Roberto Clemente: A Visionary Leader

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Synthesis Essay – Roberto Clemente
MSgt W. Michael Martinez
Air Force Senior Noncommissioned Officer Academy

Roberto Clemente What does a Visionary Leader look like? If I was to tell you that there is a Major League Baseball (MLB) player who was the 11th player of all time to get 3000 hits, won 12 Gold Gloves awards, four batting titles, and has been to World Series twice, would you consider him a visionary leader? Probably not but you would say he was an accomplished baseball player. However, this particular baseball player was also the first, great Latino baseball player in MLB and a great humanitarian. I’m talking about Roberto Clemente, a visionary and ethical leader. In this essay I will explain how his courage and authentic …show more content…

Finally, I will give you my personal relevance from the research I did.
Visionary Leader
After doing some research, I do consider Roberto Clemente a Visionary Leader. Not only was he a great baseball player, but he was also a great humanitarian. Roberto Clemente’s motto was “if you have a chance to help others and fail to do so you are wasting your time on this earth” (Biography.com, 2017). Roberto Clemente gave his life to this motto. On December 31, 1972, he boarded a plane to deliver food, clothing and medicine to the victims of a devastating earthquake in Nicaragua. He knew the plane was in bad shape but he still took that risk and got on it. According to the Thomas N. Barnes Center of Enlisted Education [BCEE] (2017c), “Courage should empower you to take necessary personal or professional risks” (p.16). Roberto …show more content…

I believe we have all experienced some form of ethical dilemmas, but have we encountered Potential Harm like Roberto Clemente did? Probably not, but I can remember when the new EPR system came out with the promotional quotas. I was rating on a TSgt and during his initial feedback I told him what he needed to do to get a promotion statement from the commander. This TSgt did everything I asked and the commander still didn’t give him a promotion statement. We were both upset and I had two choices, I could sign the EPR or I could confront the commander. I knew confronting the commander could potentially harm my career but I decided to do the right thing. After an hour of talking to the commander she decided to give him a promotion statement. She also thanked me for showing her what she had missed. Making the decision to talk to the commander was one of the hardest decisions I had made up to then as a new SNCO. I wasn’t sure how she would take me complaining about not giving him a promotion statement. However, making the ethical decision and using free thinking has steered me in the right direction so far in my career. Who knew that doing research on Roberto Clemente would open my eyes to what it takes to be a visionary and ethical

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