There are, however, those obstacles to communication that can not be overcome. An example of these obstacles is structural or institutional systems. Granted that these obstacles can possibly be fixed, there is a reason that these systems are there in the first place. A lower enlisted member of the Army can not walk into a general's office and let them know why a certain operation is not going to work on the ground.
Hopefully, in this example the problem would be fixed before it snowballed into a problem that got too much momentum to be stopped. This chain-of-command can be found in Department of the Army Pamphlet 10-1 Organization of the United States Army, with that lower enlisted soldier's message having to go through five levels of leadership before it is received by that general .
Yet another problem with this particular system is the gossip factor. When a message moves through that many different people with their different interpretations of the message, the message that finally gets to its intended recipient is rarely congruent with the original message that was volunteered. Moreover, the general can not speak to every one of his soldiers and be completely understood, nor does he have the time to have an open-door policy which has proven to be an astoundingly successful leadership technique.
One of the most important things that a leader must possess is the trust of their followers. Trust is one of the many important benefits of being a good communicator. The upward communication that is so critical to the success of any organization will not be adequate if the leader can not be trusted; however, trust only comes with satisfactory communication. It is important to remember that although a good leader is creative they also have to be slightly predictable to gain some peoples' trust. Consistency is what makes people willing to put their trust in someone.
An additional trait of a superior leader is having that vision that you want to convey. There has to be a roadmap to your goal. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. beautifully expresses his vision for the equality of the American people both at the time of his speech and in his kids' future in the speech “I have a Dream” .
It is obviously established that Dr. King had both a great vision and the tools needed to paint a picture in our minds of that goal. Also, Dr. King knew that non-violent protesting was the necessary path to the goal that he had set in front of America. mindtools.com tells us:
“The process of setting goals helps you choose where you want to go in life. By knowing precisely what you want to achieve, you know where you have to concentrate your efforts. You'll also quickly spot the distractions that would otherwise lure you from your course. More than this, properly-set goals can be incredibly motivating, and as you get into the habit of setting and achieving goals, you'll find that your self-confidence builds fast.”
This means that these goals or visions can be successful in all aspects of life and not just the business or political arena. The problem is that some people are intimidated by their own goals or goals that have been set for them by their leaders. However, Ralph Waldo Emerson is quoted in the book Lessons from the Top: The Search for America's Best Business Leaders by Thomas J. Neff and James M. Citrin as saying “Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.”
Then a person could argue that leadership is only giving someone what they want. When a large corporation makes money from you being their employee, they must be giving what you want or you would not be willing to let them make money from your efforts. When a teacher gives a child praise because they got an arithmetic problem correct, this teacher is giving this child what they want in the form of recognition.
Nevertheless, this form of leadership is not always practical. That same teacher does not give that same child all the candy that they can eat after solving that arithmetic problem because it is going to hurt their ability to lead that child throughout the rest of the day and could be harmful to the child no matter what the child thinks they want.
The difficulty for some people is to discern between the two options. Some would say that giving the child the candy that they want should make the child want to get that reward again and try that much harder at studying. Yet anyone who has seen a young child who has just binged on sugar will know that the child is going to have a hard time focusing on the tasks that they are assigned.
