Over the last several months I have been evolving a new theory of what leadership is. The theory goes something like this:
Leadership is choosing the time and place to take risks, and the size of the risk to take. This definition is not totally satisfactory to me, though, because I think that taking risks is still too easy of a thing to do. If someone is well versed in probability, they can effectively figure out times and places where the reward:risk ratio is best, and that would constitute leadership. But, this seems too simple.
In fact, I would argue that leadership is more than just taking risks. Leadership is doing things that are unpopular. Defining unpopular here is difficult, and it's more than simply the fact of something enjoying less than 50% support. For lack of a better one, I have decided to use the Rousseauian term General Will to express "the wants of the masses." The leader goes against the General Will. Doing this well is the stuff of history.
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4 comments:
Good leadership, to me, is making decisions that benefit whoever (whomever?) it is you're leading. Sometimes those decisions are risky, sometimes they're unpopular, but the good leader is the person who communicates his reasoning and gets people to--what's the word?--follow. This is why, say, Reagan falls under 'good leader' and why Bush will be considered anything but.
That definition seems a little more populist or utilitarian than I would like. I like to think sometimes a leader must make the the "right" decision, even if it is ultimately bad for more people than it is good for.
Reagan and Andrew Jackson were perhaps the two greatest presidents of the type you describe.
Which is more important? Making the right decision, or getting people to follow the decision you make? You can't always have both.
You're perhaps forgetting that it's possible to be a leader, and a great leader, without having any decision-making authority whatsoever. I think what you're really looking for is, What makes someone a good executive?
What makes you think I'm forgetting that it's possible to be a leader without being an executive?
And who doesn't have decision-making power for themselves? Perhaps being a leader means doing that thing which others disagree with, by and for yourself.
Granted, "leadership" does imply that someone, somewhere, will at least witness the choices you make, even if they are not bound by them or obligated to adhere to them.
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