The characteristics of transformational leadership are creativity, interactive, visionary, empowering and passionate, which has been identified by many researchers (Hackman & Johnson, pg. 103). Guevara was considered creative as well as visionary because he challenged the status quo by seeking out new ideas, products, and ways of performing tasks (Blanch & Media). After Guevara witnessed widespread poverty and oppression in South and Central America, intertwined with his interest in Marxism, he came to the conclusion that the only solution to South and Central America’s problems was an armed war (History.com). He wanted to remove the social injustices from society and believed it would happen through a socialist society. This embodiment of the characteristics of creativity and visionary to create change and difference for people demonstrated how Guevara exemplified the characteristic of creativity as a transformational leader as well as being interactive. As a leader Guevara described revolution as “not an apple that falls when it is ripe. You have to make it fall” (Guevara). This direct quote from Guevara proves he was an interactive leader who believes in order to create change you need to make it happen. This shows Guevara s a transformational leader because “Transformational leaders are masterful communicators able to articulate and define ideas …show more content…
Guevara stated, “Remember the revolution is what is important, and each one of us, alone, is worth nothing” (Guevara). Guevara was able to create a relationship with and influence the people of Cuba that in order to create change they needed to band together behind his organizational objectives. This demonstrates how Guevara’s elements of leadership – leader-follower relationship, influence, organizational objectives, change, and people – go hand-in-hand with Bennis’ ideology of transformational leadership. Guevara was able to form an army of 3,000 members and lead them to defeat 30,000 professional army men of the Batista government, which alone shows how Guevara was a successful leader. Guevara is an important leader to learn from because he created the industrialization and the change of face of the Cuban Revolution. He defined the change he wanted to see in South and Central American and created a revolution for people to follow, which displays why Che Guevara was a successful transformational