Leadership X & Y: The Problem No One Sees nor Hears 

The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ASPA as an organization.

By Troy Chavez
November 1, 2024

I am employed with a state agency promoting and supporting people with disabilities in the workplace. I outreach to businesses, connect clients to employers and educate the community about this wonderful population and their rightful place in employment. We call this training “Windmills,” and there are myriad modules and instruction materials. It was created by Dr. Richard Pimentel, who served in Vietnam and returned an injured veteran. There is a movie about him you can watch, Music Within, starring Ron Livingston as Dr. Pimentel.

I truly enjoy this portion of my job. I get to see faces light up with enlightenment, intrigue and interest. However, during one session where we, fellow instructors, participated in, I found my very own light bulb flashing brightly—going from white to red. 

 Windmills is an inclusion training instructing people on how to navigate the workplace alongside employees with disabilities (both hidden and seen). I will not go fully into the module, but we essentially had to create a calendar fitting the schedule of each team. Plus, find ways to get funds so that the team is properly budgeted. It is a simulation of a private (for-profit) company and how their organizational structures can be difficult for people with disabilities. While each team fought for their schedule and budgets, I was one of four chosen to leave the room and eventually return—without saying a word. I had to be invited by the group to speak. The kicker was, I knew how the game was supposed to work….

When I returned it was chaos and no one was collaborating or working together. Even when I literally gave my team the rules and how the game could be won, still, no one earnestly offered an olive branch. Ultimately, the rules state everyone can receive exactly what they want. The overall budget has enough money to be dispersed evenly. Some teams had more money than they needed.  Additionally, there was enough room on the schedule for each team to get exactly the days they needed. When I informed my group that this is what can happen, one of them stood up and said, “Hey!” trying to cut through the noise. “Everyone! We just have to work together, and we can all get what we want!”

All were skeptical, but also slightly willing. But when one person from a group said, “No! We aren’t going to do that!” and began asking for what they needed and offering things to trade, I knew my efforts were folly…. Time ran out.  

This is a hard module to teach because of all the moving parts. Indeed, I can relate the exercise to disability awareness, but I saw through that veil and found something troubling. Why didn’t anyone want to work together?

This small exercise made me examine the nature of competition, free markets and winner-take-all mentalities. How can a country come together when that is not how the system is designed? Now, the free market has made many U.S. citizens and foreign companies successful, but at what cost? What have we ALL lost because of this systematic dynamic? And like the exercise above, who are we not listening to? And who are we giving too much airtime?

It is not an easy feat to solve capitalisms ills in one small column, but what is needed is an examination of public service leadership. We need to vote for people who understand simply less government or more government is not a panacea. Frankly, we have not had an earnest conversation about governance since Obamacare. We may have disagreed, but we kept the conversation largely about policy and budgets. I will concede that that is also when the conversation turned dour, and fast.

I interviewed Tim Tsujii, Forsyth County Elections Chief, (my previous PA Times Interview link: On Elections, a Three Part Series: Part Two: Mechanics and Safety – PA TIMES Online | PA TIMES Online) and asked him what government can do to help make elections smoother. He said that they needed to stop trying to help. The constant flux of changes saddled them with challenges they were forced to ride out—till told to turn back once more. And this is at the state level. Imagine the fluxing changes in the behemoth that is the federal government. I worry—as someone who sees seemingly simple tasks turn into complex ones, daily—for who leads not only my organization, but all governmental organizations within the United States.

“A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, they will say: We did it ourselves,” said Lao Tzu, on how governance and leadership thrives in subtly and humility. Bureaucracy is not perfect, nor will it ever be. But we do not need leaders demonizing the good work thousands do every day in this country. We need leaders, not tyrants. We need guidance, feedback and respect. A cyclical loop of hearing from the actual experts tasked with doing what’s printed on paper and digitized to hundreds of agencies. We need someone to work with us, not against us. Vote for leaders who understand they are in a democracy, not an autocracy.

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 Author: Troy Chavez, M.P.A. is a PhD candidate at Liberty University with a masters in public administration and works in government doing community relations. He can be reached at [email protected].

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