[讨论] AI33 第一次写issue，高手能否给把把关？

33. "People are likely to accept as a leader only someone who has demonstrated an ability to perform the same tasks that he or she expects others to perform."

Discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the opinion stated above. Support your views with reasons and/or examples from your own experience, observations, or reading.

I strongly agree that people are likely to accept a leader who has demonstrated an ability to perform the same tasks as he or she expects others to perform. The prerequisite of becoming a good leader is to gain followers' trust. By displaying the ability to carry out his or her followers' tasks is the most effective way to achieve that goal. Furthermore, in the process, the leader can gain a new prospective of strength and weakness of his team and therefore, help him make better decisions in the future.

In the first place, the reason why I agree with the opinion is that trust between a leader and his followers is vital to the success of the overall operation. Without trust, a leader's vision and commands are unlikely to be carried out. Hence, a failure in leadership resulted from lacking hands-on experience can create a disastrous consequence. For instance, the result outing of Michael Brown, the director of FEMA serves as a good example. Michael Brown, a career lawyer and politician, lacks the fundamental administrative and coordinative skills that are required during emergency relief operations. In the aftermath of Katrina Hurricane, Michael Brown was simply unable to organize effective and responsive relief efforts. His incompetence sent a wrong message to his fellow admistrators. Not believing Michael Brown can oversee the relief campaign, his followers lost trust in him and refused to follow his commands. Hence, the situation in New Orleans became worse a few days after hurricane landed. Given the example above, it is obvious that a leader must earn his followers' trust by demonstrating he is at par in their skills.

In the second place, much evidence has shown that carrying out the same task as followers do, a leader will have a better understanding of the human resources he has in hands. Thus, the future plan can be tailored based on the strength of these resources. One of the counter examples is to have someone who does not have any engineering background to lead an engineering team. This case is more often proven to be a catastrophe than success. Imagine a leader who does not understand the pros and cons of engineering. Therefore, he does not have an accurate view of his team's strength and leads the team in the direction based on his assumption and belief not on the pragmatism. He is doubtful to deliver the promised service in time. Hence, another equally important aspect is that performing the same jobs as people to gain practical experience.

Given the reasons discussed above, we may safely arrive at the conclusion that a leader must display an ability to do his followers' work in order to earn their acceptance. Without doing so, a leader will not be successful.