Mal Fletcher comments

In so doing, the Queen Mother revealed not only her genuinely felt sympathy for those directly affected by the bombing; she showed that she understood the value of leaders as symbols.

The mere fact of her presence sent a potent signal to friend and foe alike. For the British population, her visit demonstrated that in a hitherto class-conscious society, all classes would now stand shoulder to shoulder for victory.

To Britain's enemies, her actions declared that this nation wouldn't cower in the face of Hitler's devastating destruction.

King George VI may not have had the oratory flourish of Churchill - his stammer is remembered in the upcoming movie release The King's Speech. But his wife certainly had a flair for the picture that paints a thousand words.

When President-elect Barack Obama and Vice-President-elect Joe Biden rolled into Washington D.C. aboard the inaugural train, they traced Abraham Lincoln's 1861 train journey.

Speeches were made along the route, drawing lessons from the work of Lincoln, Dr. Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy. The Declaration of Independence was also cited, in what was an exemplary exercise in symbolic leadership.

When the future seems more than usually uncertain, good leaders know how to draw on both past and present experience, to outline shared values and aspirations so they can rouse their followers into action, to turn common goals into realities.

This is what Europe's fat cat administrators have failed to do. In the current precarious financial situation, people are looking for more than just labyrinthine quota-sets and regulatory treaties.

Europeans are looking for leaders who can bring adventure to the fore, above accountancy - while still practicing the principles of sound fiscal governance.

People need to be inspired and given the confidence to innovate and flourish in spite of the challenges confronting them. This is the basic service and role of leadership in tough times.

At its root, bureaucracy looks to the safety of metrics, while leadership concerns itself with reconfiguring mindsets. Administrators concentrate on building or fixing organizational structures, while leaders focus on changing group cultures, thereby reaffirming or realigning the community's central focus.

Administration deals with benchmarks, but leadership deals with innovation, often turning accepted practice on its head.

Established practice, which is apparently the key reference point for Eurocrats, is all-too-often deadly to creativity; it stifles innovation.

When it comes to the future, especially when stiff winds are blowing, people need hope more than knowledge. This is not the same thing as empty hype of the kind that imbues the hot-headed rhetoric or knee-jerk actions of the politically-motivated and selfish.