[chapter-delegates] On Leadership

Mon Jan 31 20:16:43 PST 2005

Veni,
I agree with Mike Todd. We have a great opportunity to begin a true
discussion of a vision of ISOC that we can all rally around. You have earned
the respect of many people and I believe that your last email has to be one
of the finest emails I have ever read on this list. It has inspired me to
think and has challenged me to take action in my local chapter for we suffer
from some of the same things you have pointed out in earnest. 

I appreciate and wholeheartedly support your invitation to share our dreams
and to place our ideas as to the kind of organization that we wish to build
in order to earn the respect of the newly emerging world internet community.
I wish to add that we need to share some ideas or establish common ground on
the issue of leadership itself. I have pulled these 10 characteristics
together from the Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership based on a
leadership model which defines the primary function of leaders is to serve
others in the pursuit of the dreams they share in common. Thus the term
servant leadership is used in this excerpt. After reading it last night, I
thought of you and wanted to share it with everyone as we seek to raise our
level of awareness of the type of leadership we need to foment in our
countries through this organization. 

These ten characteristics include:

1. Listening:  Leaders have traditionally been valued for their
communication and decision-making skills.  Although these are also important
skills for the servant-leader, they need to be reinforced by a deep
commitment to listening intently to others.  The servant-leader seeks to
identify the will of a group and helps to clarify that will.  He or she
listens receptively to what is being said and unsaid.  Listening also
encompasses getting in touch with one's own inner voice.  Listening, coupled
with periods of reflection, are essential to the growth and well-being of
the servant-leader. 

2. Empathy:  The servant-leader strives to understand and empathize with
others.  People need to be accepted and recognized for their special and
unique spirits.  One assumes the good intentions of co-workers and
colleagues and does not reject them as people, even when one may be forced
to refuse to accept certain behaviors or performance.  The most successful
servant-leaders are those who have become skilled empathetic listeners. 

3. Healing:  The healing of relationships is a powerful force for
transformation and integration.  One of the great strengths of
servant-leadership is the potential for healing one's self and one's
relationship to others.  Many people have broken spirits and have suffered
from a variety of emotional hurts.  Although this is a part of being human,
servant-leaders recognize that they have an opportunity to help make whole
those with whom they come in contact.  In his essay, The Servant as Leader,
Greenleaf writes, "There is something subtle communicated to one who is
being served and led if, implicit in the compact between servant-leader and
led, is the understanding that the search for wholeness is something they
share." 

4. Awareness:  General awareness, and especially self-awareness, strengthens
the servant-leader.  Awareness helps one in understanding issues involving
ethics, power and values.  It lends itself to being able to view most
situations from a more integrated, holistic position.  As Greenleaf
observed:  "Awareness is not a giver of solace--it is just the opposite.  It
is a disturber and an awakener.  Able leaders are usually sharply awake and
reasonably disturbed.  They are not seekers after solace.  They have their
own inner serenity." 

5. Persuasion:  Another characteristic of servant-leaders is a reliance on
persuasion, rather than on one's positional authority, in making decisions
within an organization.  The servant-leader seeks to convince others, rather
than coerce compliance.  This particular element offers one of the clearest
distinctions between the traditional authoritarian model and that of
servant-leadership.  The servant-leader is effective at building consensus
within groups.  This emphasis on persuasion over coercion finds its  roots
in the beliefs of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers)--the
denominational body to which Robert Greenleaf belonged. 

6. Conceptualization:  Servant-leaders seek to nurture their abilities to
dream great dreams.  The ability to look at a problem or an organization
from a conceptualizing perspective means that one must think beyond
day-to-day realities.  For many leaders, this is a characteristic that
requires discipline and practice.  The traditional leader is consumed by the
need to achieve short-term operational goals.  The leader who wishes to also
be a servant-leader must stretch his or her thinking to encompass
broader-based conceptual thinking.  Within organizations, conceptualization
is, by its very nature, the proper role of boards of trustees or directors. 
Unfortunately, boards can sometimes become involved in the day-to-day
operations--something that should always be discouraged--and, thus, fail to
provide the visionary concept for an institution.  Trustees need to be
mostly conceptual in their orientation, staffs need to be mostly operational
in their perspective, and the most effective executive leaders probably need
to develop both perspectives within themselves.  Servant-leaders are called
to seek a delicate balance between conceptual thinking and a day-to-day
operational approach. 

