70,000! That’s how many results you’ll get if you search for “leadership books” on Amazon. There sure is a lot of information available about leadership.
That’s good and bad. It’s good because there is lots of information available. It’s bad because there is lots of information available. Let me explain.
The inconvenient truth is that leadership development is a business with lots of practitioners. In order to be considered a thought leader or have a best-selling book it seems to be necessary to present something new or different. (I was told that by a magazine editor once when he rejected by submission) And that’s the problem.
There is really nothing new in leadership. In fact, a good primer on leadership is a book called Cyrus the Great. Written by the Greek historian Xenophon about 100 years after the fact, the book chronicles the rise of Cyrus the Great who created the Persian Empire in the 6th century BCE. The book presents a good narrative of leadership skills and techniques that are still relevant, and that we teach today. The book is still available and should be on the shelf of (and read by) anyone serious about becoming a more effective leader. (Don’t worry, it’s been translated from ancient Greek so you can read it.)
In an effort to find, or create something new and different, it is quite easy to make things more complicated than they need to be. The fact is the basic skills needed to be an effective leader haven’t changed much in thousands of years.
However, although basic leadership skills haven’t changed much, how each leader applies those skills to their own situation to meet their own challenges does change. Leaders must develop a clear understanding of leadership skills so they can adapt those skills to the unique challenges they face.
What is Leadership?
A review of those 70,000 some books will provide a wide variety of definitions and models of leadership. Some definitions are quite involved and models are often very complex and even artistic. But in reality, at its most fundamental level leadership is
That’s it! From the first-line supervisor to the CEO of the company, all leaders are tasked to accomplish something. The only way they will be successful is by working with other people. Therefore, they get things done through people.
Is that two simplified? Academics spend considerable time studying the deeper nuances of leadership. If you are a serious student of leadership the deep analysis is certainly interesting. But if you are trying to lead a team when things aren’t going well or you’re trying to put a failing company back on track, basic skills and techniques are much more useful. Effective leaders recognize they have a task to accomplish and the ability to work with and lead people on a team is what will make them successful at that task.
Who is a Leader?
There is a considerable amount of ink, both real and virtual, spilled on the topic a management versus leadership. Popular, but incorrect comments such as, “He’s a manager, he’s just not a leader,” and “Managers and supervisors are not leaders, leadership is a function of the executive level” are far too common.
Such attempts at making a distinction between management and leadership are just a silly waste of time and can be harmful. Remember that leadership is getting things done through people. Therefore it follows that any person who is responsible for what others do is, by default, a leader. The question then is not if they are a leader; they are. The correct question is, are they a good leader.
Another unfortunate discussion revolves around who can be a good leader. Do certain people have talent that will result in effective leadership while others do not? The answer to that is emphatically no! In more than 40 years of leading teams and developing leaders, I’ve become convinced there is no particular genetic makeup, no specific strand of DNA that will ensure leadership success. In fact, I’ve found there are really only two requirements to become an effective leader.
1. A real desire to be an effective leader
2. A willingness to learn the skills of good leadership
That’s it. Anyone who can meet those two requirements will likely become an effective leader.
Leadership is getting things done through people. Anyone who is responsible for what others do or produce is a leader and should strive to learn leadership skills and apply them to their own leadership responsibilities.
If you would like some tips on being a good leader, get Don’t Worry: You CAN Do This.