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Leading Organizations and Employees
toward Service Excellence
Identifying Leadership
Identifying leadership has been likened to the story of the blind men and the
elephant.
1
Originally from India, the story relates each of several blind men
touching a different body part of the elephant (the trunk, the body, a leg, an
ear). Being blind, none is able to see the animal in its entirety. The individu-
als form a mental image of the whole beast from one of the parts. The person
who touched the elephant’s trunk suggests that the animal is like a snake.
Others suggest that the animal is like a wall (from touching the body), a tree
(from touching a ...