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    You are here Home » leadership

    The December 2013 Leadership Development Carnival: Leadership at the Movies Edition

    Last updated on Dec 2, 2013 by Dan McCarthy · This post may contain affiliate links

     
    The movies
    can be a rich source of leadership inspiration and help us identify role models
    and examples of leadership skills and characteristics that we can choose to
    develop.

    Back in 2008
    I wrote a post called “20
    Best Leadership Movies; Break Out the Popcorn
    ”. It’s been one of my
    all-time most viewed posts, and people still leave comments with their own
    favorite leadership movies.

    For this
    month’s Leadership Development Carnival, I asked my trusted network of
    leadership bloggers to answer the question:

    What is your favorite
    movie or movie scene that you would recommend to others to learn about
    leadership (or some specific aspect of leadership)?

    Here are their
    answers. Some I had on my list, and there are some I would have never thought
    of but will need to rent for some holiday viewing.

    Please feel
    free to add your own favorite as a comment, and who knows, maybe you’ll help
    inspire someone to be a better leader.

     
    1. Apollo 13 
     
     

    Submitted by Mary Faulkner, from Surviving Leadership:  “ There
    are some excellent examples out there, but one that I go back to time and again
    is the scene from Apollo 13 in
    which Ed Harris must redirect the Mission Control team away from the mission of
    landing on the moon and focus on the mission of saving the astronauts' lives.
     The clarity of purpose, how he supports an atmosphere of true
    brainstorming...all of the techniques used in the scene can be used as examples
    of leadership in action.”

     
    2. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

    Submitted by Jon Mertz, from Thin Difference: “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington shows how wide-eyed optimism and belief in
    people can be met with the steeliness of questionable motives. In these
    moments, we can run and hide or we can summon our inner courage and fight for
    our integrity and the integrity of higher purpose. Mr. Smith, as played by
    Jimmy Stewart, exemplifies leading with principle and taking on the machinery
    of questionable actions.”

     

     
    3.
    Star Wars

    Submitted by Dana Theus, from InPower Consulting: “To this day my favorite movie
    leadership advice is from Yoda in Star Wars. "Do. Or do not. There is no
    try." I believe Yoda's advice is an excellent expression of leadership
    integrity. Leaders with this kind of intense integrity are very specific about
    what they will and won't do, without wasting energy on guilt, and they ask
    their team for the same level of integrity. With this focus, the energy of the
    group becomes immediately efficient and focused. This is a particularly
    important strategy for managing individual and team stress. Here's a post I
    once wrote on this subject of using integrity to manage holiday stress.”

    4. Remember the Titans

     


    There were two votes for Remember the Titans, and it’s on my
    Top 20 list too.

     

    Submitted by Beth Armknecht Miller, from Executive Velocity:
    “
    One of my favorites is Remember the Titans. The specific leadership
    angle is building teams and appreciating diversity. Denzel Washington does a
    great job of depicting a coach who leads a team from dysfunctional to
    functional.”

    And also submitted by Lisa
    Kohn and Robyn McLeod
    from The Thoughtful
    Leaders Blog
    : "There are a great
    many movies that reflect on leadership, but I suppose my favorite is
    "Remember the Titans."  There are a few scenes where Denzel
    Washington, as a college football coach, strikes an amazing balance between
    hard and gentle leadership – and in the process develops leadership within his
    team and brings them together to excel.  While "Remember the
    Titans" is a moving drama, we can learn about leadership from less-weighty
    movies too.  Our post from a few years ago – Stupid movie lines and what they mean for leadership
    – reveals some of those."

     
    5. Henry V (1989)

    Submitted by Matt
    Paese
    , from Talent Management intelligence : “To learn about leadership, I recommend the
    movie Henry V (1989) with Kenneth Branagh as the title character delivering his
    St Crispin’s Day Speech. This speech preceded the battle in which 6000 British
    soldiers defeated 60,000 French soldiers who were fully armored and on
    horseback. The British had neither the armor nor the horses. Henry’s passionate
    and almost joyous speech, in the face of near-certain defeat and death,
    envisioned the promising future that victory would bring. It conveyed his faith
    in his own people and captured the hearts of men who stood little chance of
    winning, inspiring them forward to victory.”


     
     
    6. Wall Street

     
    Submitted by Miki
    Saxon
    , from MAPping Compnay Success:
    “There are those of us who don't go to
    movies or even watch them on TV. Then again, since leadership equals influence
    these days, perhaps I should offer up Gordon Gekko in Wall Street and his
    famous (infamous) "greed is good scenario. Never saw the movie, but know
    the scene well, as do we all. It certainly is proof that "leadership"
    can go either way.”

     
     
    7. Hoosiers

     

     

    Submitted by Joel
    Garfinkle
    , from Career
    Advancement Blog
    : “This article I
    wrote
    Feeling Equal to Someone Senior Than You mentions the movie
    Hoosiers. Here’s what I say:

    “…first thing the coach of the Hoosiers
    team does is take them to the huge arena where the state finals will be played.
    He asks his players to pull up a chair and measure the height of the hoop.
    "How tall is it?" he asks. They say ten feet. The coach asks them how
    tall is the basketball hoop in their tiny home gym. They reply, 10 feet. There
    is no difference to playing on the court at home and playing on the court in
    front of 20,000 people. There is no difference between someone senior than you,
    except what you make them to be.”  

    I think it’s an excellent example
    for the point I am making about seeing yourself as equal to someone who is more
    senior at the company.”

