Anne Sullivan's Leadership: Helping Helen Keller Without Replacing Her

The core lesson that businesses can learn from Anne Sullivan's leadership lies not in the dedication of doing everything for team members, but in distinguishing the support necessary for individuals to work using their own judgment. While Helen Keller received Sullivan's help in the process of receiving lessons and reading books, she was the protagonist who wanted to go to college, solved problems, and expressed her own thoughts in writing. Leaders who develop people must look beyond how much they helped to see how the person who received that help made those decisions their own. The expression 'Anne Sullivan who made the great Helen Keller' embodies respect for the teacher, but it also carries the risk of reading Keller's achievements solely as the work of a single person. To properly understand Sullivan's contribution, we must instead divide the roles of the two individuals. Sullivan o…