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What can this painting tell us about leadership in the COVID-19 era?
Jun 1, 2020
Like the crews in Hokusai's masterpiece, those on the COVID-19 frontlines are today fighting towering waves. But - just as the sailors can spot Mount Fuji - they do so because they have a strong sense of purpose. Theirs, then, is a lesson in leadership for all.
There’s a painting hanging beside my desk. I keep it there because when I’m faced with a challenge, it gives me inspiration. Today, I look at it and think maybe I’ve kept it all these years to help me precisely in this moment.
It is The Great Wave Off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai. I cannot imagine a better depiction of our current crisis.
We are fighting rough waves at the moment. Every day, there are more challenges. For frontline employees in healthcare and senior care, especially, it is an exhausting and unrelenting battle.
Have you read? COVID-19: How leaders can create a new and better normal
That’s how I originally understood the Great Wave when I first saw it as a teenager. The towering waves, the impending doom, the people caught in the chaos captured how I felt at that moment in my teenage life.
But that is not, as I have grown to believe, what the picture is about. Just as I have grown to believe that the current crisis is revealing more than simply the violent nature of a virus.
In Hokusai’s image, Mount Fuji stands in the distance. My father, an art lover, eventually pointed this out to me. The mountain is solid and stable, the destination for the troubled crews. They are not fighting the waves in vain. They have a purpose.
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