num_pages: 473
description: Are leaders born or made? Where does ambition come from? How does adversity affect the growth of leadership? Does the leader make the times or do the times make the leader? In Leadership Goodwin draws upon the four presidents she has studied most closelyAbraham Lincoln Theodore Roosevelt Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon B. Johnson (in civil rights)to show how they recognized leadership qualities within themselves and were recognized as leaders by others. By looking back to their first entries into public life we encounter them at a time when their paths were filled with confusion fear and hope.Leadership tells the story of how they all collided with dramatic reversals that disrupted their lives and threatened to shatter forever their ambitions. Nonetheless they all emerged fitted to confront the contours and dilemmas of their times. No common pattern describes the trajectory of leadership. Although set apart in background abilities and temperament these men shared a fierce ambition and a deep-seated resilience that enabled them to surmount uncommon hardships. At their best all four were guided by a sense of moral purpose. At moments of great challenge they were able to summon their talents to enlarge the opportunities and lives of others.
language: English
title: Leadership: In Turbulent Times
publisher: Simon & Schuster