by Daniel H. Kim

Rereading Robert Greenleaf 's renowned 1970 essay "The Servant As Leader" is always an exercise in humility for me. His writings are a constant reminder of the high standards leaders must set for themselves if they are to be worthy of people's full commitment. Of all the things that Greenleaf wrote, I have found the following passage to be the most striking and most challenging to live up to:

"The failure (or refusal) of a leader to foresee may be viewed as an ethical failure; because a serious ethical compromise today (when the usual judgement on ethical inadequacy is made) is sometimes the result of a failure to make the effort at an earlier date to foresee today's events and take the right actions when there was freedom for initiative to act. The action which society labels 'unethical' in the present moment is often really one of no choice. By this standard, a lot of guilty people are walking around with an air of innocence that they would not have if society were able always to pin a label 'unethical' on the failure to foresee and the conscious failure to act constructively when there was freedom to act."

I have never heard anybody talk about leadership responsibilities in that way. Others may admonish us for not having exercised better foresight or for incorrectly anticipating the future. They may call it a failure of planning or an error in judgment. But to call such a lapse an ethical failure is such a strong stance that it compelled me to take a deeper look at the issue so that I could come to better understand why Greenleaf used such provocative terminology.


This article originally appeared in The Systems Thinker, Vol. 13 N. 7 (September 2002). Click here to receive a free current issue of The Systems Thinker.

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by Larry Dressler

A volcano erupts in Iceland. Tens of thousands of flights are cancelled, and millions of passengers stranded. This is the kind of surprise I call an "oy vey moment." Oy vey is a Yiddish term. I grew up hearing my grandparents use the expression frequently. It's an exclamation of dismay, frustration, or exasperation.

Oy vey moments have three defining characteristics. They are unexpected. They are unwanted. They are uncontrollable in that we have little ability to contain or influence them directly. Organizations have their own versions of volcanic events--a product failure, the loss of a key employee, an economic recession. We often label these events as distractions, disruptions, or disasters.

In the midst of unwanted surprises, leaders and change agents often lose their calm and clarity. We get stuck in fight-flight-freeze mode. Have you experienced any of these typical reactions in the face of an oy vey moment?

• Lost your sense of humor
• Became fixated on what wasn't working
• Gave up completely
• Felt annoyed and resentful
• Looked for someone to blame
• Pretended it wasn't happening