Painting the Vision

 

In this wonderful example of inspirational leadership, Henry uses the most effective tool in his arsenal.  He "paints the vision" of the future.  He, in effect, becomes a master storyteller.  The inspirational leader must learn the power of a story and the best way to tell it to the audience.  We relate to stories.  We all want to see what will happen.  If the story is about us, so much the better, especially if it has a happy ending!  Painting the vision allows the inspirational leader to tell a story of his follower's future. This is a story the inspirational leader fully controls.  He does not have to be weighed down with what has happened, or even what is happening.   He is concerned with what will happen.  With what can happen.

 

Henry realizes that in order to motivate his men, in order to change their perception of what they believe, he must give them an alternative vision.  The one that exists in their mind is filled with death, and ending.  It is an anxious and despairing series of images that breed a self fulfilling ennui that will lead to the very disaster they brood upon.  The offshoots of this vision are bitterness, anger, and resentment that are directed, or will be directed, at their leaders.

 

Henry must change this vision.  But he cannot change it by addressing each portion of the vision they have.  He must supplant it entirely.  To do that, he must create an alternative reality.  A reality just as possible as the one the army has created for itself.  But it is not as easy as it looks.  Henry cannot just say "Men, we are going to win today, because I say so, so follow me!"  As much as he may desire it, the King knows his army does not have blind faith in him, or in anybody.  He cannot create that blind faith.  He can create, however, faith in each other.  And this he does.

 

Indeed, what a powerful vision Henry has created.  It is a vision that creates legions of bonding mechanisms..  Henry knows that everyone wants to be part of something bigger, so he sketches out the rules of the game.  To be part of this magnificent effort, this band of brothers, you must stay and participate.  It will be worth any price you may have to pay.  If you leave, you will not be part of something bigger, you well be part of nothing, of the great unwashed, of all the cowardly souls now asleep in their beds in England.

 

Henry also knows that everyone needs and wants to feel valued, so he points to individuals to make his point.  He tells each man how the King himself will value him, as a "brother".  He tells how society will value him, with honor and envy. 

 

Finally, the King knows that everyone must have a reason for doing what they do.  Everyone desires to be ennobled, to have their effort, their life, mean something.  So, throughout his oration, he paints an emotional vision.  A vision of "brotherhood".  The ties that bind here are spiritual.  They are the emotional links between each man in the army that says "we were here together, and shared this amazing experience.  No one else can understand what we went through on this day."