MGT202: Reflective Essay on Leadership, Learning, and Maxwell's Quote

This essay reflects on John C. Maxwell's quote, "A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way," through the lens of organizational learning theories. It delves into the three ways—knowing, going, and showing—using experiential learning and assimilation theory. The essay provides examples of leaders from political and business contexts, such as Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Tim Cook and others, to substantiate the arguments. The author also shares personal experiences, highlighting leadership qualities observed in everyday life, and concludes by emphasizing the inspirational value of Maxwell's quote and the applicability of organizational learning theories in understanding leadership.

Running head: REFLECTIVE ESSAY ON LEADERS AND LEARNING
REFLECTIVE ESSAY ON LEADERS AND LEARNING
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

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REFLECTIVE ESSAY ON LEADERS AND LEARNING
Introduction
Theories of Organizational Learning help us in understanding the need for being
competitive in the changing and challenging world. The theories of organizational Learning
especially help organizations to adapt to the changing environment. The role of the leader here
becomes extremely important because the leader is the one who knows how to implement
change, goes ahead, does it, and shows others how to do it.
In this essay, I shall discuss Organizational Learning theories in the context of the quote
by John C. Maxwell. I will first introduced the quote and break it down to see what the speaker
meant by it. While breaking down the quote, I shall explore the three ways – knowing, going and
showing – shown by Maxwell. In doing so, I will utilize the Organizational Learning theories to
validate the arguments. I will provide examples of leadership in the political and business
context to prove the arguments.
The quote –
“A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way”
The quote was used by John Maxwell in one of his books titled The 21 irrefutable Laws
of Leadership and since then, the quote has inspired many. The quote precisely explains the way
a leader should be and is.
Discussion
In my views, the quote is simple yet very powerful because it explores the previously
ignored and undisclosed qualities of a leader. Previously, leadership qualities mostly focused on
the leader as the possessor of vast knowledge and capabilities. The leader was the one who only

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knew how to inspire the followers and guide them. Maxwell argued that the leader is the one
who walks the path himself and then inspires others to follow him. The quote can be viewed
from different perspectives, the one being that it was meant to inspire common citizens to
become leaders themselves in their daily lives. Other perspective could be that the speaker of the
quote wanted to let people know that they have the ability to make people listen to and follow
them.
We could explore the three ways of knowing, going and showing in a better way by using
the organizational learning theories. Prior to discovering the three ways, we must first explore
the theories of OL and establish an association between those and the three ways. The most
common definition of OL theory, as I have found is that it is a course of developing, preserving
and relocating knowledge within an organization. The OL theory also states that individual
learning is the first or initial phase of OL and when the information learned by the individual is
shared and stored, it becomes organizational learning (Noruzy et al. 2013). Theorists have
developed several theories of OL over the years that included the experiential learning theory
and assimilation theory.
Coming back to the three ways of knowing, going and showing, the three theories of OL
concisely explain these. Experiential Learning theory comes under the cognitive category of OL
and has four stages of learning. David Kolb was the proponent of this theory. As Kolb describes,
the first stage is the concrete experience followed by the second stage, which is abstract
conceptualization (Kolb 2014). The third and fourth stages are reflective observation and active
experimentation respectively. While the first two stages constitute the acquisition of information,
the last two stages form the transformation of experience. We could observe that two ways of
knowing and going mentioned in the quote is explained through these stages. When the leader

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passes through these four stages, he receives vast knowledge through experience. After receiving
the knowledge, the leader then analyses those and acts. The experience, reflection and thinking
phase explain the knowing way while the acting upon those explains the going way as mentioned
in the quote. However, many argue that OL theory especially experiential learning is not helpful
for all and hence, does not clearly explain the three ways. As Radu Lefebvre and Redien‐Collot
(2013) point out, people with limited experience will not benefit from this type of learning. I
contrast this view because I believe learning from the mistakes as explained by the theory is one
of the best ways for knowing.
McCarthy (2016) on the other hand, supports the experiential learning arguing that it does
not always give predictable outcomes. According to the author, the four stages of learning
through experience are limited and do not clearly explain the attributes of the leader. I tend to
disagree with the statement because although experiential learning theory is not all
encompassing, it provides a solid ground from where we could proceed to higher levels of
explorations. As Bower (2013) have argued, the theory has helped leaders from varied areas like
sports, health, education and business has greatly assisted people to enhance their knowledge.
We shall now focus on exploring the showing way, as mentioned in the quote. The
assimilation theory is the behavioral approach of OL theory according to which, learning is
observable, rational and measurable (Duke, Harper and Johnston 2013). I feel the theory is apt
for exploring the three ways particularly, showing. When the leader gains enough experience and
learns through those experiences, he applies those practically in his own life. After applying the
knowledge, the leader then examines if it worked or not. The assimilation theory, I feel is the
next phase of experiential learning because it involves practical application. Zimmerman (2013),
states that the assimilation learning theory enables students to develop their capability to become

