The real heart of leadership

#Case Study 1

source
He was a young, vibrant eunuch who had been captured in war and brought to serve in the palace of the king of Persia. Because he was diligent in the duties assigned to him, it was only a matter of time before he would rise to a position of favour and prominence in the palace. He became the king’s wine-bearer, a position that gave him direct access to power. He had the responsibility not only of serving wine to the king directly, but of tasting the wine to be sure that it was not poisoned. In a way, he was the custodian of the king’s life. His position and performance therefore afforded him a position of comfort enough to deaden his nostalgic feelings for his ruined homeland. This was Nehemiah’s situation until one day, a palace guard had come to announce to him the arrival of some visitors from home.

One of his siblings, Hanani and some of his friends, obviously having heard about the glory of one of their own in foreign territory, decided to escape from the desolation of Jerusalem and pay him a visit. Perhaps they too could get a taste of the better life. When they stood face-to-face with Nehemiah, his first question to them was about the happenings back home. In a sympathy-laden voice, they replied, “The survivors left from the captivity are there in great distress and reproach. The wall of Jerusalem is also broken down and its gates are burned with fire”.

From that moment, Nehemiah lost his peace. He did not bother to ask any further questions. In fact, the visitors standing before him might just as well be figurines as his mind processed the words, “survivors…great distress…reproach…walls broken down…burnt with fire” Suddenly, the tears began to flow. For many days, he was inconsolable. He went into a protracted period of fasting and prayers and assumed responsibility before God for the national dysfunctionality that brought that calamity on the citizens. But he did not stop there. He immediately chose to remedy the situation. He thereafter took steps that eventually saw him journeying to Jerusalem. He rallied a work force from among the very people in the city who had earlier been helpless and forlorn. In fifty-two days, the walls were rebuilt and the municipal dignity restored.

In the story above, sympathy knew the problem, lived with it and could accurately report it. But compassion did something about it. By virtue of what he did, a captive, who would otherwise have been forgotten by virtue of the fact that he was in foreign territory, wrote himself into national history and became the poster boy of transformational leadership in the Holy Bible. The book of Nehemiah remains a veritable handbook for any leader who desires to build a sustainable organization.

#Case study 2

She was a widow who probably would have remarried but for the disadvantage of age or the responsibility of nurturing the only fruit of her union with her deceased husband. But now, her entire world has crumbled. The son who had grown to become a fine young man lay cold in the grip of death in a coffin, about to be buried. It is not the easiest of feelings when what you have come to regard as your only hope suddenly vanishes before your eyes. The tears flowed ceaselessly as her pupils dilated. The sympathetic crowd ululated. Yet, with her son in that casket, her hope was castrated. As the funeral procession made to exit the city gate on their way to the cemetery, they met another procession entering the city. When the Rabbi who was leading the incoming procession saw the woman and her forlorn condition, compassion welled up inside Him. Then He spoke the word of hope that no one had been able to speak because they were all caught up in the grind of sorrow-induced sympathy characteristic of the communal reaction to grief, “Stop weeping!”. But in the character of compassion, He went further to touch the coffin and he called the young man back to life!

Compassionate leadership sees past the moral or spiritual inadequacies or shortcomings of the recipient and focuses on the way out of the problem. Then it begins to engage the recipient in a process of interrogation that seeks to ensure that the misfortune is neither repeated nor perpetuated. To successfully do this, the recipient is engaged in the resolution process. This brings to fore the other side of compassion. Beyond merely reaching out to solve a problem, where necessary, compassion appeals to the sense of responsibility of its object.

John 3:16 anchors the Christian gospel of salvation. Compassion made God reach out to mankind through the giving of His only begotten Son to save man from the predictable quagmire that a sinful existence had led him to. However, to appropriate the benefits of this gesture, man must exercise responsibility by deliberately accepting the offer of salvation.

Compassion is literally powerless beyond a recipient’s willingness to receive its offer of a solution. This is because very many people who mouth a desire for a change in their circumstance actually have no such intention. They are content with the cycle of whining that only attracts attention and evokes pity from others; an act that only translates to short-lived cycles of benevolence. Have you ever been approached for financial help by a well-dressed person who communicates his ‘predicament’ in flawless English? On some occasions when this has happened to me, after helping out financially in the way that I could, I have been moved to go as far as offering such persons the opportunity of employment. And that is when they take off and never return! Compassion does not force responsibility by the imposition of a response. When it has acted its own part, it commands responsibility – or sometimes rejection – from the recipient.

Genuine compassionate leadership does not stop at contributing significant value to the lives of followers but seeks to empower their capacity for contribution and value creation both for themselves and for others.

Like a divine dynamo, compassion generates the power for working miracles. Motivated by compassion, a leader is capable of achieving things hitherto considered impossible. This is because compassion may be informed by status quo, but it is not instructed or limited by it. In one breath, compassion feels the emotions connected with the problem but engages it with the thinking cap of the desired solution.

The core concern of compassionate leadership therefore is making life better for all. To achieve this, a compassionate leader sometimes appears tough to the followers because he loves them too much to let them remain as they are. In the short run, this may sometimes make him unpopular. This happens because, in addressing their status quo, he literally ‘goads’ the followers into an ideal that challenges their paradigms and their complacency.

Compassionate leaders are idealists. It follows therefore that idealism is driven by compassion. Idealism in turn drives advocacy. No one can effectively create a future without a patent discontent with the present… continued.
Remember, the sky is not your limit, God is!