My good friend, and Ranger Buddy, Ryan Harry, just asked me to comment on some really interesting leadership questions. I enjoyed the questions so much, I thought I would share them here, along with my answers. As two guys who attended what the military calls "the most demanding leadership school" I love that we still think about this stuff critically, and share our thoughts. What are your thoughts?
1. Is a person “Born to Lead?
I don't think leaders are born, nor do I think they are made. You "make" a car or a can of coke - other than our parents, no one "makes" people - we develop people, so we develop leaders. No one is born a leader, we may have innate skills that make some parts of leading feel more natural, but leadership is developed. You want a leader, you have to develop them, as people and as leaders.
2. Is Leadership learned in the class room or through the study of leadership?
The second question is also not as clearly answered as it seems - there is the theory of leadership and then there is the practice of leadership. It is too easy to say that "you have to do it to be good at it" (what most practitioners will say). To be a great leader you have to do both - you need to study leadership, talk about it, think about it and share the ideas you have about it. But it can't stop there. You need a balance of both.
3. Is Leadership gained through life experience and situations?
The last question is the easiest - HELL YES! The only way to lead is with the self-awareness of your own experience through life's situations. We have to understand our experiences, and the experiences of those you lead. That is where empathy comes from and I believe that empathy is essential to good leadership. My teammate Tim Paul and I wrote an article in response to a Jack and Suzy Welch article. If you are interested in that - here is the link:https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/jack-suzy-welch-got-leadership-wrong-time-jc-glick/
Here is the bottom line - leadership has no easy answers, so the development of leaders is also not easy. Anyone who tells you with some simple answer about leadership, or a leader's development, simply doesn't understand either.
J.C. Glick, LTC, U.S. Army (Ret.), Director, Leadership Resiliency with 360 DEVELOPMENT™ part of Destination Athlete®