Leading Minds

July 3, 1995
In a novel analysis of leadership, writing with Project Zero staff member Laskin, Harvard education professor Gardner defines a leader as one who successfully imparts a central message or story to a receptive audience. In their framework, Eleanor Roosevelt exemplified the ``story'' that a woman of ordinary appearance could improve the lot of the disadvantaged and refute the misconception that only men can lead. Martin Luther King Jr. embodied the precept that African Americans must stand up nonviolently for their rights. The authors differentiate visionaries--leaders who create new stories, such as Gandhi and Jean Monnet, architect of a unified Europe--from such innovative leaders as Margaret Thatcher, who identify a theme latent in the population but neglected over the years and give it a new twist. Other leaders on whom they focus are George Marshall, Margaret Mead, J. Robert Oppenheimer, Pope John XXIII, former General Motors president Alfred P. Sloan Jr. and educator Robert Hutchins. This study will repay the close attention of aspiring leaders in many fields. Photos.