“If you tell a big enough lie, and tell it frequently enough it will be believed.” (Adolf Hitler Quotes. n.d.). What if I told you that 50% of you in this room would have joined Hitler’s cause? I’m crazy right? Maybe not. This essay is on why I believe Adolf Hitler is a visionary leader but not an ethical one. I will introduce facts to support my claim of how he used inspirational motivation and cognitive flexibility to achieve his vision and make it reality. I will then show how his Intellectual Arrogance and ethical relativism led him down the path of unethical leadership. Finally I will tie my own personal relevance into how I have used each one of the above lessons in my own leadership style. I will discuss how I could have used
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I will then show how I knew my knowledge limits and trusted my Airman not allowing intellectual Arrogance to rule me. Finally, I will show how I avoided the ethical trap of ethical relativism by not allowing my personal bias to dictate my decisions. Let’s get right into the making of the most ruthless dictator of our time who also happened to be very inspirational.
Visionary Leader
We have all witnessed that leader who gets up and just naturally has a commanding presence. Their confidence is contagious and we just want to follow them regardless of the task ahead. This is the type of presence that Adolf Hitler displayed. According to John Toland’s book ADOLF HITLER (1976) his speech was so polished and he was so poised that his words had an explosive effect. Even those that showed up just to jeer him were compelled to listen. From that statement we can gather that even people who wanted to disagree with his stance were swayed by his confidence and inspirational motivation to listen to his cause and possibly join him. According to the Full Range Leadership development lesson: inspirational motivation articulates a vision that paints an optimistic and enthusiastic future which is exactly what Hitler was doing with his public speaking …show more content…
Below are some examples of the types of leadership I exhibit either parallel to Hitler or opposite of him. Recently my unit was going thru an inspection and a bunch of airmen were sitting around griping about how it was a waste of time. I was trying to explain how it benefits us and the Air Force by getting our network up to par. It didn’t have the effect I needed and while we passed the inspection the Airmen didn’t buy into the need. If I had articulated what it effected better or even what impact they are having maybe it would have raised their spirits and got them on board. While used for different reasons and visions I too use cognitive flexibility approach. I use my connections from across my organization to get things done. If we need something accomplished and are getting push back from another work center I will use my connection in that section to bypass the issue and solve the problem. While obviously used on a lesser level than Hitler, the style is exactly the same. In my own career I have used Intellectual Humility on more than one occasion. For instance, I was placed in a position where I had to trust one of my Airman whose expertise surpassed my own. My Airman was aware of an existing network issue, and built a script that would correct the glitch. It is important to note he was not assigned to work on the network issue, but felt compelled to develop a solution. He briefed the COA to
I will then show how I knew my knowledge limits and trusted my Airman not allowing intellectual Arrogance to rule me. Finally, I will show how I avoided the ethical trap of ethical relativism by not allowing my personal bias to dictate my decisions. Let’s get right into the making of the most ruthless dictator of our time who also happened to be very inspirational.
Visionary Leader
We have all witnessed that leader who gets up and just naturally has a commanding presence. Their confidence is contagious and we just want to follow them regardless of the task ahead. This is the type of presence that Adolf Hitler displayed. According to John Toland’s book ADOLF HITLER (1976) his speech was so polished and he was so poised that his words had an explosive effect. Even those that showed up just to jeer him were compelled to listen. From that statement we can gather that even people who wanted to disagree with his stance were swayed by his confidence and inspirational motivation to listen to his cause and possibly join him. According to the Full Range Leadership development lesson: inspirational motivation articulates a vision that paints an optimistic and enthusiastic future which is exactly what Hitler was doing with his public speaking …show more content…
Below are some examples of the types of leadership I exhibit either parallel to Hitler or opposite of him. Recently my unit was going thru an inspection and a bunch of airmen were sitting around griping about how it was a waste of time. I was trying to explain how it benefits us and the Air Force by getting our network up to par. It didn’t have the effect I needed and while we passed the inspection the Airmen didn’t buy into the need. If I had articulated what it effected better or even what impact they are having maybe it would have raised their spirits and got them on board. While used for different reasons and visions I too use cognitive flexibility approach. I use my connections from across my organization to get things done. If we need something accomplished and are getting push back from another work center I will use my connection in that section to bypass the issue and solve the problem. While obviously used on a lesser level than Hitler, the style is exactly the same. In my own career I have used Intellectual Humility on more than one occasion. For instance, I was placed in a position where I had to trust one of my Airman whose expertise surpassed my own. My Airman was aware of an existing network issue, and built a script that would correct the glitch. It is important to note he was not assigned to work on the network issue, but felt compelled to develop a solution. He briefed the COA to