Image of Leadership

by Oleksii Kyrylchuk

When I think about leadership in Ukraine, the first thing that comes to my mind is the Ukrainian revolution of 2014. While it didn't really have a distinct "leader", I'd say that the thing on the whole could be viewed in terms of the 5 practices model.

Model the way

Yanukovych (then-president) refusing to sign a deal with EU

The whole thing started with Yanukovych (then-president) deciding to align himself with Russia instead of EU.

This went against the values of a lot of people in Ukraine - which led them to (1) determine that an integration with EU is really important to most people there and (2) start a protest (i.e. walk the talk).

Inspire a shared vision

A common vision of more "global" Ukraine

The shared vision that people were imagining was the one where Ukrainian people would get a lot of benefits from joining EU - better jobs, more opportunities to travel and lower prices for the imported goods.

(Needless to say, depending on your framing you could turn those into downsides as well)

Challenge the process

I'm not sure if protesting on the street can be called "challenging the process" - it might both be considered pretty "out there" as well as not innovative enough.


But I'd say that the whole process was pretty innovative - people constantly strived to improve the main square's defenses, made up new ways to withstand the attacks, etc.

Enable others to act

Self-defence training

Trusting relationships is the cornerstone of the Ukrainian culture, and their importance gets amplified even more in a life or death situation.

Once you were let into Independence Square you were treated as the part of the inside crowd - and you had to act accordingly, doing certain jobs and improving your self-defense skills.

Encourage the heart

People giving flowers to the graves of the "Heaven 100"

One of the most heartbreaking moments that I witnessed when participating in the revolution was people carrying corpses of the people killed by the police - the soldiers were screaming "HERO! HERO! HERO!" and the crowd roared with them.

While at that time I was really skeptical of whether the whole thing will succeed or not, those screams really touched me to the core and made me feel like we were doing something worthwhile.