Leadership: John Muir

Manager, motivator, director, president, captain... these titles are often times used interchangeably with the term leader but most people do not really understand what a leader is and how it differs from other roles. Many people confused managers and leaders as the same role requiring the same set of skills. While both managing and leading are integral parts of one another they are very different. Managing typically consists of tasks such as organizing, planning, and enforcing rules and procedures whereas leadership is commonly associated with risk-taking, creativity, motivation, change and vision (Hughes, Ginnett, Curphy, 2012). Most commonly a leader is defined as a person who influences the thoughts and behaviors of other. To be a leader you must have followers. A leader establishes the direction for others to follow them. Leadership is seen in a variety of different settings such as in businesses, teams, clubs, community groups, church and other organizations. Leaders fill many roles such as interacting, communicating, motivating, solving conflicts, setting goals, planning strategies, and guiding behaviors to reach desired outcomes.

As expressed earlier, leaders can be in all different forms in a variety of organizations. John Muir is well known in history as one of America's greatest conservation leaders. While he is probably not one of the top ten names that come to mind when you think of influential and successful leaders in history he most definitely was a very effective leader in a subject that motivated him. Through Muir's preaching of conservation from 1870-1914 he effectively forced Americans to think about the damage they were causing to the nation's beautiful lands and wildlife (Peterson, 1994). Although far from your traditional leader, Muir successfully motivated many Americans to make changes to how they treated the environment.

Muir is best known for his influence on Yosemite National Park. He "helped to draw up its proposed boundaries in 1889, wrote magazine articles that led to its creation in 1890 and co-founded the Sierra Club in 1892 to protect it" (Perrottet, 2008).