Bottom-line, I define great leadership as the provision of apparent sustainable hope. It's clear in Churchill, Ghandi and JFK. It explains how Hitler got as far as he did. It'll decide the current presidential election. It's given PM Brown of the UK a much-needed second wind.
And in very tough times it's what your people need from you:
HOPE: a belief that it's all going to be OK. You can get them out of this mess and restore their lives to some semblance of normality.
SUSTAINABLE: no quick blips, please. We want the real thing.
APPARENT: here's the catch. We won't know until you have been doing it for a while.
Here's hoping.