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a leader. I find this observation intriguing and relative to one of the three ways, because it helps
students become leaders by going the way. Agarkar and Brock (2017) supports the statement
asserting that because of the behavioral or practical nature of this theory, it ensures quick
acquisition and application of knowledge.
I have witnessed leaders who know, go and show the way in both personal and
professional life. Apart from the renowned world leaders – political and business, many leaders I
have come across who are not popular but possess equal capabilities. However, first I would
discuss the leaders about who most of us know and see if they fit to Maxwell’s quote. Political
leaders like Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr., are some prime examples of leaders
who have done all the three things (Jackson 2013). Mahatma Gandhi knew that non-violence is
the most powerful way to win any battle; he adopted this in his own life, faced atrocities and
suffered, but ultimately achieved his objective. He had shown the way to millions of people in
India, which is visible from the mass protests against the British without violence. Martin Luther
King Jr., similarly, was a great leader in the sense that he led the African-American Civil Right
movement by inspiring people through his speeches. He knew that he had the ability to give
powerful speeches and motivate people. The people even today follow his ideals and are inspired
by his speeches.
In the world of business, examples of such leaders abound. In my view, those leaders
who have helped their organizations rise from the slump could be considered great leaders. They
have known the way, applied their OL and gone way and set examples for their employee that is,
shown the way. Tim Cook (Apple Inc.), Indira Nooyi (PepsiCo) Warren Buffet, Marry Barra
(General Motors) amongst others is great examples of such leaders (Forbes.com 2018).

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In my real life, I have come across numerous people who have demonstrated great
leadership qualities. In school, I had my teachers, particularly my principal, who I feel, led the
school with example. Our school was not a very big school but the principal knew the ways to
manage everything within limited budget and infrastructure. More than anything else, he had the
capability to motivate the other teachers and the students. He did this by applying the knowledge
he had gained through experience in school. One example that I can give is that he used to
encourage students to share their books with others who could not afford those. These were
something that he has a student had himself done. The idea inspired others and it became a trend
in other schools as well.
Conclusion
In the end, I should reiterate that the quote by John Maxwell is inspiring and gives great
boost to people who aspire to become leaders in the future. I have myself been motivated by the
quote and believe that I too could be a leader. In this essay, I tried to analyze the quote by
breaking it down into parts and then explain it. While exploring the three ways mentioned in the
quote, I delved upon the theories of Organizational Learning (OL) and found that OL is an apt
theory to explore the ways. I say this because as I researched through the theory, I found that the
two theories I researched – experiential learning and assimilation theory – clearly explain what
knowing, going and showing the way means. I also provided various examples of leaderships in
political, business and societal context to substantiate my argument in favor of OL theories
explaining the three ways.

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References:
Agarkar, S. and Brock, R., 2017. Learning theories in science education. In Science Education
(pp. 93-103). SensePublishers, Rotterdam.
Bower, G.G., 2013. Utilizing Kolb's Experiential Learning Theory to Implement a Golf
Scramble. International Journal of Sport Management, Recreation & Tourism, 12.
Duke, B., Harper, G. and Johnston, M., 2013. Connectivism as a digital age learning theory. The
International HETL Review, 2013(Special Issue), pp.4-13.
Forbes.com 2018. Top 10 List: The Greatest Living Business Leaders Today. [online]
Forbes.com. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidkwilliams/2012/07/24/top-10-list-
the-greatest-living-business-leaders-today/#4dda01cb4986 [Accessed 31 Aug. 2018].
Jackson, T.F., 2013. From civil rights to human rights: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the struggle
for economic justice. University of Pennsylvania Press.
Kolb, D.A., 2014. Experiential learning: Experience as the source of learning and development.
FT press.
McCarthy, M., 2016. Experiential learning theory: From theory to practice. Journal of Business
& Economics Research (Online), 14(3), p.91.
Noruzy, A., Dalfard, V.M., Azhdari, B., Nazari-Shirkouhi, S. and Rezazadeh, A., 2013.
Relations between transformational leadership, organizational learning, knowledge management,
organizational innovation, and organizational performance: an empirical investigation of
manufacturing firms. The International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing Technology, 64(5-
8), pp.1073-1085.

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Radu Lefebvre, M. and Redien‐Collot, R., 2013. “How to do things with words”: The discursive
dimension of experiential learning in entrepreneurial mentoring dyads. Journal of Small Business
Management, 51(3), pp.370-393.
Zimmerman, B.J., 2013. Theories of self-regulated learning and academic achievement: An
overview and analysis. In Self-regulated learning and academic achievement (pp. 10-45).
Routledge.