The Art of Leadership
By Dag Heward-Mills
A leader may use his creativity or he may not. But a good leader will use his creativity. This will be seen in the innovations, inventions and ideas that men come up with. Remember, God created man in His image and therefore man is innately creative!
History Shows the Impact of Creativity
- How Venice and Holland Became Rich through Creative Activities
Spain was one of the great seafaring nations of Europe. You will realize that most of South America and Latin America speak Spanish. This is because they were invaded by the Spaniards who came there in search of gold.
But it became clear to observers in the mid-1500s that the enormous wealth, made up of gold and silver flowing into Spain, through their ships returning from South America, just flowed out again and ended up in two places – Venice and Holland.
Why did this flow of gold and silver finally end up in these two places? What distinguished Venice and Holland where so much of the Spanish gold ended up? The answer was simple. Venice and Holland had hardly any arable land for agriculture. Both of these places are well known for their swamps and water locked lands. But they had an extensive and diversified industry. The realization spread through Europe that the real gold mines of the world were not the physical gold mines in South America but in the manufacturing industry.
Anders Berch (1747), the first economics professor in Sweden, also stated, “The real gold mines are the manufacturing industries. Italy is a country in which there is no important gold or silver mine and so is France: yet both countries are rich in money and treasure; thanks to industry.”
In various forms, the statement that “manufacturing is the real gold mine” is proven all over Europe.
- 4. How King Henry VII Made England Wealthy by Ensuring Creativity through Industrialization
King Henry VII of England, who came to power in 1485 had spent his childhood and youth with an aunt in Burgundy in Europe. There he observed great affluence in an area with woolen textile production. Both the wool and the material used to clean it were imported from England.
When Henry later took over his destitute realm of England, he remembered his adolescence on the continent. In Burgundy not only the textile producers, but also the bakers and the other craftsmen were well off. England was in the wrong business of farming. The king decided on a policy to turn England into a textile-producing nation, and not an exporter of raw materials.
Henry VII created extensive policies to ensure that England would shift from diminishing returns activities to industrial activities.
- He introduced export duties to discourage the export of raw materials from England to force the people of England to manufacture wool instead of exporting raw materials.
- He gave tax exemptions to anyone who would manufacture wool from the raw materials.
- He attracted craftsmen from Holland and Italy who would take up manufacturing in England.
In the eighteenth century Daniel Defoe and other historians saw the wisdom in this strategy which they labelled the ‘Tudor Plan’ after the kings and queens from that family. Like Venice and Holland, and by the same methods, England prospered from the triple incomes of their industries, raw materials and overseas trade.
- How Creativity, Industrialization and Increasing Returns Activities Drove Malaria out of Europe
Malaria was endemic in Europe for centuries, and the fight against this disease is already documented from the times of the Roman Empire. Historically, malaria was present in areas no one today would associate with: Swiss Alpine valleys as high as 1400 metres above sea level were infested with malaria in the Middle Ages, and the disease had been found as far north as the Kola Peninsula in north-western Russia, beyond the Polar Circle.
Europe got rid of its malaria through industrialization and development.
More advanced and intensive agriculture caused swamps to be drained, and irrigation canals – even hydro-electric power plants – meant that the type of stagnat water where malaria thrived was incompatible with economic development. Huge public health works and eradication systems also freed Europe from malaria.
In the place of this economic development that made Europe rich and malaria-free, Africa continues to keep a colonial economic structure that mainly exports raw materials.
Remember you can be creative because God, your creator, is creative:
And God said, LET US MAKE MAN IN OUR IMAGE, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowls of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So GOD CREATED MAN IN HIS OWN IMAGE, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. Genesis 1:26-27
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