John Bell - Some Achieve Greatness

How are we to endure this global leadership drought?

Theres a reason we often use the word Shakespearean to describe dramatic times: William Shakespeare is our best analyst of human behaviour and motivation. A man well acquainted with turmoil, he produced works bristling with wit, profound empathy and a deep understanding of the best and worst of our nature. His words still ring with relevance today; they might just contain some of the answers were looking for.

Australians are weary of the farcical spectacle of mid-term prime ministers being shoved through the revolving door, scandalous failures of governance in financial institutions and the moral abyss in Church stewardship. Throughout the mess of Brexit, chaotic unpredictability of the Trump administration and Covid-19 the gravest leadership challenge since World War II stable, reliable, sensible leadership has been in short supply.

Having spent a great deal of the last seventy-something years studying, performing and directing Shakespeares plays, John Bell has absorbed timeless lessons in life, character and leadership from the Bard and put these to good use running two successful theatre companies. Some Achieve Greatness presents invaluable lessons to help us navigate this unpredictable time.

Some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon em.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, TWELFTH NIGHT

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First published in 2021 by Pantera Press Pty Limited

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Text copyright John Bell, 2021

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ISBN 978-0-6487488-8-5 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-0-6487488-9-2 (eBook)

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Some are born great, some achieve greatness and
some have greatness thrust upon em.

William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

That some achieve greatness, is proof to all that
others can achieve it as well.

Abraham Lincoln

CONTENTS

SHAKESPEARE ON INTEGRITY

This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.

Hamlet

INTRODUCTION

Leadership is not a person or a position. It is a process and a complex moral relationship that ought to be based on trust, obligation, commitment, emotion and a shared vision of the good.

Joanne B. Ciulla

For the last twenty years or more the cry on everybodys lips has been Leadership! Around the globe people have been yelling about it, demanding it, begging for it. From the farcical spectacle of short-lived Australian prime ministers shoving each other through the revolving door, scandalous failures of governance in Australias financial institutions and the Australian Defence Force, and the moral abyss in church leadership, to the mess of Brexit and the after-effects of the chaotic Trump administration, stable, reliable, sensible leadership has been in short supply.

Then in early 2020 the world faced its greatest leadership challenge since World War II: COVID-19 hit the planet Earth like a meteor and, before we could blink, had become a pandemic. World leaders reacted in ways that would define each of them, some surprisingly, some not. Most European heads of state reacted strongly but too slowly. The most inept leaders like Trump and Brazils Bolsonaro went straight to their default positions of denial, cover-up and misinformation, with catastrophic outcomes for their populations and economies. China, the supposed source of the virus, struck a posture of outraged innocence.

Amazingly, Australia, whose politics over the last couple of decades has been defined by ugly and juvenile infighting, responded in a way that could serve as a model to the rest of the world. Prime Minister Scott Morrison proclaimed a pandemic way ahead of the World Health Organization and we saw a novel and extremely welcome bipartisan response across the Commonwealth. State premiers handled the lockdown, social distancing, self-isolation and a gradual easing of restrictions firmly, each according to local conditions. Expert advice from the medical fraternity was sought, accepted and acted on. The public was kept well informed as to what was happening and why. And they responded, for the most part, with generosity and a sense of pride in their social cohesion. New Zealand, strongly led by Jacinda Ardern, was similarly successful.

As I write this, in late 2020, the pandemic is far from over and every country, including Australia, is on the alert for further waves of infection. But so far the whole episode has proved to be a reassuring example of what decisive, sensible and inclusive leadership can achieve, not only at the top, but all the way down the line. You dont have to be a prime minister to be a leader. You might be a local fire chief, school principal or manager at a McDonalds outlet.

Reaching for hyperbole to describe seismic events, the media often resort to the word Shakespearean. And indeed we can learn a lot from William Shakespeare (15641616) about leadership good and bad. Besides being a genius whose mind could encompass great vistas of the imagination, he had an acute sense of historical perspective and an uncanny psychological intuition that enabled him to look deep into peoples innermost beings and to do it with wit, empathy and a complete lack of sentimentality.

His career as an actor and dramatist meant he spent every waking moment observing and analysing peoples behaviour and rendering it on a public stage before a critical, discriminating and highly sophisticated audience. As head of the theatrical troupe favoured by Queen Elizabeth and King James, he spent a lot of time close to the seat of power, with an opportunity to observe all the facets of leadership that determined the day-to-day government of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England.