I have been following a discussion by leadership experts on the topic of VISION and, in particular, whether visionary leadership is teachable – what a topic!
In the interests of clarifying what a visionary is, let us consider what Wiki has to say:
Defined broadly, a visionary, is one who can envision the future. For some groups this can involve the supernatural or drugs! The visionary state is achieved via meditation, drugs, lucid dreams, day dreams of art!
Not a great start, but fortunately Wiki further explains:
By extension, a visionary can also be a person with a clear, distinctive and specific (in some details) vision of the future
For me, the point as to whether a leader is a great visionary is not so important. What is important however, is that leader embrace and drive their vision. Great leaders are renowned for driving visions and for articulating and selling them as a part of doing this: these are both teachable skills.
Whether or not I am correct with this perspective, what is clear is that all leaders are at some point inspired by something that either leads them to identify a vision (and hence be the visionary) or otherwise embrace one that somewone else has seeded (for example - a mentor, a religious, political or social perspective… the types of ‘stumilants’ that Wiki mentions… or even market forces).
Needless to say, those leaders who do adopt a vision that someone else has seeded, frequently mold it into their own or otherwise participate in the creative processes that achieve this: both of these are also teachable skills (as deBono and others have made a career out of teaching us!)
