What type of leader was benjamin franklin

Another article on it would be of help. Thanks Gen. Satterfield for listening to us. I will step out on a limb and say that all six of these from Benjamin Franklin are worthy leader lessons that should be taken for face value. They work. If you cannot do them all, then you cannot be a good leader, period.

There is, of course, much more to being a leader but these are the keys to doing well in the long term. Use the best person for the task. Recognizing individual talent is a skill of effective leaders. Franklin, for example, was a consummate politician and persuader. Best of all six. Just my thinking. This is very hard to do but has the best outcome. Well written, thanks. But 2 and 6, now they are worthy of further discussion.

If possible, Gen. Satterfield, maybe you could add more here. Dennis, well said. US Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal wrote a book called Team of Teams. In that age, most people thought lightning was an instrument of God, used to punish people. He was curious.

How to capture it? In June of he and his son William flew a kite, and the link of lightning and electricity was confirmed. The effect of harnessing nature, thereby proving that lightning was not a supernatural event and could be understood, was a major revelation. It helped break the grip of dogma and superstition of the receding Dark Ages. The days of open inquiry and freedom from past ignorance were upon the Western world.

Even the conventional wisdom of repressive political institutions was to be challenged. The futurist Alvin Toffler author of Future Shock wrote, "Man's highest talent is the ability to learn, and then to unlearn and to relearn, when new ideas present themselves.

Franklin believed that change was the norm. And why not? It was everywhere around him. He saw that he could be a part of that change and influence change. Or he could be outside of change and be effected by it. He was excited by change and was able transfer that excitement to others.

The best way to create change, he said, is to get all people involved in the process … to be a part of the team. He never gave up. He always kept moving towards his goal, even when the odds were against him. He was a loyal subject of both the colonies and the English Crown, but when he was berated by Parliament for his role in colonial independence — he was called "Dr. Doubleface" by his English enemies — and stripped of his postmastership, he knew he would have to choose sides.

King George called Franklin the "evil genius of the revolution. Franklin arrived in France on December 3, with his grandsons, Bennie and Temple. He wore his plain fur hat in a royal court of powdered wigs.

He was warmly received as a common man's philosopher. Franklin rose from dead-end poverty. Determination enabled him, at age 42, to retire from his successful printing business. He was a determined problem-solver. And determination fired his powers of observation and deduction. Determination saw him tame lightning during his electrical experiments. Determination in his political life helped him grow from being a lobbyist for the Pennsylvania colony to becoming a co-signer of the Declaration of Independence, the Peace Treaty with England and the U.

Many of Franklin's achievements involved motivating other people towards his goals. He was successful in accomplishing many things because he enlisted the help of others. He rarely sought political office; however, his wide recognition as a man of good intentions brought these positions to him. The Pennsylvania Assembly sent Franklin to London as a political agent. He was to spend 16 years in London and nine in Paris. His immense prestige and persuasive manner and gentle humor were of great value in calming passions and resolving disputes.

As with many guerilla wars, the American rebels could not lose the Revolution, but they would have a hard time winning it. To win, they needed a powerful ally in Europe. England and France, of course, being the great super-powers of the time, were in mortal conflict with one another. France saw a chance to stick a needle into England's eye by supporting the rebel colonies.

Franklin went to France first in and then again in It was Franklin in France for the nine years from to who influenced King Louis XVI and his Foreign Minister, the Compte de Vergennes, to provide the mercenaries, the money and the munitions so vital to the American Revolution. Washington beat the British in Saratoga in , and then again at Monmouth. Soon afterwards the French recognized the new country on Feb.

Spain and then Holland entered the war. Franklin obtained for John Paul Jones a license to use French ports for his pirate raids against English shipping. The King said, "We help defend their liberties that we might defend our own. Franklin was immensely popular in France … when dolls of him became popular, he wrote to his daughter saying that he was being "i-doll-ized. He referred to himself as "Dr. His friends in France cautioned him that his valet was a spy and should be dismissed.

Franklin said, "You know he is a spy. I know he is a spy. But he does not know that we know he is a spy. There are some things I want the British to know. On September 14, he returned from France. He was so popular, in fact, that some of the more powerful people in the colony began to fear him.

When Franklin retired, he was comfortably wealthy. He was hardly rich, however, and seemed to be turning his back on a very lucrative business. While he remained very ambitious, it clearly was not money he wanted. He wanted, above all, to be respected as an intellectual. His first love was "philosophical investigation"—today we call it science. SparkTeach Teacher's Handbook.

Summary A Scientist and Leader. Page 1 Page 2. Summary By the end of the s, Franklin was well known as a civic leader. Commentary When Franklin retired, he was comfortably wealthy. Popular pages: Benjamin Franklin.

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