7. Foresight:  Closely related to conceptualization, the ability to foresee
the likely outcome of a situation is hard to define, but easier to
identify.  One knows foresight when one experiences it.  Foresight is a
characteristic that enables the servant-leader to understand the lessons
from the past, the realities of the present, and the likely consequence of a
decision for the future.  It is also deeply rooted within the intuitive
mind.  Foresight remains a largely unexplored area in leadership studies,
but one most deserving of careful attention. 

8. Stewardship:  Peter Block (author of Stewardship and The Empowered
Manager) has defined stewardship as "holding something in trust for
another."  Robert Greenleaf's view of all institutions was one in which
CEO's, staffs, and trustees all played significant roles in holding their
institutions in trust for the greater good of society.  Servant-leadership,
like stewardship, assumes first and foremost a commitment to serving the
needs of others.  It also emphasizes the use of openness and persuasion,
rather than control. 

9. Commitment to the growth of people:  Servant-leaders believe that people
have an intrinsic value beyond their tangible contributions as workers.  As
such, the servant-leader is deeply committed to the growth of each and every
individual within his or her organization.  The servant-leader recognizes
the tremendous responsibility to do everything in his or her power to
nurture the personal and professional growth of employees and colleagues. 
In practice, this can include (but is not limited to) concrete actions such
as making funds available for personal and professional development, taking
a personal interest in the ideas and suggestions from everyone, encouraging
worker involvement in decision-making, and actively assisting laid-off
employees to find other positions. 

10. Building community:  The servant-leader senses that much has been lost
in recent human history as a result of the shift from local communities to
large institutions as the primary shaper of human lives.  This awareness
causes the servant-leader to seek to identify some means for building
community among those who work within a given institution. 
Servant-leadership suggests that true community can be created among those
who work in businesses and other institutions. Greenleaf said, "All that is
needed to rebuild community as a viable life form for large numbers of
people is for enough servant-leaders to show the way, not by mass movements,
but by each servant-leader demonstrating his or her unlimited liability for
a quite specific community-related group." 

 Excerpted from Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership

Warmest regards,
Ramon Morales
Internet Society of Puerto Rico

________________________________________
From: Mike Todd [mailto:MikeTodd at miketodd.com] 
Sent: Monday, January 31, 2005 3:58 AM
To: veni markovski; Rosa Delgado; chapter-delegates at lists.isoc.org
Subject: Re: [chapter-delegates] FW: Nomination of Veni Markowski

Veni,

There is no requirement for a "second" on your nomination but I offer it,
freely.

You will be getting a lot of advice and, along with you, I am looking
forward to this being a good place to start some serious discussion of the
future of the Internet Society and the Chapters.

Marty Burack, as usual, made some very good points.  First, we need to
develop and agree on what the Internet Society is and what it does and what
it can or should do.  The reason I say "develop" is that many people feel
that the stated objectives and goals of the Internet Society are too broad
to be used to determine if it is doing the job and how well.  I think we
ought to be able to help with that and also with making sure that the
Internet Society becomes more well known around the 'net.

Mike Todd
President, Internet Society Los Angeles Chapter - www.ISOC-LA.org

----- Original Message ----- 
From: veni markovski 
To: Rosa Delgado ; chapter-delegates at lists.isoc.org 
Sent: Sunday, January 30, 2005 12:30 PM
Subject: RE: [chapter-delegates] FW: Nomination of Veni Markowski

Rosa, 
I thought you have realized that my nomination has been submitted already -
by Ramon. And I've accepted it. And yes, I will run.

Thanks for the nice words and the support!

best,
veni

At 21:10 30-01-2005 +0100, Rosa Delgado wrote:

Veni,

I am not surprise with the support you are getting from chapters, I think
you deserve it. 

So, please with no hesitation someone should summit Veni's nomination to the
web site https://www.isoc.org/isoc/general/trustees/bot-nom.php     

Regs/Rosa

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