The great leaders treat people in ways that they feel very important. The leaders make them feel they are very talented and capable. They make the people feel wanted and needed.
The people think that these leaders can lead them to great places.
When I was young I met somebody whom I would really admire. I knew that he was the man who can lead me to great places. I believed in him. With him I felt very important. While I knew that he was one of the greatest leaders, he didn't make me look inferior. I remember the first time we met in his great office that looked like a palace he got off from behind his desk, moved towards me and shook my hand.
He made me so much comfortable in his presence that everybody around him gave me the same respect that he did. There were a dozen of secretaries, assistants, and advisers around him. There were half a dozen of telephones on his desk. The telephone rang a few times. He instructed his secretary to stop connecting them as he had a very important meeting and he did not want to be disturbed unless the telephone was very important. For a moment I wondered whether the meeting was with me or somebody else. If it was with me I was not an important person at all. I was just a student.
But to him I was a person of that position that the telephones should not have been connected to until our meeting was over. A person is as important as you think he is. Never mind his position, his job, and his status, his standing in the society, his money, and his expertise. If what the person is, is not important to you then he is not important. If what the person has, is important to you then the person is important.
I was in that spacious office. The whole power of the country was placed in that office. He was the man who ruled the King. Yet as a student I was important to him. None of my professors, teachers and friends ever had made me feel that important in my life. Maybe there were four people who made me feel important: My two sisters, especially the older. She wanted me to be what she could not. She respected me the way she wanted to respect the person who was extremely important to her. She respected me the way she wished to respect the person she wanted to be. My younger sister saw me as the most handsome man around. She made sure that I looked the most handsome man among my peers by washing my clothes, pressing them, and helping me in choosing them. My mother adored me. I was the sense of pride for my father. And I always achieved more than my father wanted. Yet, these were my family members. Allen was the most powerful man in the country.
With his original and genuine smile and his full attention to me, Allen started talking to me, encouraging me to become comfortable and at ease. He knew that his office was the environment of power and politics.
A kid of my age could have easily been overwhelmed and disorientated. He listened to me carefully. This was not like when I talked to my professors. They usually wanted to do other things at the time that I was talking to them. Even when they talked to me, they used to do something else at the same time. This was different. He was talking to me and only to me. He was doing what any leader could have done at his best. Fascinating me, taking me into his trust. When I explained what I wanted he picked up the telephone and called a minister immediately, instructing him to do what I wanted him to do.
There I was witnessing power in action, when and where the power was understood, played and administered skilfully. I was the witness in making history, making decisions that made a difference in the fate of nation and the country. And I was watching a man closely who had the power and the ability to make things happen the way he wanted.
When I was there, I felt that I am somebody, a very special somebody. It came to my attention that moment that other people could not understood my importance, this man who was important himself was capable of understanding my importance or my potential for importance.
I knew that people who are important know that other people are important or have the potential for being important. Allen has learnt in his life that everybody has a special place in the society.
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Leadership skills, how to formulate a vision? - 3 CDs
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Formulate a compelling vision for your company
Motivate all your employees and managers to mobilise all their resources for accomplishing the vision
Increase the performance of your organisation
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