A Visionary focuses on one thing at a time, often to the point of obsession and with passion and intensity. He/She usually burns that flame for a while and then moves on to the next focus of creative passion; returning to the unfinished project as the creative passion flares again. For the Visionary life is a game and ‘Play’ is the watchword. There may be a lot of mental wheel spinning for the Visionary trying to decide what they truly want to be and what they want to do and if life gets too serious they tend to withdraw and find somewhere else to play. They are always in search of an even better fit of an opportunity. In finding a balance of acceptable discipline the Visionary can be a light onto the world. Teaching others by example, how to live life,  is the spiritual song of the Visionary.

 

Leadership matters. Leadership skills are a skill set that can be possessed both in humans and in animals. Animals Lead their groups by influencing, showing examples, guiding and constantly communicating with their followers. They have the aim and goal for their followers to follow. For example, animals that travel in groups, when making migratory or movement decisions, often depend on social interactions among their own group members. They have good communicating skills and transfer information and/ or show action. This is done by signaling to one another or making noises which can only be understood by their own species. Information that is transferred is crucial as it may relate to the location of a food source, or of a migration route, or an approaching danger. Therefore in a group there is always a Leader who has all the knowledge and thus guides its followers in the right direction. This Leader is the one that takes responsibility of the safety of its followers (caring them) and in turn, the followers are dependent on their Leader.

 

Prof. Dr. Patrick Cheng and Sik-Liong Ang, like many other authors, have drawn parallels, by using various examples of Chinese proverbs and Japanese sayings,  highlighting Leadership lessons from the animal kingdom, in their paper ‘Leadership Lessons from the Animal Kingdom’ with interpretation from the Chinese and also Japanese perspective. Learning from the positive attributes of the animal kingdom, the key success factors for good Leaders are having vision, being Strong and Resilient, guiding yet flexible while being compassionate and caring and being able to Lead Change. The paper highlights some of the good features and habits of the animal kingdom without denying that bad habits and behaviour among these animal also do exist. However, without stressing on the bad behaviours that Lead to negative thinking, it is needed that emphasis be laid on the positive attributes. Similarly, mistakes may be made but more critically, both the doer as well as the observer of the mistakes, need to learn from them.

 

Leadership, among people, involves using the 3H i.e. the Head, the Heart and the Hands. The Leader should make full use of his or her analytical skills and social or interpersonal skills. By “using the hands”,  means that the Leader should Lead by the example, actions that the Leader not only speaks of but also performs.