Leaders are make, not born (Sunday Times 12 Dec)
Mr Kouzes says leaders must be humble, and that a great leader is one “whose feet are planted on the ground, with his head in the clouds dreaming of possibilities”. — ST PHOTO: DESMOND WEE
True leaders lead, fearing no problem that arises. That’s Leadership 101, or so it seems.
Gathering the top managers of Ford Motor Company in 2006, incoming car czar Alan Mulally had this poser: How well was their legendary company doing?
Mr Mulally, one of America’s most influential top honchos who had earlier piloted The Boeing Company for 30 years, told them to say ‘green’ if they thought Ford was doing fine. ‘Yellow’ meant it needed to keep an eye on some projects; ‘red’ if there were problems.
But after two meetings of green, green and more green ratings all round, an exasperated Mr Mulally said: ‘We’re losing a few billion dollars here; do you think we might be having some problems?’
Recalling that snippet with a chuckle, American leadership coach Jim Kouzes says that supposed corporate leaders who are afraid to talk about problems are the biggest problem.
‘You can’t talk about mistakes, you can’t even make mistakes. How can anyone grow that way?’ he says.
Mr Kouzes, 64, is one of the most popular thinkers on leadership today; his seminal 2007 book, The Leadership Challenge, co-authored with colleague Barry Posner, has sold more than 1.5 million copies to date.
Now in its fourth edition and published by John Wiley & Son’s imprint Jossey-Bass, it is a classic text alongside Stephen Covey’s The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People and Jim Collins’ Good To Great.
The executive professor of leadership in the Leavey School of Business at California’s Santa Clara University was in town recently to give a talk to about 100 principals, school teachers and tutors.
His key message: Leaders are most definitely made, not born. Also, leadership skills can be learnt and passed on. In other words: We are all potential leaders.
Mr Kouzes now does the lecture circuit, leaving the ‘one-on-one’ coaching of chairmen and chief executives of Fortune 500 corporations to his Korean wife Moon Tae Kyung.
Home for the couple is the San Francisco Bay area, which they share with their undergraduate son Nicholas.
That everyone can potentially lead is empowering, but the cynic would insist that Mr Kouzes and Mr Posner, co-authors for the past 25 years, have an agenda.
After all, the critics will charge, the idea that many – not just a select few – can lead will surely drive a big market for their books.
To such charges, Mr Kouzes explains that a good leader shows the way and gives others the space to explore and express themselves.
This is the way to go in the Knowledge Age, where ideas are the most coveted currency. Those who are innovative thrive best – but thrive only with good leadership.
He says: ‘The greatest tension you (the leader) have to manage is between freedom and constraint.
‘Too much constraint and people will comply for a while, but will not innovate. Worse, they will not commit to anything.’
He then asks this reporter: ‘Do you know who people cite as the greatest leaders they have known?’
Not for them the Lincolns, Gandhis or Lee Kuan Yews, he says. Most people cite their parents as their personal heroes, followed by their teachers and then community leaders.
Bosses, businessmen and celebrities rarely get a mention.
‘And yet,’ Mr Kouzes muses, ‘whenever we talk about leadership, we talk about those at the top of corporations. Why is that?’
This is his premise – that everyone not only can, but must, lead wherever and whenever they might make a difference.
So if you wait for someone to call upon you to take the lead, that would be just obeying an order to take the lead.
Mr Kouzes cites his own personal hero for the wisest words on leadership: psychologist John Gardner.
Mr Gardner, who was the secretary of health, education and welfare under then United States President Lyndon Johnson, was a colleague of MrKouzes’ late father Tom, who was the president’s deputy assistant secretary of labour.
Mr Gardner had said: ‘Pity the leaders caught between unloving critics and uncritical lovers.’
The younger Mr Kouzes explains that a leader needs to believe in himself even under attack, yet re-cognise his own fallibility.
‘Humility is the antidote to hubris,’ he adds.
A humbling thought indeed, given the recent fall of chief executives linked to names such as Enron and Bear Stearns.
And humility is born of trust, which is the daughter of honesty. Indeed, at his leadership workshop in Bishan Community Library, where around 100 participants were asked to rank the quality they valued most in a leader, close to 90 plumped for honesty and integrity.
That tallies with responses that Mr Kouzes and Mr Posner received from sessions in 73 countries thus far.
This is why, he points out, if people don’t believe in a leader, they will also not believe his message.
Whom would he consider a great leader?
‘One whose feet are solidly planted on the ground, with his head in the clouds dreaming of possibilities,’ he says.
What of his own ability to lead in leadership thinking?
He replies: ‘As long as I still get asked the question, ‘Are leaders born or made?’ then my idea of leadership will still not be a commonly shared vision.’
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