modern Leadership

Melanie Suzanne Wilson, unfiltered.

Modern leadership has changed dramatically from a generation ago. This is due to trends in the workforce, and also from new ideological ideas such as empowerment.

Leadership is not about enforcing people to obey mindless commands. Professionalism is not about the distant impersonal small talk.

Real leadership inspires people to achieve goals. Many people feel more comfortable achieving a goal they believe in, for people they believe in.

Once upon a time, I believed professionalism required me to be as distant as possible. Don't tell people what's really going on in life. That would be too much information. Don't let flaws show through. It would bring you down.

Something changed. I met friends who work hard at what they do, but are still completely honest with each other. There were friends who shared everything. The professional and unprofessional, light and serious, successes and failures.

We actually worked better that way. Take away the fear of failure, and people get more creative. Results are more original and interesting. Innovations are made.

My open minded friends don't always get it right. Some of our efforts do flop. But we pick ourselves back up again. And then something greater happens next.

That's leadership. Seeing what's possible, and pushing to what people thought couldn't be done.