Elizabeth Barrette (ysabetwordsmith) wrote,
Elizabeth Barrette
ysabetwordsmith
  • Mood: busy

How to Herd Cats #2: Leadership

Today's installment of "How to Herd Cats: Essays on Pagan Leadership" is #2 "Leadership." In order to enjoy respectable and effective leadership, we need to understand how it works and what we want. Unexamined leadership is rarely positive. So let's consider ...

1) What is a Pagan leader?

2) What kinds of things do people want a Pagan leader to do?

3) What are some personality traits that suit someone for leadership roles in the Pagan community?

4) What are some skills that a Pagan leader needs?
Tags: community, daily spell, paganism, writing
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  • 12 comments
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ysabetwordsmith

Re: Yay!

ysabetwordsmith

April 22 2008, 06:08:30 UTC 13 years ago

It has been widely observed that many Pagans dislike the concept of leadership. (I'm not a big fan of hierarchy myself.) Often it's because they've had bad experiences with power abuse and wish to avoid repetitions of that. I think another key reason is that most Pagans are spiritual immigrants, and it takes a very strong-willed person to leave their childhood faith in search of something more suitable to their needs. Such people are more likely to be individualists, which makes it challenging for leaders. They get the idea that leadership is bad.

Trouble is, not examining leadership tends to have unsatisfactory results.

Deleted comment

ysabetwordsmith

Re: Yay!

ysabetwordsmith

April 22 2008, 16:48:15 UTC 13 years ago

There are lots of reasons why power abuse happens. One is that it's easier in a context where people aren't watching closely or don't know what warning signs to watch for.

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ysabetwordsmith

Re: Yay!

ysabetwordsmith

April 26 2008, 05:41:27 UTC 13 years ago

Power abuse can happen anywhere, but I think it happens more often in contexts where people don't pay careful attention to the organizational structures and processes. That's not just a power vacuum, it's a shenanigan vacuum.

Like you, I quickly become suspicious and resistant if demands are made without providing clear and sensible reasons. But when I treat people the way I'd like to be treated ... sometimes it works, and sometimes it just confuses and frustrates them. So your remarks about ascertaining the type of leadership needed by a particular group are very important. I have filed this under "Requests" and will get to it if I can. I do have some stuff planned for exploring leadership skills and techniques.