Each Friday I will share a quote I appreciate. It might be long or short. It might be funny or thought provoking.
Leaders are men and women who can influence a group of people toward a common goal. Their leverage comes from their ability to envision, communicate, and embody a better future. They see something wrong and they want to change it. Yet for a group to be motivated they must come to some level of disillusionment with the status quo; they need motivation to change. The difficulty for those of us who are called into leadership in this era, in a society of spectacle riddled with passive spectatorship and intermittent distraction, is made increasingly difficult.
The society of the spectacle creates passivity among its citizens, a reluctance to initiate, to lead. Instead we are encouraged to view, to consume. We fear committing, worrying that by doing so we will reduce our freedom, cut ourselves off from the myriad of choices that constantly entice us.
– Mark Sayers, Facing Leviathan: Leadership, Influence, and Creating in a Cultural Storm, Pages 59-60