Gandhi Was a Leader By: Stephanie George

Introduction: A transformational leader wants change and sticks to the vision and works towards their goal. Transformational leaders achieve change by doing the 4 following steps: Challenging the process, Inspiring a shared vision, Enabling others to act, and Modeling the way. The first is challenging the process which is finding something that could be improved or that needs to be changed within a society. Next a leader must inspire a shared vision. This is when a leader allows others to see what needs to be changed and help them see how this change will affect them personally. Then the leader must enable others to act. This means that the leader must give the people the necessary tools they need to make the change. The leader tells the people what they need to do so that they can make the change happen. Lastly, the leader must model the way. The leader needs to demonstrate how to make changes. The leader does what he tells the people to do. Gandhi was a transformational leader because at some point he did all of those steps to achieve independence for his people.

Overview The purpose of this presentation is to show examples of how Gandhi was a transformational leader. Gandhi used transformational leadership to gain India’s independence and stop the civil war. Gandhi knew that something needed to be changed, that his country needed freedom Gandhi shared this vision with his people and made it clear to them that independence was a necessity. He showed them how to achieve freedom. He planned everything that they did to do so. Gandhi modeled the way for his followers. He showed his followers how to be non violent and non cooperative.

British Occupation There was a lack of Indian economic independence. Challenge The Process: In the film, the very first problem that Gandhi noticed was that he was unable to sit in first class. He noticed there was some racism going on and it needed to be changed Inspired a Shared Vision: In the film Gandhi got the people to see this issue by having a protest rally. During this rally they burned the passes that only non- whites were able to have. Gandhi told the people “We’re all children of God” in order for them to see that racism was not ok and that it would affect them.

British Occupation Cont. Enabling Others: In the film Gandhi provides his people with the tools needed to fix this issue. He starts building communities and putting the issues in the newspaper. Modeling the Way: In the film Gandhi does what he tells his followers to do. He tells them to burn the passes during the rally and he also does. Even when told to stop Gandhi continues to burn the passes. Gandhi takes a beating for this behavior and gets arrested, all to show his followers how to make a change.

British Occupation Cont. Challenge the Process: During the film Gandhi notices another issue that needs to be changed while he is touring India. He notices Poverty. Inspire a Shared Vision: In the film Gandhi makes a speech to help his followers see the issue. The focus of the speech was his concern about people who were starving. He also talked about how the people trying to kick Britain out of power only want the power for themselves.

British Occupation cont. Enable Others to Act: In the film Gandhi tells his followers what not to do to solve poverty. He tells them that terrorism, derailing trains, and killing people will not win “home rule Model the Way: In the film Gandhi demonstrates non-cooperation with British authority when he had an incident with an officer who did not want him in his part of the country. When asked to leave and pay bail by a judge Gandhi refuses.

British Occupation Cont. Enable Others to Act: In the followers Gandhi told his followers how to act toward British tyranny in order to change it. He told the people to never submit to unjust British laws, and to resist actively and provocatively and to embarrass the British. He told them to change their minds but to not kill. Model the Way: Gandhi models his method of protesting by organizing a strike and by getting arrested and willingly going to jail.

British Occupation Cont. Inspire a Shared Vision: In the film Gandhi tries to convince the British that change is needed. He tells the British to leave because there are 350 million Indians and 100,000 British. He says that the Indians should be able to deal with own problems and not be humiliated and controlled. Gandhi tells the British that the Indians would prefer their own bad government over a foreign one. Enable Others to Act: Gandhi suggest that everyone stop buying from the British and start making their own clothing in order to solve the problem of imported cloth taking income away from the Indians. Model the Way: In the film when violence starts to break out Gandhi models his non-violent method of protest by ending the campaign and fasting until the people stop rioting. Another way Gandhi models the way is when he’s in court in the film he urges the court to punish him to the full extent of the law.

British Occupation Cont. Challenge the process: In the film Mohammed Jinnah proposes that Pakistan and India separate. Inspire a Shared Vision: After this news gets around an angry crowd protests outside Gandhi’s ashram and he tells them that he’s Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Christian, and tells them all that they are all children of God to inspire non-violence. Enable Others to Act: In the film, Gandhi offers Jinnah prime minister ship in an attempt to enable the Muslim minority to take part in a unified India and to prevent the country from splitting into two nations. Model the Way: Gandhi protests the rioting and civil war between Hindu and Muslim groups by fasting until the point of death.

Characteristics of a transformational Leader Gandhi showed the characteristic Idealized Influence in the film. Gandhi acted as a role model in many ways in the film. One way he did this was by doing the things he told his followers to do. For example in the film Gandhi tells his followers to burn the passes when there was racism going on and Gandhi acted as a role model and burned the passes with them.

Characteristics of a Transformational Leader Cont. Gandhi portrayed inspirational motivation. Gandhi motivates his followers to act a certain way in the film. For example in the film Gandhi told his followers how to solve problems like the cloth issue he told them how to act in order to solve it. He inspired them to make a change and to stop buying from the British.

Characteristics of Transformational Leader Cont. Gandhi portrayed the characteristic Intellectual Stimulation. He encouraged change of values and made the problems in India well known. Gandhi wanted his people not to be violent. For example in the film when his followers began to be violent Gandhi made sure they knew it was wrong by fasting until they stopped.

Characteristics Cont. Gandhi shows individual consideration through out the film. He attends to the needs of his followers and acts as a mentor. For example, Gandhi sees that there are changes that need to be made like poverty and he helps his followers make these changes. He acts as a mentor and gives a speech about the poverty to make everyone aware of it because he cares about his people and doesn’t want to see them suffer.

Conclusion A transformational leader knows what they want to change and inspires their followers and achieves their goals. Gandhi showed he was a transformational leader in many ways. He shared his vision of independence and made everyone see the issues that occurred in India and showed them how to achieve it and modeled the way for them. Gandhi believed in his country to achieve their goal and he did anything and everything to inspire them to want change. Gandhi was not only a transformational leader but he was a hero for his people.