0.5 Why is school leadership preparation so complex

This chapter will make a wide sweep of leadership research, exploring some of the mysteries and attemptingto define the term“leadership.”affirm the difficulties in linking leadership preparation in universities and executive developmentprograms in preparing individuals to become successful leaders, examine what seems to be missing in leadership research, who is incharge when leaders back down and how do leaders keep the organization on the proper edge for productivity when faced withinevitable political tensions between members of the community, school board and school administrators?

One More Time: What is Leadership?

Any discussion about leadership returns to the tired question: are leaders born or made? Next come the issuesabout leaders’temperament, intellect, persistence, and values and why some individual’s with great leadership potential never succeed and others with what appear to have limited leadership skillsaccomplish great things. The discussion can lead to personal charisma, gender, race, and physical attributes of strength andsize and why some individuals perform better under pressure. Some leaders adjust to situations better than others, some are bettertest takers, others are more reflective, some leaders have an inner sense of when and how to act under pressure and how to guide othersout of confusion. This inner sense of leadership was never more evident than during the horrible times at Auschwitz, the Nazi deathcamp. Elie Wiesel (2006) a prisoner at age 13 stood starving and shivering in the cold darkness when a Polish Jew supervisor of thebarracks smiled at him and the others. Wiesel recalls his words of hope. He told us“Comrades, you are now in the concentration camp Auschwitz. Don’t lose hope. We shall all see a day of liberation. Have faith in life. Hell does not last forever”(p.41). Even though this young Pole was assigned by the Nazis to keep order in thebarracks, he had compassion for their suffering and gave them hope for survival. Those were the first human words that 13 year oldElie Wiesel heard after being beaten and dehumanized for several days. In another classic display of leadership Winston Churchillexcelled. During the devastating bombings of London in World War II, Winston Churchill strengthened the resolve of his people andthe world with his daily messages of hope. He told the world (Rogers, 1986):