by Crystal Apilado
Staff Writer
La Verne community members gathered together at the President’s Dining Hall Thursday, May 4, for a coffee-hour conversation with Stephen M. Dobbs, co-author of the book “Leaders Who Make a Difference.”
Dobbs was invited to the University of La Verne as a special guest in part of a series of coffee gatherings sponsored by the Master of Science Program in Leadership and Management.
Dobbs discussed ideas from his book about the definitions of a leader, what makes a leader, what a leader may be expected to do and different types of leaders.
“There are leaders who don’t make a difference,” said Dobbs.
“There are people who hold titles, like president and manager, that are thought to be associated as leader positions. However, just because a person holds that title, doesn’t necessarily mean that the person is a leader,” said Dobbs.
He discussed that a conflict of being a leader may depend on what one is the leader of. He said that one would not be proud of being the leader of the top worst firms or the leader of the top 10 worst dressed celebrities.
Dobbs invited the audience members’ perspectives into his discussion of what characteristics a leader would possess.
He mentioned that today’s society is constantly bombarded with and has grown accustomed to believing that leaders are the most popular, the richest, the fastest and the best. He gave the example of how celebrities are the comparison to who the leaders are in today’s society.
“What are the leading American companies?” Dobbs asked the audience.
“How would you go about answering that question? What would you use as your criteria for deciding in the domain of commerce what are the leading American companies?” he continued to question.
Dobbs mentioned that some of the criteria that society may consider in what makes a company a leader is the amount of money a company brings in or has, the promise of money that a company makes, the size of a business and the image of concern or of a contribution to a greater good.
Dobbs also discussed the differences and requirements of a leader in a profit organization and a non-profit organization.
“The non-profit leader is motivated by something different from the profit leader,” said Dobbs.
Dobbs explained how the non-profit leader needs to be able to build relationships for specific purposes and need to be able to communicate with people because the celebrity culture causes challenges for non-profit to be recognized in the shadow of bigger well known organizations.
He also discussed how non-profit organizations need to be able to fix problems and set new goals.
Dobbs went on to discuss the importance of volunteers to a non-profit organization.
He reflected on how some organizations don’t use volunteers to their fullest. Some non-profit organizations use volunteers to write out a check instead of for the community service that volunteers are offering to perform.
“Get involved, but let others in also,” said Dobbs.
Referring to his book, Dobbs discussed that leaders wear different hats, but can only wear one hat at a time and need to able to change the hat when needed.
“The engine has fixed while on the track,” said Dobbs as he compared a leaders job to the job of a pit team during a car race.
Dobbs listed the six hats from the book as being vision, strategic, change agent coach, politician and fundraiser as examples to the audience.
He also discussed each hats purpose and how it applies to leadership.
Dobbs spoke of philanthropy, giving three different examples of it in the business aspect.
The street definition of it is of a group who is rich and gives money to show their materialism. The second example is how volunteers give their personal time and talent to help others. While the third example he described is the giving of a giving spirit. Giving back to mankind.
“How big of a part of leadership is passion?” asked Dobbs as he challenged an audience members statement.
According to Dobbs, in order for passion to be useful in leadership, that passion needs to be directed towards something; it needs to have a purpose.
Dobbs shared the example of his experience in observing the leadership involved in the Harlem Boys Choir.
He was amazed how a single man could take a group of boys from a rough neighborhood and bring them together to perform for special events nationwide.
“It shows up in the unexpected places,” said Dobbs about leadership.
“Everyone has it within them to be a leader in some part of their lives, said Dobbs. “Young people need to explore the opportunities for themselves.”