     

     
    8. The King’s Speech

     

    Submitted by Mary Jo
    Asmus
    , from Aspire-CS: “My favorite leadership movie is The King’s Speech. Although
    leadership is demonstrated by the obvious Duke of York (who steps up to become
    King George VI even though he doesn’t want the job) as he gains courage to
    speak despite his stammer, I think the less obvious leader is Lionel Logue, the
    Duke’s speech therapist.

    This therapist believed in himself
    and his ability to help the Duke. He remained unshakeable as he persisted to
    help the Duke break through his lifelong speech difficulties. Lionel did this
    not only with talent, but through creating and sustaining the relationship,
    persisting even when the Duke rejected him. Lionel could see the Duke’s
    potential, and was instrumental in helping him to emerge as an inspiring
    speaker and the King of England.

    This movie demonstrates that the
    best leaders believe in their employees, even when they don’t believe in
    themselves.”

     
     
    9. Philomena

     

     

    Submitted by Anna
    Farmery
    from The Engaging Brand:
    “Judi Dench is one of my favourite
    actresses and I have just been to see her in Philomena, a wonderful true story
    of love and betrayal. The scene that made me think hard about myself as a
    leader was towards the end when her character turned to the person who had
    betrayed her so badly and lied to her and said "I forgive you".

    I am sure not many of the audience
    would have done, yet in those 3 words she released the past mistakes and
    embraced the future. She accepted. She chose to learn from the past but not to
    hold on to the past. 

    So often in leadership we are faced
    with problems, mistakes from ourselves and others...and often the key part of
    moving forward is forgiveness. Forgiving yourself, forgiving those around you
    and even forgiving customers at times. Leaders who can learn forgiveness are
    not compromising, they are choosing not to hold on to the past and using it as
    fuel for future excellence.

    Great lesson for us all to consider
    especially at these holiday times.”

     

     
    10. Mr. Holland’s Opus

     
    Submitted by Karin
    Hurt
    , from Let’s Grow Leaders: “True
    leadership shows up in the lives we impact, often without realizing it.   The leadership of Mr. Holland....
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8E807R7GkI”

     
     
    11. Bridge on the River Kwai

     

     
    Submitted by Wally
    Bock
    , from Three Star
    Leadership
    : “I've never blogged about
    movies and leadership, because I think too many movies have superhero leaders
    or are about holding out when everyone seems to disagree. I don't think either
    of those is a good model for most leaders. The movie that has a lesson for just
    about every leader is Bridge on the River Kwai. It's too easy to get wrapped up
    in the details and handle them well while losing sight of the main objective.”

     
     
    12. Support Your Local Sheriff

     
    Submitted by S. Chris
    Edmonds
    , from Driving
    Results Through Culture
    : “One of my
    favorite movies was released in 1969: Support
    Your Local Sheriff
    with James Garner playing the lead role of Jason
    McCullough. He’s hired to be the sheriff of a Western town in the midst of a
    gold rush with the outlaw Danby clan taking advantage at every turn.

    Jason is calm and cool, and has a
    vision of how the town needs to be run. His leadership is steady &
    consistent. He recruits key players to his cause and deals with less than
    optimum resources (check out this clip of him seeing the new jailhouse: 

    http://movieclips.com/fYDe-support-your-local-sheriff-movie-inspecting-the-jail/).
    And, in the end, he defeats the outlaws and wins the girl.

    The leadership moral: Calm and cool
    can carry the day. Have a vision and a plan to make that vision a reality. Work
    the plan. Keep on keeping on!”

     
     
    13. Coach Carter

     

    Submitted by Mary Ila
    Ward
    , Horizon Point
    Consulting
    : “My favorite movie for
    Leadership (and career) Development is Coach
    Carter.  
    The reason I have chosen this movie is because of the
    following quote that one of his players stands up and shares after the coach
    has made a profound point with his players and the school board about
    priorities and what it means to be a leader:
             
      “Our deepest fear
    is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond
    measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.  We
    ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous-
    Actually, who are you not to be?  You are a child of God. Your playing
    small doesn’t serve the world.  There is nothing enlightening about
    shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.  We were
    born to manifest God within us. It is not just in some of us, it is in
    everyone. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other
    people permission to do the same.”

    The irony in servant leadership is
    that leaders serve others through shining their light, not extinguishing it.
     And when they do, they start a fire.  
    Your Light is a blog post about this concept.”

     

     
    14. Heartbreak Ridge
     
    Submitted by Mike Henry, Lead Change Group: “One of my
    favorite movies to teach the contrast between leadership and management is
    Heartbreak Ridge starring Clint Eastwood at Gunnery Sergeant Tom Highway.
    One scene is when the division is readying for emergency deployment. The Major
    is instructing the supply sergeant, "I want every round of ammo accounted
    for."  GS Highway requests night vision goggles and he's told to fill
    out the proper forms.  At that moment, the General comes up ans asks how
    the process is going.  Highway doesn't hesitate.  In front of his
    Major, he replies to the general that he believes the whole effort to be a
    "cluster-flop" (in the PG rated version). 
    Throughout the movie, Highway leads from who he is, problems and all, by
    putting his job and his men first.  He speaks truth to power and stands up
    for what he knows to be right.”

     

     
    15. It's a Wonderful Life
     
    From Dan McCarthy,
    Great Leadership: “While I don’t have a
    single favorite, given it’s the holiday season, I’ll have to go with my favorite
    holiday movie, It’s a Wonderful Life. The leadership lesson here is that even
    the most “ordinary” leaders has the ability to have a significant impact on
    those that they lead.”
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