Leadership and sustainability

As human being we have to develop certain types of skills that will help us to reach
our personal goals, in work, in relationships or even in self growth, this skills can be a part
of your personality or you can build them through your journey to your own success; each
one of the skills you choose to develop can create a trait or a characteristic inside yourself,
for example being careful, or being empathic can create a much bigger characteristic, like
leadership. Let´s start talking about what does being a leader means. First of all, we need to
know that In order to develop an emotion there always has to be an outside incentive that
creates thoughts that leads to emotions which generates acts, for example, thanks to the
disagreement of society about the unfair death of George Floyd it wouldn’t be any
mobilizations or marches rejecting it, this disagreement made the people outstand for what
they believe and what they fight for, in this case, black lives. Not just nowadays, but since
colonization times, topics like: slavery or injustice moved people, but also, for making a big
change you have to create (or have) a big platform that touches a lot of individuals, and for
this task you need strength and determination, like Martin Luther king had, he was a man
that was tired of the division of society, division of white skin people and black skin people
that created racism and discrimination which was already a part of a culture, and that’s not
okay. Even though how dangerous the task was, he was determined on speak out his voice
and try to make a change, from the political framework itself and from the modification of
society’s mind, thus, he was seen as a leader, a person who had the guts to change things
because he was tired, he needed to be the first one to take an step in order to be followed,
he needed to take the risk and show people that fighting for your rights is legitime just
because we are human beings. And that’s what being a leader is about and what it means,
not as a definition but as a impact in someone’s life, being a leader is the one who takes the
first step and encourage the others to take it as well. In this essay I’m going to talk about
actual examples that can answer all the questions about leadership, the why, who, what and
how of being a leader and also how this is directly related to be sustainable in our decision
making.
 Great movements have been created by amazing leaders, feminism is an example, a
movement that encourages equality and respect for the women in a time were the typical
stereotype was for them to be in the kitchen serving their husbands and unable to even go to
college. To talk about this movement, we must talk of Emmeline Pankhurst, an English
politician and activist that lead the suffragist movement creating the feminism. This
revolution came with the idea of the right of women for voting and deciding on their own,
the main argument against it was that women didn’t have enough education or intelligence
in order to have such responsibility in their hands. Women where tired of being suppressed,
they felt powerless and not worthy, mainly because at that time the believes revolved
around the fact that women only where capable of being mothers and wives, and reveal
themselves was not an option, mainly because economic reasons (they couldn’t work or
even live without their husbands last name). This situation was rejected thanks to the
culture, the religion and even science, society it self dis not believe that women were
capable of having a job or develop certain skills, through the history of humanity women
were characterized for being submissive and obedient, from ancient indigenous tribes to the
middle age, so it was necessary for them to take action, also, at that time (1890-1930) the
world war one made women to go out and start doing “men work” as the men weren’t
present cause the war; so basically, a bunch of situations made this movement to explode.
So going back to Pankhurst, she still is an icon and a woman who is to admire, since she
was a kid had a pig platform inside politics thanks to her father, so she really grew up with
the tools to make a change. She was known as a tenacious, careful, strong, ambitious
woman, she had everything to be a leader in a game changing movement. This is one of the
reasons why leadership can make big things happen, without leader people we wouldn’t
have our actual present, leadership is the start of a path to a better future, not just in social
matters, but inside a business, a leader makes sure that the team can accomplish their goals
by being supportive and encourage them to make a good work. (purvis,2011)
 From another point of view, we have the digital framework in which many people
participates and try to win as many followers and likes as the can, mainly in order to being
recognized or win some money, but there´s a big responsibility that comes with this type of
fame, for example, knowing that the audience you reach for is underaged and you have to
take care of what you say or who you support, because you know this kids look up to you
and want to be you in certain way, even though it wasn’t you goal, you are an actual leader
in social media. Platforms as Instagram, Twitter and TikTok give this influencers the social
power to be leaders, now, they decide what to post, what to support but at the same time
they have to do it with certain of social responsibility. As an example, I’ll go back to my
introduction example, the movement of black lives matter. Surely, without social media this
movement would not be as big as it was, starting by how people knew about George Floyd
´s dead. The video of his abuse was uploaded on Facebook first, then it went “viral” and
was everywhere, on the news, newspapers, international journalism was talking about it
too, it was an explosion, next thing we know, politics was involved and people were
claiming for justice, all social media went black as a symbol of support, hashtags went
trending on twitter and thousand of videos were make showing support, famous people felt
the responsibility to support this cause and lead this movement, in fact, they are the ones
demanding the everyday cases of abuse, also are the ones that show foundations in order for
the people to donate, they know they have this huge and important platform that they can
use to change society, is their duty, with every cause the believe in. This duty requires
determination and empathy, leader characteristics, they know that they can embrace people
´s heart for change. Leaders are the ones who are changing the world, they are the ones that
make sure things are being done, without leader people our world would be pretty much
different. In conclusion, leaders are the most important thing inside a society or any
organization that is looking forward to accomplishing their goals, leaders have to be
responsible and sustainable in what they are doing because the influence a lot in every days
decisions, people look up to them and follow them, their critical thinking and analytical
perspective should led to choose the best way, the way that is better for everyone or thing
involved. As a manager myself, I think that being a leader is the first step to success, and to
having a better future, is the key to have a organized enterprise and life.
References:

June Purvis (2011) Emmeline Pankhurst (1858–1928), Suffragette Leader and Single

Parent in Edwardian Britain, Women's History Review, 20:1, 87-
108, DOI: 10.1080/09612025.2011.536389

Gwenn Schurgin O'Keeffe, Kathleen Clarke-Pearson and Council on Communications and

Media
Pediatrics April 2011, 127 (4) 800-804; DOI: https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2011-0054

Dave, D., Friedson, A., Matsuzawa, K., Sabia, J., & Safford, S. (2020). Black Lives Matter
Protests, Social Distancing, and COVID-19. Retrieved 28 September 2020, from
https://www.nber.org/papers/w27408; Document Object Identifier (DOI): 10.3386/w27408