On a personal level, it provided me with an opportunity to experience an epiphany that so rarely comes along during one's professional work. This group had an obvious intellectual and emotional understanding of what constitutes leadership behavior - more than any other group with whom I have worked over the past decade. The answer became immediately obvious. Leadership enabled South African NGOs to survive the darker days of apartheid and, unfortunately, crisis accelerates leadership development. Since NGOs were often incubated and maintained in response to the government's repression, there now exists an incredible wealth of competent leadership among those in the NGO system.
American managers are usually competent in th role of manager but require development in leadership.
By contrast, our friends from the NGOs are highly competent leaders who acknowledge their developmental needs in management. Currently, all participants are working on their Organizational Improvement Project which they initiated for their organizations upon returning home. The projects were to be completed by February and the group reassembled in South Africa in early March to discuss their organizational and personal progress.