Often I ponder over the idea of leadership and its role in the corporate world.
Observations of various corporate honchos differ vastly from each other, hence my question, is there any fixed definition of the leader? The answer is “Big NO.”
Leader is not a one time title
Leaders could be by birth, can be made, may cease to become leaders. It is not a one-time title and like everything else, you too need to earn this title continuously and require to invent, innovate, lead with the changing times.
When I write that one can cease to be a leader, this means that on the day a person feels no one is good enough for them. Such persons are consumed by their own brilliance and they often resist talent management. In other words, they feel they are immortal and in the absence of their successors, they believe they can work from their graves. Such people are responsible for the murder of organisations.
Let’s find out who is a leader in real terms. A leader can be seen as possessing information (measurable), skills (measurable), knowledge (nonmeasurable) and competencies (nonmeasurable).
Now, a good leader must understand that the measurable part can be made part of training programs, which is top-down. This means training will have a definite outcome depending on the quality of the training, its content and design.
The non-measurable part can be made part of learning and development programmes which is bottom-up. This means participants need to be seekers and have curiosity, but despite the best content and design of the programme, no one can guarantee the outcome.
We can enhance the transmission of coaching, mentoring and training. But as a leader, it is our moral responsibility towards humanity and organisation and we must work towards it.
Why is there an acute shortage of leaders, skilled manpower nowadays?
This is mighty threatening to all industries and no single industry is immune from this disease.
Inspite of knowing the severe consequences, what stops people short of nurturing their colleagues, transmitting their expertise? Is there an insecure feeling of losing their own crown, or fear that sharing knowledge will make you less important in the organisation or if one will run out of ideas if shared, or whether someone will score faster than you, inspite of learning from you? – there are a number of reasons which restrict the flourishing of this process.
Like parents who feel their children are not as good as them, most leaders feel their successors are not as good as them. At an extreme, some leaders feel no talent is as good as them or can be as good as them. So they refuse to invest in talent development programmes. They yearn for clones exactly like them. They love compliments from those who obey them and supplements who enhance them. But at all times, they fear competition who can substitute them, so they reject them.
These leaders forget their mortality. They do not care about the death of the organisation. Such fantasy is dangerous. Great leaders create great organisations and great organisations create great ecosystems that creates a great leader. But neither a leader, nor an organisation, however great, may be immortal. People die, processes get outdated, systems collapse eventually. It is the law of entropy. The only way for the organisation is to admit to the mortality of the leader and work towards making him immortal. But no human is immortal, so he needs to father children, replace himself with successors who are as competent as they are.
At last there is no starting stage as such for the process of becoming the leader. Passion in you brings change. Take ownership of the tasks assigned without fear of being right or wrong. Accept responsibility. Stop bothering about the designations. It is the knowledge, competency, qualification, skills, urge for learning and working continuously towards inner improvement, which is the key to true Leadership.
The original text was written by the CEO Capt Bharat Sabharwal of Transworld Group, and he authorized Global CEO Family(GCF) to reproduce it.
