Leadership

[Dr Jekyll]

Suppose you have a group of say 10 people trying to work out how to deal with a situation. Most can't come up with anything but Fred suggests option A and Tom suggests option B.

After some discussion the rest of the group fall in behind Tom and apply option B, ignoring Fred.

It turns out Tom has overlooked something Fred spotted, so Fred was correct.

Which one would be the best team leader? Fred obviously can't get people to listen, but Tom apparently doesn't listen. Fred would be pretty fed up and being told to follow Tom, but you can't really make him a team leader until he can get people to listen to him.

[Dr Jekyll]

I suspect I'm sometimes a Fred, hardly ever a Tom.

The idea of backing up Fred with authority sounds a good one in any case, he'll probably grow into the job.

[Dr Jekyll]

The problem with Tom is not just that he had the wrong idea, but that he wouldn't listen to Fred.

[Dr Jekyll]

So assume it's a general trend rather than just one situation.