Tag: postaday2011

Rugby on 9/11

If you enjoy Rugby Union it’s a feast right now. There’s always something less tense about watching two teams other than your own battle it and the England vs Argentina and South Africa vs Wales games had plenty of tension with a result that any one-eyed ABs supporter could live with. Although you’d have to say surely that penalty goal was in?! Lots of the action was happening while American was remembering the murder of its people on September 2001 in New York and Washington DC. Was I the only one that realised I was much more interested in the Rugby than in remembering 9/11? I guess 9/11 will go (and perhaps already has gone) down in history as one of those dates like Friday 13 where we remember bad things happen and to be cautious about.

On Friday 13 October 1307  French King Phillipe IV conspiring with Pope Clement V commenced the arrest of the Knights Templar. Most of their alleged crimes were related to the sort of claptrap we now view as laughable such as denying religion, idolising false gods (how do you choose which one is false!?) etc. As you can imagine, many were killed including being burned at the stake for (as the arrest warrants asserted) causing displeasure to God (not a false one I presume). There’s no universal agreement that this is the cause of our fear of Black Friday, but it’s a good start for thinking about 9/11 in a weekend consumed by that (false?) god of Aotearoa, Rugby.

A man called Rick Perry  who is the governor of Texas would like to be the next president of our most powerful country, USA. He has expressed skepticism about evolution as scientifically valid and claimed that the two “theories”  – evolution and creationism were taught in Texas. Turns out he was wrong on the teaching part as it’s been ruled unconstitutional to teach a religion, which is what creationism is part of, in school. He has used phrases like “it’s only a theory” and “there are gaps” to somehow put down what is, frankly, beyond any doubt. As far as scientific theories go, the court will rule beyond any doubt that it’s true.

The events of 9/11 were obscene and as I’ve blogged here in the past, murder. It is inescapable that those who put this together and executed the plan used religion as some sort of twisted justification either to themselves, their families and the global population.  Included in this justification was a “belief” that there would be a reward in the metaphysical world for their actions. Communities far and wide including the Muslim world were and are repulsed by this. As intelligent beings we are entitled to a belief. But that belief must be based on credible and justifiable propositions, facts and reasoning. As a potential leader of the USA Rick Perry shows the same dark-ages belief system as those who controlled the events of 13 October 1307 and 11 September 2001. No, Rick Perry isn’t burning anyone at the stake (although his state has executed 473 of the 1266 people executed in the US since 1976), or flying plane loads of innocent passengers to a terrifying death.

My gig in leadership is authenticity. Everyone knows that. Being authentic in leadership means being real. Being yourself. It also means being real and true. Hanging on to absurd, middle-aged and demonstrably false “beliefs” when aspiring to the highest leadership in this world is dangerous role-modelling at its worst. There’s always going to be crackpots who say, deny the Holocaust, but our most powerful, would be “world’s policeman” shouldn’t be anywhere near this. Even being in the argument as he must inevitably be provokes the worst in those who are denied or have limited access to science. He has no excuse.

We know Rugby is our false god. That’s okay. We’ll be gutted if we don’t win the World Cup. But we’ll survive and no-one will (I hope!) get hurt or suffer irrational consequences for enjoying their false-god religion. In fact, come to think of it, we should encourage everyone to support a false god like Rugby. It’s a heck of a lot safer than the true one!

Go the ABs!

Stephen

Two days of leadership

In many backward countries there are military leaders who are also political leaders. It usually arises because of  view that “managing” a country can only be done though force, micro-managing events and the public necessarily involving a loss of freedom, both physical and emotional.

We’re pretty fortunate in New Zealand to be a democracy with a reasonable amount of freedom. I can write pretty well anything I wish to express a view here on this blog, without interference. I felt uneasy when it was announced that the new governor-general was to be a man who was a public servant heading the spy agency and very recently had headed the defence force. Part of that was his reputation for being a micro-manager which didn’t inspire the sort of leadership that we might expect from our head of state’s representative. He said on his first day in the job that he was looking forward to getting to know New Zealanders and it’s been reported that he will bring an informal style to the role.

