Leadership Knowledge Protects Society

VIDEO: Without education in Leadership, people cannot enact Leadership and cannot critique Leadership to protect themselves and their communities

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Dr Alex Kennerly Vasquez

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Without education in Leadership, people cannot enact Leadership and cannot critique Leadership to protect themselves and their communities

1. The topic of leadership is notably absent from public dialogue

2. We all need to be aware of essential concepts in leadership

3. We all need to have the ability to discuss and articulate the topic of leadership

4. Training in leadership is notably absent from all/formal/graduate education whereas it should be included throughout

5. Leadership requires the participation (feedback, input) and enrollment/agreement of the people being "led"

6. Different types of leadership are appropriate for different situations (eg, political vs military vs employer-employee vs owner-manager vs parent-child vs teacher-student) but all leadership has at least four common characteristics

7. Lack of leadership always has consequences: error, injury, death(s) or simply wasted time and effort

8. All good leadership has defined common characteristics

   1. Defined specific goal(s), clearly communicated, along with the supporting strategies and tactics: The goal must be defined (after input and agreement) and the strategies and tactics specified. Undefined specific goals are never accomplished; therefore, for a group to achieve any complex or worthwhile goal, that goal must be defined, then subdivided, and then each facet has to be addressed with a specific strategy supported by implemented tactics. Goals (organizational targets) are defined, then subdivided into components (jobs); then, each subcomponent is addressed with a specific strategy (teams) which is then implemented with tactics (skills)

   2. Enrollment of participants: When the goal has been determined, the leader must then communicate the goal and enroll the participants to gain their full participation. This may be simple or may require some great deal of education in order to convey the importance of the goal and the means to achieve it.

   3. Welfare/maintenance of participants: Good leadership protects the welfare of the participants/implementers. Any leader who doesn’t look out for his/her participants isn’t leading them but rather simply using them, as if they were tools or implements. This is not a successful strategy for achieving the goal because eventually people will get sick, injured, burnt out, bored or exhausted and when the troops leave the war cannot be won. Enthusiastic and incentivized participants are the driving force behind the implementation of worthy goals, strategies and tactics.

   4. Success: Good leadership is generally successful in achieving the goal; failure to achieve the goal(s) is accepted and incorporated into a revised plan until success is achieved.

9. The prevailing power structures want followers and "managers of predetermined goals" -- not leaders -- and they want to keep people ignorant about the criteria and implementation of leadership. Because most people are ignorant about the implementation and evaluation of leadership, they are mute and helpless and ineffective when confronted with incompetent/manipulative leadership; when people cannot articulate their discontent, they cannot seek agreement from others as necessary to effect public/social change; this leads to the persistence of bad leadership.When people cannot articulate and clarify their discontent, they tend to distrust it or ignore it and allow themselves to be distracted by other trivia; this also leads to the persistence of bad leadership. Thus, by various mechanisms, ignornance about leadership leads to the perpetuation of bad leadership, of which we appreciate two types.

10. You can also note the converse of this: a population (of troops, citizens, workers) knowledgeable about leadership will hold the leaders to higher standards of performance and/or eliminate the incompetent/manipulative bad leaders. As such, any true leader who is more committed to the success of the group than to maintenance of his/her position would therefore seek to train his/her subordinates in leadership in order to create a culture of competent leadership and high-performance. Because most people are ignorant about the implementation and evaluation of leadership, they are mute and helpless and ineffective when confronted with incompetent/manipulative leadership; when people cannot articulate their discontent, they cannot seek agreement from others as necessary to effect public/social change; this leads to the persistence of bad leadership. When people cannot articulate and clarify their discontent, they tend to distrust it or ignore it and allow themselves to be distracted by other trivia; this also leads to the persistence of bad leadership

11. "Bad leadership" has two types: 1) incompetence, and 2) manipulation

    1. "Honest incompetence" occurs when someone lacks experience, knowledge, talent; these people are / should be open to correction and eager to learn. Honestly incompetent people will remove themselves from positions they cannot handle

    2. "Manipulators" will not remove themselves from the failures they refuse to acknowledge; manipulative incompetence usually implies self-deception and lack of insight/intelligence, eg, Dunning-Kruger

12. Anytime you ask for clarity and do not receive clarity 1) you are being lied to, and/or 2) you are being manipulated. As such, asking clear and reasonable questions is a very specific and effective tool for differentiating the two types of bad leaders. (Note: this also applies to bad bosses, bad employees, bad contractors, bad friends, etc). Asking a clear and reasonable question should elicit a clear and reasonable answer; anything less is a problem, of which two categories exist: 1) Unknowing: an unclear answer could represent incompetence/unknowing, in which case the honest person might search for an answer and/or acknowledge that they don’t know the answer and don’t have the information, after which they will seek the answer. 2) Evasion and manipulation.

13. You can only recognize manipulation if you study and can thereafter identify the techniques; 1) gaslighting: changing the fabric of reality to make other people think they are going crazy, 2) shapeshifting: Karpman drama triangle

14. Clear questions deserve clear answers; anything less than clarity is evasion and manipulation. Period. Anything less than clarity is evasion and manipulation.

15. Good leadership requires the establishment of goals that are reasonable, clearly defined, achievable, worthwhile. This perspective/perspectivism requires honest and unfiltered inquiry with peers, experts, implementers, and the affected population.

16. If the goal is not clear then the leader has already failed. Good leadership defines the vision, mission, goal, strategies, and tactics. Good leadership defines how the people and systems will be physically/ socially/ financially/ spiritually/ emotionally supported during the mission.

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• I hope you enjoyed this brief update; please see the other videos and articles in the Antiviral Nutrition Course. This educational material is not to be considered personalized health advice; consult a nutritionally-knowledgeable licensed clinician before taking nutritional supplements especially if you have preexisting health problems and/or are taking medications. Dr Vasquez’s books are available internationally via bookstores such as BookDepository, Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, ThriftBooks, AbeBooks, BetterWorldBooks, WaterStonesBooks.

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