Peter's space

Are You a Born Leader?
By Mitch McCrimmon 

In the 1960's, we believed that all people could become anything they wanted to be. Today, we recognize that some talents have a biological or genetic basis. Leadership too probably has both learned and unlearned elements. You may be born with some such talent but there are useful developmental experiences to help you along. The question is: What leadership talent might be unlearned and what aspects can you learn?

The Born Leader

It all depends on how we define leadership. If it means getting to the top spot in a group, company or country, then whatever it takes to be a dominating, commanding person is key. No doubt there are influencing skills that help people get to the top which are, in part, learnable. However, the ability to dominate a human group is not so different from what it takes to achieve a similar status in other animal groups - you need to have superior strength relative to your competitors. This might be greater intelligence, being more confident, domineering, aggressive or decisive. You might also have a magnetic personality or a commanding presence. Being tall and good looking can also help sway followers. Most of these traits are either acquired very early in life or not learned at all. Having such attributes could make you a born leader.

Another Definition of Leadership

There is a tradition of associating leaders with providing direction, challenging the status quo, "showing the way." Whenever you do something that is recognized by your colleagues as excellent, many follow suit. This is leading by example. Similarly, whenever you question existing policies or propose a new product and others get on board, you have shown leadership. You might be a front-line product developer or knowledge worker with a good idea on how to do something better. Such leadership doesn't require being in a position of authority over any group.

The Psychological Basis of Finding a Better Way

Young people are naturally inclined to be dissatisfied with the status quo. Part of growing up entails questioning authority, feeling that the older generation is messing things up, wanting to prove yourself by showing that you know better. This instinct is often referred to as "youthful rebelliousness." Now, people differ widely on how rebellious they are and on how they channel this attitude. Some of us are very conservative. We are good at getting things done, but we rarely question the way things are. Others are very rebellious, but some channel this talent in unproductive ways, becoming dropouts or criminals. Martin Luther King, Jr. is a great example of having a rebelliousness that was focused on improving social equality and ethical ways of living.

In any case, the drive to rebel is surely not something that we learn in a classroom. We are either born with it or grow into it naturally very early in life. The fact that young people tend to be more rebellious than older ones suggests that people are likely to have more leadership potential when they are young. This is no surprise. The same is true of creativity, as a general rule, to which there are exceptions of course.

Aspects of Leadership To Learn

So, you have a healthy dose of rebelliousness and you challenge the status quo where you work. But, let's say, you are struggling to get others to follow your lead. What can you do differently? Your success in leading others depends on two things: how good your idea is and how effective you are at influencing people. If your idea is obviously great, opportunists will jump on the bandwagon with little persuasion required from you. On the other hand, the harder it is to prove the merits of your case, the more persuasive you need to be. For example, it is very hard to argue that the free market system is fundamentally flawed while it might be very easy to show that a new piece of software is superior to everything else around. If you aspire to be a political leader, where there are no obviously right answers, you need to come as close as possible to having the oratorical skills of a Martin Luther King to succeed. It is influencing skills that can, to some extent, be developed.

The fundamental drive to change the world, however, is not a learnable skill set. Still, "changing the world" can be done on a very modest, local level, such as modifying how people in your department serve customers. Convincing your colleagues to make minor changes in how they work is still leadership, even if it is not on the grand scale of a Martin Luther King. So, a lot more people can show some leadership than who have what it takes to get to the top of an group hierarchy. Everyone, therefore, is born with a talent for seeing how some aspect of his or her environment could be better. This means that everyone can show some leadership, even if only on a small scale.

The bottom line is that both definitions of leadership are based, in part, on traits that are hard to learn, but only the second allows everyone to show some leadership.