Summary: The importance of motivation in leadership cannot be denied. But most leaders overlook a critical component of motivation, the human dream. The article describes what dreams really mean in the realm of leadership.

Leadership is motivational or it's stumbling in the dark. The best leaders don't order people to do a job, the best leaders motivate people to want to do the job.

The trouble is the vast majority of leaders don't delve into the deep aspects of human motivation and so are unable to motivate people effectively.

Drill down through goals and aims and aspirations and ambitions and you hit the bedrock of motivation, the dream. Many leaders fail to take it into account.

Dreams are not goals and aims. Goals are the results toward which efforts are directed. The realization of a dream might contain goals, which can be stepping stones on the way to the attaining dreams. But the attainment of a goal does not necessarily result in the attainment of a dream.

For instance, Martin Luther King did not say, "I have a goal." Or "I have an aim." The power of that speech was in the "I have a dream".

Dreams are not aspirations and ambitions. Aspirations and ambitions are strong desires to achieve something. King didn't say he had an aspiration or ambition that " ....one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.'" He said he had a dream.

If you are a leader speaking to people's aspirations and ambitions, you are speaking to something that motivates them, yes; but you are not necessarily tapping into the heartwood of their motivation.

After all, one might aspire or be ambitious to achieve a dream. But one's aspiration and ambition may also be connected to things of lesser importance than a dream.

A dream embraces our most cherished longings. It embodies our very identity. We often won't feel fulfilled as human beings until we realize our dreams.

If leaders are avoiding people's dreams, if leaders are simply setting goals (as important as goals are), they miss the best of opportunities to help those people take ardent action to achieve great results.

When Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence that "Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed," he was writing about a dream. Not one European government at that time was a democracy. There had been few true democracies in the West since the fall of the Athenian democracy more than 2,000 thousand years before. But Jefferson's "dream" motivated people to take action. In fact, that dream motivates people to act around the world today.

Understand the dreams of the people you lead. People will not tell you what they dream until they trust you. They won't trust you until they feel that you can help them attain their dreams. Acquiring that understanding can cement a deep, emotional bond between you.

Dreams are not fantasies. Going to the mountain may be a dream. Standing on the mountain may be a dream. On the other hand, having the mountain come to us is

About the Author: The author of 23 books, Brent Filson's recent books are, THE LEADERSHIP TALK: THE GREATEST LEADERSHIP TOOL and 101 WAYS TO GIVE GREAT LEADERSHIP TALKS. He is founder and president of The Filson Leadership Group, Inc. – and for more than 20 years has been helping leaders of top companies worldwide get audacious results. Sign up for his free leadership e-zine and get a free white paper: "49 Ways To Turn Action Into Results," at http://www.actionleadership.com