Friday, January 31, 2003

Landmark plans leadership culture

"There is a crisis of leadership in American society; the nation is being guided, not by leaders but by managers and its condition could be described as being over-managed and under-led," writes Tom Marshall in his book "Understanding Leadership."

With this in mind, Landmark Christian School will begin next fall implementing a plan to develop an intentional leadership culture that spans the curriculum.

"This nationwide crisis has caused us to evaluate our leadership training at Landmark and prompted us to begin the process of creating an intentional leadership culture," said Mike Titus, Landmark's dean of students. "The word culture is important, we do not want leadership training to be something we do, but rather we want leadership training to be who we are. Anyone who knows anything about Chick-fil-A knows that great service is not what Chick-fil-A does, it is what they are. Chick-fil-A has developed a culture of great service. In the same way, at Landmark, we want to develop a culture of great leadership."

This month, a group of faculty members and key leaders from the Landmark community are meeting to (1) define leadership Landmark style, and (2) identify Landmark's leadership core values. From there, faculty and staff will receive leadership training in an effort to intentionally "weave" leadership development into all areas of the school; that students would develop leadership skills in the classroom, on the stage, on the court, and in every area of the Landmark educational experience.

"With every crisis comes great opportunities and Landmark definitely sees this as a great opportunity," said Titus. "What better way to meet this national cry for leadership than with kids who can not only lead our country and our companies, but who will do it in a way that impacts the world for Jesus Christ?"