Mahatma Gandhi – Soft Leadership
Globalization Human Resources Peace Performance Self-Development
“Christ gave us the goals and Mahatma Gandhi the tactics.” – Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
I led a webinar on “Soft Leadership: A New Leadership Perspective”
organized by International Leadership Association on August 29, 2012.
When I explained my new leadership concept – soft leadership, and the
soft leaders who must contain 11 C’s, one of the participants asked a
question, “Is there any leader in the world who possesses all C’s?” I
replied, “Yes, there was one leader who had all the 11 C’s such as
character, charisma, conscience, conviction, courage, communication,
compassion, commitment, consistency, consideration, and contribution –
that was Mahatma Gandhi.
Mahatma Gandhi got independence for India through truth and
non-violence. He said, “In a gentle way, you can shake the world.” He
proved that a leader can achieve everything through moral power, soft
power, soft tactics, and soft skills. He showed that it is not the size
but strength that matters. It is not the physical strength but moral
strength that counts. Mahatma Gandhi influenced the world through his
soft leadership including five Nobel Laureates – Dr. Martin Luther King
Jr, Nelson Mandela, Dalai Lama, Aung San Suu Kyi, and Barack Obama.
What is Soft Leadership?
Soft leadership is a new direction to leadership coined by me. We need
this style with the changing times and technologies and due to the
dynamic global business environment. This new leadership perspective is
essential to meet the rising expectations of all stakeholders globally.
Soft leadership can be defined as the process of setting goals;
influencing people through persuasion; building strong teams;
negotiating them with a win-win attitude; respecting their failures;
hand-holding them; motivating them constantly; aligning their energies
and efforts; recognizing and appreciating their contribution in
accomplishing the organizational objectives with an emphasis on soft
skills. It is based on the right mindset, skill set, and tool-set.
Soft Leaders and 11 Characteristics
Soft leaders are the leaders who make a difference in the lives of
their partners. They don’t believe in leadership and followership, but
in partnership. They blend hard and soft skills and lead from the front
with 11 characteristics. They adopt various tools such as participation,
persuasion, influence, negotiation, motivation, recognition,
appreciation, and collaboration. They adopt soft power, soft tactics,
and soft tools and techniques to get the tasks executed successfully.
They are more of people-orientation rather than task-orientation, and
adopt transformational style rather than transactional style. Precisely,
soft leaders are relationship-oriented, people-orientated,
service-oriented, transformational, authentic, and thought leaders who
lead through soft skills. Here are the 11 characteristics that
substantiate that Mahatma Gandhi was a great soft leader:
Character
Character is one of the key components of soft leaders. It is through
their strong character they lead their people by influencing and guiding
them. Character is the key thing that differentiates good leaders from
others. In fact, good character makes a person a great leader. What
counts at the end of the day in your life is who you are, not what you
have. Mahatma Gandhi was a great example for character who practiced
what he preached. He walked his talk throughout his life. He
enlightened, “The Roots of Violence: Wealth without work, Pleasure
without conscience, Knowledge without character, Commerce without
morality, Science without humanity, Worship without sacrifice, Politics
without principles”
Charisma
Mahatma Gandhi differentiated, “Power is of two kinds. One is obtained
by the fear of punishment and the other by acts of love. Power based on
love is a thousand times more effective and permanent than the one
derived from fear of punishment.” One of the greatest characteristics of
soft leaders is their charisma. Charisma helps in connecting with
others easily as people feel valued and pleased to talk with these
leaders. Mahatma was a charismatic leader. He succeeded as a soft leader
because of his ability to control mystical inner power. He connected
with the common man with his charisma. He strongly believed, “An ounce
of practice is worth more than tons of preaching.”
Conscience
Conscience is one of the major key components of soft leaders as clear
conscience makes them stand out from other leaders. People expect
leaders to be ethical and responsible. They also look up to leaders
whose conscience cares them. Conscience differentiates the right from
the wrong. Leaders must have a clear conscience to convince themselves
so that they can persuade others. If there is a chasm between the word
and the deed, conscience reminds the same. Mahatma Gandhi was always
clear with his conscience. He unveiled the mistakes he made in his
autography – “Gandhi An Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments With
Truth”. Every person makes mistakes but how many unveil and admit them?
In fact, it requires a lot of courage to reveal one’s wrong-doings. He
rightly said, “The human voice can never reach the distance that is
covered by the still small voice of conscience.”
Conviction
Mahatma Gandhi asserted, “You can chain me, you can torture me, you can
even destroy this body, but you will never imprison my mind.”
Conviction is another key ingredient for soft leadership without which
the soft leaders cannot lead successfully. It is their convictions that
take soft leaders forward and inspire their people to move forward
toward achieving their goals. Mahatma Gandhi was a symbol of sacrifice
and convictions. He said, “A ‘No’ uttered from the deepest conviction is
better than a ‘Yes’ merely uttered to please, or worse, to avoid
trouble.” During India’s independence he was subjected to several
hardships but he strongly believed in his convictions. Hence, Mahatma
Gandhi was an apt example for conviction.
Courage
Mahatma Gandhi said, “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the
attribute of the strong.” Courage is an integral part of soft
leadership. Courage doesn’t mean fighting with others physically.
Courage means standing for your principles and policies, and values and
ethics. Mahatma Gandhi remarked, “Strength does not come from physical
capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.” He stood for his values of
non-violence and Satyagraha. Remember what counts at the end of the day
is neither your muscle power nor money power but your moral power.
