Transformational Leader Profile: Gaku Homma
The transformational leader I have chosen for this assignment is a man whose transformational leadership abilities predominate throughout all aspects of his life. He is an accomplished Aikido instructor of global recognition, a published author, and a civic-minded philanthropist both locally and internationally. His crowning achievements include being the Founder of Aikido Nippon Kan – a federal non-profit cross-cultural humanitarian organization, and the owner and head chef of Domo Japanese Country Foods Restaurant. This man is Gaku Homma Sensei.

I met Homma Sensei approximately eleven years ago. I was attending Red Rocks Community College on scholarship, while working a full time graveyard shift in a minimum wage position. I had previously earned a black belt in Tae Kwon do, and was seeking to study what I hoped to be a more complete martial art. Like many other Americans, I saw a Steven Segal film, and became interested in Aikido. Homma Sensei often jokes about - how every time a Steven Segal movie comes out - he gets about fifty new students with ponytails trying to emulate Steven Segal, and unfortunately, I was probably no different. I trained very hard on the mat, but my training was very irregular at first, as my schedule did not afford a lot of free time. I remember being passed over for promotions, probably due to attendance, but I was very upset as I felt my techniques and abilities on the mat merited some recognition. As I later learned, promotions are related to growth off the mat, probably more so than technical abilities on. Still, I inquired with the office staff as to why I was passed over, and shortly after, much to my delight and surprise, I was asked by Homma Sensei himself to become an Uchideshi (live-in) student in Nippon Kan’s scholarship program. While my technical abilities on the mat are still tremendously short of any actual competency, the lessons I was taught about community, responsibility, and duty to serving others, I will carry with me forever. I continue to learn from them while attempting to live up to these principles which I have been given.

Homma Sensei who personally has trained in Aikido for over forty years now, began his practice of martial arts like most children in Japan, by studying the art of Judo. Eventually, Homma Sensei became the last Uchideshi (live-in student), to the Founder of Aikido Morihei Ueshiba before his passing in 1969. To this day, Homma Sensei strives to maintain and teach the founder’s Aikido with the highest regard to the fidelity and integrity of the original techniques and philosophies that were imparted to him. Homma Sensei founded Aikido Nippon Kan in Denver Colorado in 1978. Nippon Kan’s current facility is the largest Aikido-related Japanese culture center complex of its kind in the United States. Some 11,500 students have completed the beginners’ course, with approximately 250 continuing regular student members (NK Brochure, N.D. p. 2). The philosophy of Nippon Kan involves not only community services, civic duties, cultural exchange programs and feeding the local homeless, but international aid missions, international fund raisers, and helping to feed and shelter the homeless abroad as well. In my youth as an uchideshi, I always marveled at how this man from another culture, who having faced tremendous discrimination as such in America, was so concerned with the local community here in Denver, as well as the international community as a whole. It seemed to me such a thankless job at the time, this man, preparing and serving homeless meals at his own expense every month, organizing and coordinating community service activities, beautifying the parks, planting bushes and trees, turning over flowerbeds, holding charity drive seminars, and donating services to international causes. I now understand, that it is on this type of growth (off the mat) as a human being, and duty to the world itself, upon which promotions are partly based at Nippon Kan.

I have chosen Homma Sensei as a transformational leader due to his abilities to adapt several leadership styles throughout his career and tremendously impressive philanthropic achievements. The transformations I have personally witnessed involve the use of: great man, trait theories, charismatic leadership, humanistic theories, personal and situational theories, and finally transactional leadership theories. (Bass, 1994.) Much to the credit of his humility, I was unable to find any formalized list of awards received by Nippon Kan or Homma Sensei directly for personal community service and philanthropic activities. As impressive and extensive as such a list would be at this time, no such list exists. Homma Sensei’s leadership inspires confidence in those around him while building trust and loyalty. It is the ability to adapt to the situations with the theories listed that Homma Sensei is truly a transformational leader.

Reference:
Bass, B. M. (1990). Bass & Stogdill's handbook of leadership: Theory, research, &
managerial applications. (3rd ed.) New York: Free Press.
Nippon Kan Headquarters of Aikido Humanitarian Aid Network, (N.D.). NK Brochure
Retrieved November 14, 2003, from http://www.nippon-kan.org/index2.html