{"id":22315,"date":"2016-04-11T09:29:01","date_gmt":"2016-04-11T07:29:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.times.mw\/?p=22315"},"modified":"2016-04-11T09:29:01","modified_gmt":"2016-04-11T07:29:01","slug":"mindset-change-be-the-spartacus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/2016\/04\/11\/mindset-change-be-the-spartacus\/","title":{"rendered":"Mindset change: Be the Spartacus"},"content":{"rendered":"

E<\/strong>very person is a leader. The distinguishing difference is how our leadership can give people the dynamism and enthusiasm to follow us. In most of the political, social and economic circles, the leadership that dominates is the leadership that is coercive, the leadership that brings the anthem \u2018yes bwana\u2019. If we have to develop Malawi in all the sectors we need a leadership that is shared with the people, a leadership that followers are ready to die for not through fear but belief and shared purpose and dreams.<\/p>\n

Napoleon Hill was right to say that the starting point of all achievements is desire. Keep this constantly in mind. Weak desires bring weak results, just as a small amount of fire makes a small amount of heat. If the corporate sector is failing to develop then the leadership must realise that it has detached itself from its followers, it has not created an understating of shared purpose and because it leads a people that only follow it through fear then it can never prosper.<\/p>\n

An exciting event took place in 1st century BC in the Roman empire. A slave, Spartacus, led slaves\u2019 revolt. He established an army of slaves. Not that he was recruiting them but they followed his ideals because he shared one common purpose with them: liberation from the tyranny of the Roman regime. His ill-trained and ill-equipped army won several battles but when eventually it was trapped and most slaves massacred, the Romans wanted to locate the slaves\u2019 leader for a special punishment.<\/p>\n

The Roman General leading the trapping of the slave army well said, \u201cI bring a message from your master, the commander of Italy. By command of his most merciful Excellency, your lives shall be spared. Slaves you were and slaves you will remain but the terrible penalty of crucifixion has been set aside under the single condition that you identify the body of the living person of a slave called Spartacus.\u201d<\/p>\n

To the total disbelief of the general, one by one, the slaves started standing up and each shouted \u2018I am Spartacus.\u2019 The slaves\u2019 conviction and love and loyalty for their leader was unshakeable. They were ready to die for Spartacus. Since they denied saving their lives by pointing who Spartacus was, they were all sentenced to death by crucifixion.<\/p>\n

The question is, what is it that made all the surviving slaves who had seen colleagues massacred, be ready to face death for the sake of one person? The first point is that Spartacus was a positive thinker. He had inculcated in his fellow slaves that no matter the circumstances, there will always be light at the end of the tunnel. The slaves believed that even long after death they would have defeated slavery as the Roman Empire would be afraid to use slaves anymore for fear of revolts. It is this inculcation of common and shared ideals that the 21st century leadership is failing to embrace.<\/p>\n

Paradoxically, our leadership has much information at its disposal, attends leadership summits and conferences throughout the globe but can hardly change. It is all just because in as much as they learn, their hearts are far away from embracing change. To them it has to be business as usual. To them it is the \u2018boss mentality\u2019 than the \u2018leader mentality\u2019 that dominates. To them the default instinct is not \u2018our vision\u2019 but \u2018my vision\u2019. Even the tone of their language concentrates on \u2018I\u2019 and not \u2018we\u2019.<\/p>\n

If productivity levels fall down when the leader is not around then that is a clear measure that the leadership is far from having the Spartacus spark. A team of people that has been led with Spartacus ideals will always be productive whether the leader is around or not; the team would even take risky and challenging decisions to advance the common agenda of the body they work for.<\/p>\n

Malawi has the potential to develop but it requires the Spartacus-philosophy leadership. If it is in the political circles, the leaders must be those that share a common vision with the people that follow them. They should more or less be indispensable. If it is in the environmental sector, the leaders have to be those that are ready to sleep on empty stomach because they could not use charcoal to prepare food. Then people will believe them unlike the dominant crop that confiscates bags of charcoal from people and use them in their homes. These are those that are far from being the Spartacus factor for development.<\/p>\n

We need Spartacus teachers in our schools and colleges. These are leaders that are willing to teach more and lecture regardless of resource constraints. These are people that will inspire their students to believe in what lies in the future upon attainment of appropriate qualifications. We need Spartacus medical doctors that would treat patients though in a situation of inadequate resources. These are those that can even tear down a sleeve of their shirt to help an accident victim in a situation where there are no bandages.<\/p>\n

The development agenda for Malawi has to start with the Spartacus leadership mentality that will attract the attention of followers who will be more than willing to sacrifice their resources in supporting the leader. If we have to be the Spartacus, the great leader, then we have to envision a compelling and vibrant future than what is the situation at present. We need to have a clear alternative view of what the world will be like tomorrow. We need to have a shared purpose that others would be compelled by, inspired by and work towards achieving it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every person is a leader. The distinguishing difference is how our leadership can give people the dynamism and enthusiasm to follow us. In most of the political, social and economic circles, the leadership that dominates is the leadership that is coercive, the leadership that brings the anthem \u2018yes bwana\u2019. If we have to develop Malawi […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":21896,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22315"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22315\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22317,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22315\/revisions\/22317"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}