An area that has always intrigued both renowned academics as well as seasoned practitioners is the area of leadership of an organisation. It is not a topic of the 21st century but rather a topic of the 19th century. Since no definite answer has been forthcoming and there is an abundance of ideas in terms of what constitutes a good leader, the last word on the subject is still to be written. Probably it will never be written.
Last week I touched on the point, albeit briefly, that a good leader needs to have a high degree of intelligence quotient (IQ) and emotional intelligence (EQ), as well as a high level of love quotient (LQ).
It needs to be appreciated that up to some 150 years ago, the principle of might is right ruled the day. A leader was a leader because one was feared. And there are people today who still believe that for a person to be a good leader, one needs to be feared. At that time and for centuries before that, a person in a position of leadership had a good say over one’s subordinates lives.
Historical references to this abound. Think of slavery; think of those burned at the stake for daring to believe in something else that was not the right thing to believe in the leader’s eyes; think of those whose head was chopped off because they dared to contradict their leader.
The leader that is effective at inspiring one’s team is more likely to succeed to lead by influence
Most attempts at democracy before the 19th century did not live long. Again history teaches us this – think of Rome. We had a lack of democracy in most countries throughout the 19th century and in significant parts of the world also in the 20th century.
If democracy was not tolerated in society, it was even less tolerated at the place of work. This explains why the idea of leadership by influence, as opposed to leadership by power, still generates different ideas. Today – and it cannot be said that such an opinion will still be accepted tomorrow – it appears to be generally accepted that a good leader leads by influence not by power and fear.
How such influence can be exerted is what has challenged the thinking of academics as well as practitioners. There are different ideas as to the extent leaders should communicate with their team. There are also different ideas as to what motivates persons to strive at work. The validity of the idea of the entrepreneurial manager appears to start being challenged, while it was seen as the best idea in town some 20 years ago. People cannot seem to agree on what the word empowerment really means.
One idea that still has a lot of appeal is inspirational leadership. The leader that is effective at inspiring one’s team is more likely to succeed to lead by influence. However what generates that inspiration? Some say it is good example. It is yet to be proven that setting a good example is enough. People seem to be more likely to follow a bad example than a good example. Others claim that what generates inspiration is action, that is a leader who is a doer more than a talker. Even this is known not to apply most of the time.
One idea that is gaining ground is that a leader who inspires one’s team is also a leader who aspires, who has aspirations. So far it has been said that an inspiring leader is the one who manages to meet the aspirations of one’s team. This is now changing to saying that an inspiring leader is someone who has aspirations and manages to influence one’s team to make these aspirations their own.
This means that such aspirations cannot be the material enrichment or self gratification of the leader as no one would subscribe to such aspirations. What these aspirations should be is something that probably each leader needs to find out with one’s own team. But the motto seems to be ‘aspire to inspire’. If we look around us, we can probably see some good examples of this.
I believe the debate as to what constitutes a good leader will continue for years, decades and centuries to come. I don’t believe leaders can ever be robotised or cloned. Therefore, there will always be leaders and there will always be the need for effective leaders.