In an opinion article published in The Education News a little while back, Kennedy Buhere, writing in this newspaper, asserted that “The real work of a leader is primarily in the office, not in the field.” While he deserves credit for sparking an important conversation about leadership and strategic focus, this claim cannot go unchallenged. Though offices are undeniably vital centres of planning, coordination and decision-making, reducing leadership to a desk-bound function presents a narrow and incomplete understanding of what effective leadership truly requires.
There is no dispute that offices serve an essential role in leadership. They are spaces where vision is clarified, policy is drafted, resources are allocated, and long-term strategies are shaped. Leaders need uninterrupted time to analyse data, evaluate reports and weigh competing priorities. Sound governance and institutional stability depend on such structured thinking. However, elevating office work to the primary or superior form of leadership risks detaching decision-making from the lived realities those decisions are meant to address.
Reports, briefs and performance summaries are important tools, but they are mediated versions of reality. Every document that lands on a leader’s desk has passed through multiple layers of interpretation and filtering. In that process, nuance can be diluted, and uncomfortable truths softened. Field engagement provides a corrective lens. When leaders step beyond their offices and encounter situations firsthand, they gain insight that cannot be fully captured in written updates. They observe the gaps between policy design and practical implementation. They hear unscripted feedback. They notice what statistics sometimes conceal.
Leadership is also fundamentally about influence and inspiration. Influence cannot be sustained solely through memos and directives. It grows through presence. When leaders visit schools, hospitals, project sites or community initiatives, they communicate the seriousness of purpose. Their visibility reassures teams that the work on the ground matters. Morale often rises when those at the helm show genuine interest in operational realities. Such engagement does not automatically amount to micromanagement; rather, it reflects responsible stewardship.
The assertion that field visits distract from “real work” assumes that strategic thinking and ground-level engagement are mutually exclusive. In reality, they are complementary. Strategic insight deepens when informed by lived experience. Leaders who understand operational constraints firsthand are better positioned to craft realistic, implementable policies. Decisions shaped by both analysis and observation are more resilient than those formed in isolation.
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Moreover, leadership requires empathy. Empathy is not a sentimental add-on to authority; it is a strategic asset. Leaders who interact directly with stakeholders develop a clearer sense of how policies affect morale, motivation and trust. These intangible elements often determine the success or failure of institutional initiatives. A technically flawless strategy may falter if it fails to account for human factors that are visible only through engagement.
In public leadership contexts, especially, complexity is the norm. Resource constraints, cultural dynamics, social pressures and logistical challenges shape outcomes in ways that cannot always be predicted from spreadsheets. Field presence allows leaders to appreciate this complexity and to calibrate expectations accordingly. It prevents the creation of elegant but impractical solutions conceived without sufficient grounding.
None of this diminishes the importance of office-based responsibilities. Leadership demands reflection, coordination and disciplined planning. Excessive immersion in operational detail can blur lines of delegation. However, the answer is not retreat but balance. Effective leaders know when to step back for strategic oversight and when to step forward for direct engagement. They do not choose between thinking and seeing; they integrate both.
Ultimately, leadership is not defined by location but by responsibility. The office may be the nerve centre of coordination, but the field is where policies are tested against reality. Vision must meet context. Strategy must encounter experience. To insist that the real work of leadership is primarily in the office overlooks the indispensable value of presence. The most effective leaders understand that meaningful transformation occurs at the intersection of thoughtful planning and active engagement, where ideas are refined by the realities they seek to change.
By Ashford Kimani
Ashford teaches English and Literature in Gatundu North Sub-county and serves as Dean of Studies.
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