Welcome to Alpha
Influential Leadership’s Activation Programme
The REVolution in Leadership Practice
Prologue
A Journey in Two Parts
You are about to embark on a two-stage Leadership Journey.
In the first stage, you will navigate through the formalities of the Alpha Programme. This stage has two primary objectives:
1. To equip you with the information and knowledge necessary to practice Influential Leadership.
2. To activate your leadership consciousness, enabling you to choose to lead.
In other words, the first objective provides you with the tools to lead, while the second stimulates your Social Agency to lead. When these objectives are successfully achieved, they form the framework of your Leadership Apex Skillset.
Alpha is purposefully called an Activation Programme because knowing is not enough—there must be application, what we call ‘the doing‘.
The second stage, for which the Alpha Programme prepares you, is the practice of Influential Leadership in any context.
This stage begins on Day 1One, the day you complete the formalities of Alpha, marking the start of your perpetual journey. It ends when you stop choosing to apply the Influential Leadership System or leave this life.
Five Route Markers
Between now and Day 1One (the day you embark on your perpetual Influential Leadership Journey), we cover significant ground. The Prologue offers five route markers to keep you on track throughout the Journey:
1. The Purpose of Leadership
2. Leadership as an Apex Skill
3. Our Choices Define Us
4. Leadership characterised by Activism
5. The REVolutionary nature of Influential Leadership
Treat these markers as GPS points to guide and keep you on course as you navigate the twists and turns, the ascents and descents, and even the tailwinds.
1. The Purpose of Leadership
Is there any social construct that lacks a purpose?
Leadership is a social construct.
Social constructs are created by humans for humans, tangible or otherwise, so they must have a social purpose at a fundamental level.
Leadership is thus no different from accounting, music, or sports.
For example, each of these social constructs serves specific purposes in our existence:
- Accounting: To record, interpret and report the financial situation and dynamics of an entity.
- Music: To please the ear and heart, earn a living, or achieve fame.
- Sport: To maintain fitness, showcase prowess, and meet various social and economic needs.
Leadership is no different.
Why was Leadership invented?
Leadership’s purpose is to bring about productive change for people. It propels progress and distinguishes greatness from mediocrity, advancement from decline.
Furthermore, leadership must also intend to achieve productive outcomes for people.
Whenever you encounter the word ‘leadership,’ think about its stated purpose and actual outcomes.
Subtleties and inferences in these descriptions will become clearer as we progress.
2. Leadership as an Apex Skill
Leadership is a skill, and like all skills, it must be learned and practiced to be mastered.
That is why you are on the Alpha Programme learning Journey, to fulfil the first element of skill development.
Once learned, it is honed through practice.
‘To practice’ is to do something: (i) repeatedly until deft (skilled), and (ii) as a convention (and a profession).
If Leadership is not learned, how would one acquire it?
Through birth, personality, anointing by the universe, seizing an office or title, or ego?
No.
Leadership as an Apex Skill is learned, just like other skills.
‘Apex’ is at the top or at the peak (literally and figuratively).
An ‘Apex Skill’ encompasses multiple capabilities, both horizontally and vertically.
Influential Leadership is an Apex Skill(set) because it integrates and leverages other skillsets and life contexts into the practice of Influential Leadership.
In other words, whatever one’s base skillsets might be—everyday, social and technical—it is Influential Leadership that facilitates the application of these existing skillsets into an Apex Skill(set).
In the AI Age, mastering an Apex Skill keeps you relevant, adds value, and places you at the top of your game.
3. Our Choices Define Us
In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves.
The process never ends until we die.
And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962).
American political player, diplomat and activist.
Husband was Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd president of the USA.
Our third route marker is another anchor element of the Influential Leadership System—choices, personal choices.
Eleanor Roosevelt’s statement quoted above provides a powerful summary of this position—that we are each responsible for our own lives, that we must exercise choices to realise the life we want, for ourselves and others, including whether we choose to lead or not.
At the centre of our Social Agency lies the power of our choices, always.
Of course choosing implies that our choice is based on thoughtfulness (critical thinking) and followed by (purposeful) action.
Yes, some choices are so complex and difficult that it seems we do not have a choice—but we do.
The alternative is that we are slaves to our conditions—that we have no influence over our present or future.
The Influential Leadership way is that we always have a choice, even in the most dire circumstances.
4. Activism
Activism implies action—it emphasises the ongoing practice and promotion of Influential Leadership.
An activist is always on-duty, practicing Leadership at home, in transit, in queues, at school, in teams, workplaces, communities and in political spheres.
Being Apex Skilled involves choosing to lead wherever you are.
Learning and knowledge are accompanied by action—hence, we are ACTIVISTS.
5. Influential Leadership is a REVolution in Leadership
…this is a time for major change.
Incrementalism—minor tweaks…
are inadequate to the tasks at hand.
What are needed are dramatic changes…
Joseph Stiglitz. People, Power and Profits. Progressive Capitalism for an Age of Discontent (2019).
Nobel Prize Winner for Economics (2001). Chief Economist at the World Bank. One of the 100 most influential people in the world (2011).
Joseph Stiglitz highlighted the need for dramatic changes in our economic, political, and social domains, where leadership plays a crucial role. Legacy leadership fails to meet the current demands and expectations. Technologically, we are in the AI Age, but in legacy leadership, we are stuck in the Stone Age.
Effective leadership, a social construct created to serve humans, must evolve to serve our needs better. The Influential Leadership System offers a new form of leadership that surpasses the limitations of legacy practices. This System focuses on driving substantial and meaningful change in personal lives, homes, places of learning, workspaces, communities, governments, and countries.
After all, leadership is a social construct—created by humans for humans—it must serve our needs. If it fails to do so, it deserves to be replaced by something that does. To improve our lives and secure a better future, we must innovate a new form of leadership that works for everyone and fulfils the fundamental purpose of leadership.
The Influential Leadership System transcends:
- Tinkering at the margins of failure
- Rehashing old ideas and practices under new names
- Outsourcing leadership to ‘those whose business it is’
- Imagining that leadership arrives miraculously
- Confusing current misleadership practices with proper leadership
- Throwing the word ‘leader’ at anyone and hoping they will sort things out
No, none of these setups are considered in the Influential Leadership System.
As Professor Joseph Stiglitz, who has reached a similar conclusion, points out, it’s not just about incremental tweaks but fundamental change.
While Stiglitz refers to economic, political, and social domains, leadership is a primary component within these spheres. It cannot continue as it has been. Fundamental change is essential, and this is where the Influential Leadership System makes its mark—in personal lives, homes, educational institutions, workspaces, communities, governments, and countries.
The Influential Leadership System is designed to be a:
- Fundamental
- Radical
- Revolutionary change from legacy practices.
In this regard, we take the sound advice of R. Buckminster Fuller who advocated that it is more effective to change something by building a new model and practice that makes the existing one obsolete, rather than by fighting the current reality. As Fuller said:
You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.
R. Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983)
American engineer, architect, futurist, poet and philosopher.
Fuller developed the geodesic dome and was recognised for his unorthodox ideas on global issues.
Let the Journey Commence
Take the five route markers with you. Keep them in your mind’s eye, especially in Part 1 as you begin to explore new ideas and concepts. The list of terms, abbreviations, and definitions attached to Part 1 will also guide your way.
