新gre写作题库：GRE作文范文大全（57）
Whether effective leadership requires that a leader consistently follow his or her principles and
objectives is a complex issue--one that is tied up in the problem of defining effective leadership
in the first place. In addressing the issue it is helpful to consider, in turn, three distinct forms of
leadership: business, political, and social-spiritual.
In the business realm, effective leadership is generally defined, at least in our corporate
culture, as that which achieves the goal of profit maximization for a firm's shareholders or other
owners. Many disagree, however, that profit is the appropriate measure of a business leader's
effectiveness. Some detractors claim, for example, that a truly effective business leader must
also fulfill additional duties--for example, to do no intentional harm to their customers or to the
society in which they operate. Other detractors go further--to impose on business leaders an
affirmative obligation to yield to popular will, by protecting consumers, preserving the natural
environment, promoting education, and otherwise taking steps to help alleviate society's
problems.
Whether our most effective business leaders are the ones who remain consistently
committed to maximizing profits or the ones who appease the general populace by
contributing to popular social causes depends, of course, on one's own definition of business
success. In my observation, as business leaders become subject to closer scrutiny by the
media and by social activists, business leaders will maximize profits in the long term only by
taking reasonable steps to minimize the social and environmental harm their businesses
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cause. Thus the two definitions merge, and the statement at issue is ultimately correct.
In the political realm the issue is no less complex. Definitions of effective political leadership
are tied up in the means a leader uses to wield his or her power and to obtain that power in the
first place. Consider history's most infamous tyrants and despots--such as Genghis Khaan,
Stalin, Mao, and Hider. No historian would disagree that these individuals were remarkably
effective leaders, and that each one remained consistently committed to his tyrannical
objectives and Machiavellian principles. Ironically, it was stubborn commitment to objectives
that ultimately defeated all except Khan. Thus in the short term stubborn adherence to one's
objectives might serve a political leader's interest in preserving his or her power; yet in the long
term such behavior invariably results in that leader's downfall if the principles are not in
accord with those of the leader's would-be followers.
Finally, consider social-spiritual leadership. Few would disagree that through their ability to
inspire others and lift the human spirit Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King were
eminently effective in leading others to effect social change through civil disobedience. It
seems to me that this brand of leadership, in order to be effective, inherently requires that the
leader remain steadfastly committed to principle. Why? It is commitment to principle that is the
basis for this brand of leadership in the first place. For example, had Gandhi advocated civil
disobedience yet been persuaded by dose advisors that an occasional violent protest might be
effective in gaining India's independence from Britain, no doubt the result would have been
immediate forfeiture of that leadership. In short, social-spiritual leaders must not be hypocrites;
otherwise, they will lose all credibility and effectiveness. 感谢您阅读《GRE作文范文大全（57） 》一文，出国留学网(liuxue86.com)编辑部希望本文能帮助到您。
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