Leadership – Tim, John & Kenny

Yesterday millions of Americans voted in midterm congressional elections. We’ve seen and heard President Biden and Donald Trump engaged in a divisive campaign… immigration, inflation, abortion, crime…

World leaders and delegates from nearly 200 countries are at the COP27 climate summit in Egypt, discussing climate change…

We’ve recently watched the elections in Brazil, constantly seen the national leaders of Ukraine and Russia… and here in the UK we have our third prime minister this year.

International leaders in the spotlight…

I went on many school leadership courses. One of my heroes was the educator Tim Brighouse – originally from Lowestoft. His advice for school leaders? ‘You need unwarranted optimism, an endless wealth of intellectual curiosity, to regard crisis the norm and complexity as fun, a complete absence of paranoia or self-pity.’

In our church we’re thinking about leadership; we’ve recently invited a new pastor to join us. I’ve often reflected on church leadership… Leadership lessons from Moses, Joshua, Gideon, David, Elijah… Jesus, the servant leader, washing his disciples’ feet…

American church-leader and author John Maxwell said: ‘A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way and shows the way.’

I enjoy Kenny Rogers’ wisdom on leadership in ‘The Gambler’:

You got to know when to hold ’em
Know when to fold ’em
Know when to walk away
And know when to run…

Good leadership is about having the wisdom to act in the right way, at the right time… taking others with you.

Yesterday… close to home I met a muntjac deer – on the pavement, five metres away… I looked at him, he looked at me and sauntered off… In three significant phone calls, friends told me about diabetes tests, grand-daughter’s new boyfriend, a close family member’s dementia, breast cancer, imminent heart surgery, grand-daughter’s baptism, settling into a new house…

Grand thoughts and high ideals of good leadership are put into perspective; I’m left musing on Kenny’s words:

Cause every hand’s a winner
And every hand’s a loser…