Leadership

[Motivation_Follows_Action]

I need to get some perspectives and opinions, and none more helpful than the smart and savvy crowd here. Just a vox pop type of thing.

I was debating with someone today about the concept of "the art and science of leadership". The person I was talking to was explaining that leadership was an art. Like Warren Bennis said, leadership is caught, not taught. It's not a finite skill that can be learned, like typing or math. It's hard to measure.

I come from a different school - I think leadership styles and skills can be developed through experience, reflection and application. You can't learn it in a classroom in your MBA, but over time you can learn that different levers work to influence behavior and decisions, and that's the skill of a leader.

Just interested in hearing peoples' thoughts here. How would you describe leadership?

[quit-once]

I will vote the the "caught, not taught" line of thought.

But I would also not agree that leadership is an art. It is something you are born with. The right circumstances can make anybody born with inate leadership skills and abilities (i.e. the "alpha") into a great leader. Otherwise, the Peter Principle takes over and people just rise to their own level of incompetence before they stall out or fall.

[LILTEX41]

I think leadership can be learned, but most often people are just born that way. I think one has to have a certain set of personality traits to be a true leader. If someone wants to learn how to become a great leader, my suggestion is to find mentors. Study people who are considered the best in the field. Watch and study everything they do in their interactions with others. I am a firm believer social learning theory. I think most people learn the most through observation of some sort of influential model. How many times do you meet someone who inspires you? Then before too long you find yourself mimicking their behavior? I did this just yesterday. I fancied my co-workers acrylic nails so I went and go mine done, lol. I feel so beautiful now!

[BeHereNow]

I think it's both.

Which is true of any skill, even musical genius. You're born with some, but it has to be cultivated or it goes to waste.

I don't think leadership is a matter of who talks loudest and has the biggest stick either. There are so many unexpected personalities that I've seen have amazing leadership skills, they just don't necessarily use it in every situation, or maybe they use it in a different way than most people expect. With so many different types of people, and so many leadership situations, there has to be a wide variety of leaders. If that diversity is within one organization,, spread across different areas, I think it's really empowering. That shouldn't take the "too many cooks in the kitchen" form, it's more like one person in the kitchen, one person in the garden, one person researching new foods and recipes, etc.

I think a huge part of leadership depends on that person's expertise, how they convey it to others, and how they get people on board with their unique insights into the situation. How a person interacts with other people, and not necessarily in a domineering way, although that's sometimes there too.

Many varieties of persuasion, multiple forms of intelligence, multiple varieties of leadership.

I don't have an MBA, but I did do a leadership development program (message me if you wanna know which one, it's pretty cool) and got to watch a lot of different personalities develop and use their leadership skills.

My 2 cents!

[Greg]

Hey MFA, it is interesting that you brought this up. One of the MBA classes Im taking now is actually "Leadership". Basically we have done a lot of team building exercises, written reports on leadership books, watched videos of influential people and taken all the personality tests: Myers Briggs, Emotional IQ, Firo B and TKI and analyzed them and written about them to death, to find our leadership qualities within our personality styles (or how we can best lead within our different personality style) and learned how to best develop our leadership qualities. We have analyzed these tests to death through various term papers. And actually we are now doing a group paper discussing how our personality styles work together - the group dynamics. Now that i write about it, and reflect, this class has been pretty interesting. Anyway, after this class, i definitely feel like leadership is something that can be "brought to light" or "fostered" through teaching learning and understanding.

[Motivation_Follows_Action]

Interesting. I like the musical analogy. Food for thought!