On day two he’s back to where he was – responding with indignation that anyone should question the integrity of the defence force. This followed Nicky Hagar’s book making allegations about the defence’s actual role in Afghanistan and Iraq. The rights or wrongs of whatever Hagar says is not relevant to Mataparae’s reaction. What I think is most concerning is that our supposedly independent governor-general has breached that impartiality almost immediately. What if a government is to be sworn in that has a commitment to dismantling parts of the defence force? Would Mr Mataparae have a view on that, that he would similarly feel the need to share?  On current form, you would have to say he would, which would be totally inappropriate as his comments now are.

In leadership development we often talk about a leader’s inability to obtain appropriate feedback at the most senior levels from those around them. Having watched the sycophancy displayed by those that support politicians and senior civil servants, I can imagine no-one said anything. And being a micro-manager, he wouldn’t have welcomed such feedback. I hope that those who are there to support our new GG will have the courage to help the man in what is obviously a difficult leadership step up for him.

The defence force can speak for itself and the head of state’s representative, whatever his intimate knowledge, has no role in launching into the topic. Count to ten next time! You’ve got 4 years and 363 days to go.

Stephen

Tintin

On the flight to Wellington last week I engaged in a conversation with someone working on the Tintin movies. Turns out I knew more about Tintin than she did, which isn’t surprising as Tintin has been part of my life for as long as I can remember. Tintin’s creator Herge, was an insightful and thorough man.

Tintin is responsive, engaging, determined, has vision, loves life and is affronted by evil. He’s a risk taker too and manages up to his much more senior friend Captain Haddock and his policeman friends Thompson and Thomson.

The stories are full of psychopaths – first mate Allan and other drug dealers, slave runners and meglamaniacs who will start a war for commercial profit.

These stories span 1930s to early 1980s and the storylines are still relevant today.

I’m not blogging about Tintin for a leadership reason particularly, but I can’t help but see that there’s lots of what I deal with today in those books I have enjoyed for over 40 years. Maybe that’s not a coincidence!

If you’ve got children you could do a lot worse than to introduce them to Tintin for the art, the stories, the culture and the learnings about the human condition.

I usually avoid the question “who is your most admired leader?” on the basis that this can only lead to a discussion on heroes in leadership which is by and large irrelevant to leaders here and now. But I might go for Tintin next time!

Stephen

Ridiculous leadership

Pastor Jack Edward from the Shema Evangelism Ministry in Papua New Guinea along with a group of fellow church ministers requested that the then acting prime minister Sam Abal approve a new public holiday to be known as Repentance Day.  Mr Abal apparently went along with this and gazetted this new public holiday so the citizens of PNG could have a day to ask for repentance of sins.  Pastor Jack meanwhile, is the co-ordinator for the day, presumably co-ordinating the various transgressions to be repented on the day.

No this is not a Monty Python skit, it’s true. A country where most of the population live in poverty, a country who’s unique flora and fauna is under serious threat from mining interests, a country where crime is rampant and this is the (acting) leader’s priority. Was he drunk or what?

Maybe Mr Abal want’s repentence for his son’s transgressions (allegedly killed a waitress in July).  But wait there’s more – Port Moresby was ranked near the bottom of a most liveable cities in the world survey. The top ten cities are in Australia, Austria, Canada and New Zealand (Auckland #10).

I checked and as far as I can see none of these four countries concerns itself with a Repentance day. These are generally prosperous, safe and educated countries – not perfect of course – but countries whose leadership concerns itself with things that hopefully make a difference. 

I ran a workshop this evening for a group of partners at a professional services firm. We talked about leadership. I talked about the components of authentic leadership and focussed the group’s mind on vision. A vision will separate a leader from a manager.

In the end I feel sorry for the people of PNG. Struggling with so many problems which won’t change without a vision and leadership. I don’t know how Mr Abal got to be selected for the acting role, but I can imagine why he will only ever be acting.

No vision, grasping at superstition from silly old men in a pathetic attempt to do what?  PNG people should say stick it and ignore such ridiculous leadership (and the stupidity of the day off) for what it is. The power of the people sometimes need to show leaders that more is demanded.

Stephen