Hence, Mahatma Gandhi was a great example for courageous leadership and
soft leadership.
Communication
Leaders express their ideas, ideals, and insights and persuade others
to follow them through communication skills. And soft leaders adopt
assertive communication. Assertive communication is the ability to
communicate firmly but politely. Mahatma Gandhi was a great communicator
who never compromised with his principles but expressed them politely
and adopted them firmly. He communicated with the people through
practice and by setting an example. He communicated in the language the
people understood and not in the language he knew. He said, “I have
nothing new to teach the world. Truth and Non-violence are as old as the
hills. All I have done is to try experiments in both on as vast a scale
as I could.”
Compassion
When we refer to compassion, two leaders flash in our minds – Mahatma
Gandhi and Mother Teresa. Mahatma Gandhi was a compassionate leader
whose heart was filled with tons of compassion. He empathized with the
people of all religions and faiths and respected them. He was an
empathic leader who had the ability to step into the shoes of others and
understand the things from others’ perspective. Once he was travelling
in a train, and he was standing at the door enjoying the beautiful
scenery of India. One of his chappals slipped away and fell down from
the train. He threw the other chappal as well so that the finder can
benefit as he would have a pair instead of just one chappal. Keeping one
chappal with him would be of no use to him or the finder. It shows his
empathy and compassion. Mahatma Gandhi moved with untouchables and gave
them due respect. He said, “Compassion is a muscle that gets stronger
with use.” Compassion is an integral characteristic of soft leadership.
In fact, compassion differentiates soft leaders from other leaders. It
helps connect with others easily. People appreciate the leaders who care
and touch them.
Commitment
Commitment is the key characteristic of soft leaders. Mahatma Gandhi
was committed to truth, non-violence, and peace. He rightly remarked,
“My commitment is to truth not consistency.” He believed in simplicity
and humility. He was committed to fight against inequality and injustice
when he was in South Africa and India. He was committed to fight
against suppression and oppression. He was committed to Hindu-Muslim
unity. He once remarked, “I don’t have a message. My message is my
life.” His commitment to the cause of India’s freedom was firm. As a
result, he made a significant difference in the lives of Indians.
Consistency
Consistency is another important ingredient for soft leadership.
Leaders need to demonstrate their consistency so as to have a profound
impact on their people. People expect leaders to be predictable,
responsible, and credible. Failure to demonstrate consistency might lead
to credibility crisis. Mahatma Gandhi maintained consistency throughout
his life by sticking to non-violence and peace. He remarked, “True
morality consists, not in following the beaten track, but in finding out
the true path for ourselves and in fearlessly following it.”
Consistency is essential in every area of life. Consistency is essential
in putting your efforts to achieve big. It is required to get noticed
as a credible and responsible person.
Consideration
Consideration is one of the major characteristics of soft leaders as
soft leaders basically care for their people. Consideration means how
much and how far the leaders are sensitive towards their people. Leaders
with consideration have more of people-orientation rather than
task-orientation. They empathize with others and understand the
problems. Mahatma Gandhi was an empathetic leader who always cared for
and considered others. He said, “I don’t believe in stereotypes, I
prefer to hate people on a more personal basis. The measure of a truly
great man is the courtesy with which he treats lesser men. An eye for an
eye will make the whole world go blind.”
Contribution
Contribution includes precious time, money, energy, ideas, knowledge,
and service to the society. Genuine and selfless contribution takes to
true leadership. People respect the leaders who contribute their best to
the society without hankering for wealth, power, or prestige. Mahatma
Gandhi said, “We must become the change we want to see in the world.”
His contribution to India’s freedom movement, and to bring a qualitative
difference in the lives of others is unquestionable. He enlightened the
world with the knowledge that all religions in the world share common
beliefs of truth and non-violence which is his major contribution to
mankind. Here is the diagram connecting all 11 C’s that constitute soft
leadership and symbolizes the characteristics of Mahatma Gandhi:
Mahatma Gandhi – A Soft Leader
Mahatma Gandhi said, “Truth and non-violence are as old as the hills.
All I have done is to try experiments in both on as vast a scale as I
could. In doing so, I have sometimes erred and learned by my errors.
Life and its problems have thus become to me so many experiments in the
practice of truth and nonviolence.”
Mahatma Gandhi had more concern for people and was a participative, and
relationship oriented leader. Commenting on leadership he quoted, “I
suppose leadership at one time meant muscles; but today it means getting
along with people.” It clearly shows that his leadership style is
closely connected with soft leadership. He provided a soft touch,
believed in soft power, adopted soft tactics, and applied soft skills
apart from possessing the 11 characteristics needed for a soft leader.
Hence, we can conclude that Mahatma Gandhi was an ideal example for a
soft leader. His principles are eternal and his leadership is
everlasting.
Mahatma Gandhi continues to inspire people internationally through his
soft leadership. He will be remembered as long as civilization exists.
Present world needs another soft leader like Mahatma Gandhi to preach
and practice non-violence and peace to eliminate intolerance and
impatience, and to spread universal brotherhood and fraternity. Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “If humanity is to progress, Gandhi is
inescapable. He lived, thought, acted and inspired by the vision of
humanity evolving toward a world of peace and harmony.
Prof M S Rao
International Leadership Guru
source : http://www.unpost.org/mahatma-gandhi-soft-leadership/
http://www.unpost.org/#ixzz2dtY15rKz
