There are many discussions online that seem to serve very little purpose. They are dysfunctional discussions. They seem to have gone on like forever, and continue their meandering path with little or no fruitfulness as a result. Perhaps Sam Walter Foss’ “The Calf Path” says it all too well. People tend to imbibe other people’s dogmas and adopt them as their own. It would be well if they called them their own dogmas, but they seem to enjoy forcing their thinking on others, and they either stunt the growth of others as a result, or they make themselves highly remarkable buffoons in the process. Here are a few dysfunctional discussions.

Leaders vs managers.

Stop it. Management is one of the functions of a leader, and if your job is primarily to manage, whether in a role akin to stewardship or otherwise, you had better have great leadership attributes and competencies as well!

Born or made.

Leaders are made. Period. Everyone is born with the potential for leadership regardless of styles. How you turned out depends on how you responded to the many opportunities presented to you as you were growing as a human being. Airy-fairy notions of “Born to it” have caused enough devastation in the form of racial segregation, eugenics, crimes against humanity and other unnecessary evils. Your pedigree has nothing to do with your eulogy.

Train or develop.

I am thinking that people who engage in these sorts of discussions are merely trying to get others to see them as some sort of authority on the subject simply because they seem to have an endless capacity for persiflage and bloviation. Training is part of the development process, and it is required at some time or other as and when appropriate. Go develop a brain surgeon without training if you like. I wager you won’t want him operating on YOUR brain.

So, stop engaging in dysfunctional discussions and start engaging people in developmental discussions instead. There are many generative gaps where growth is sorely needed. Stop wasting your time on things that don’t matter.