Earning the title of “leader.”
Most people I speak with think the U.S. faces a leadership crisis. Some prominent business leaders keep company with Congress and the media in the basement of public confidence.
As a result of the effective leadership crisis, leadership books, training programs, and seminars have grown tremendously over the last several decades. Numerous self-proclaimed leadership gurus are often keynote speakers at business conferences.
We accept more people as “leaders,” without sufficient study and thought. Then we are shocked to see their dismal performance. Let’s call people leaders when they demonstrate that they deserve the designation. How? Let’s start with at least the three traits below:
• Leadership is based on behavior and independent of role or rank. Just because someone has a fancy office or important title, they cannot automatically lead. Specific positions may come with the expectation that whoever holds them will be able to lead. Still, I have worked with CEOs who fell short and with strong leaders officially seated deep in the formal hierarchy.
• “Leader” is a title earned, not taken. The shortest definition of leadership is, “People follow you.” No matter what you call yourself, you aren’t leading if no one is following. Leadership is as much about followers as it is about who they follow; it is their power to anoint a leader. Leaders help make exemplary employees.
• Leadership is more about the why than the what. People who get organizations to deliver on the quarterly numbers or meet production goals are good, maybe even great, managers. Management is challenging, and doing it well should be rewarded. But only when employees follow the vision and mission of the organization will you find out how well they are being led.
Management and leadership are complementary skills. Strong leaders know at least a bit about managing, and effective managers know something about leading.
No matter the difficulty, we owe it to ourselves to stop calling people leaders when they fail to lead. We can call them executives, high-ranking officials, or senior managers. Let’s reserve the meaningful leader designation for those we choose to follow.
