Leadership | - "Sick and tired"

Fernando Bartolomé, Professor of Management, Instituto de Empresa.

Personally, I am sick and tired of reading descriptions of leadership seminars, courses and workshops on leadership and of the thousands of "leadership products" generated by the leadership industry, from the most banal to the most arcane and esoteric.

My main objections are:

1. Most models about leadership reflect the unrealistic fantasies of academics and other management gurus. And they contribute to the development of unrealistic descriptions of leadership and, even more unrealistic, descriptions of leaders. A good part of the leadership literature describes heroic, humane, enlightened leaders that never existed. (Having built up these idols, many of these myth makers seem to disappear when the idols fall. At that time a new "leadership specialist" arrives to propose wonderfully logical and sophisticated theories about why those leaders failed. By doing this, the expert proposes an alternative model of "flawless, virtuous leadership". The message is: "If you had taken my course or read my book, you would never have made those stupid mistakes".

2. But leadership experts go beyond building unrealistic images of leadership. They proceed next to build sophisticated instruments to asses the leadership potential of individual managers. The effects of this can be devastating to the manager who finds that he/she lacks vision and the capacity to inspire others, is weak in self-awareness, has limited emotional intelligence and lacks a fine-tuned sense of ethics. (Fortunately, most of the people who became good leaders did not fill in those assessment questionnaires before they embarked in their adventure).

3. These courses and other pedagogical approaches are useless for another basic reason: most managers in any organization will never be asked to act as leaders but simply to act as managers in charge of implementing ideas and projects that emanate from the top.

Conclusion: It is about time that we give up the fantasy that we are in the business of helping people become leaders. And that we accept that it is good enough if they learn to be creative and effective as managers, who are basically asked to implement the ideas, good and bad that roll down from Mount Olympus. (Part of their creativity should focus on learning how to sabotage the many stupid ideas flowing from the top).

Comments

[Troy Hendrickson]

After reading some of these entries I could not resist the urge to respond. It seems as though many people have obviously been jaded by the "leadership experience" because in fact they have not had an opportunity to "EXPERIENCE" leadership. I am not saying that there are not a lot of hollow promise leadership programs out there...because indeed there are. However, let us not throw the baby out with the bathwater; because there are also several authentic leadership development programs that actually put people in to real experiences with other "HUMANS"--(yes, that's right...humans and not just text books)...IN situations that require "LEADERSHIP" in order to cope, and to move forward, and accomplish the given task at hand--while working with other team members in the process. So whilst all of the theory and books and cliches do start to run a bit thin after a while (especially when they have been reiterated for the two thousandth time during a leadership "training" session), let us not forget that there are actually programs that do provide the level of engagement and immersion of 'self' that can, and really does result in people actually growing their own capacity to be a leader. I am not trying to sell a book or promote the course that I am involved in; but I can assure you that there is qualitative evidence from participants that they have had a shift in their capacity as leaders once they have gone through the program. So to say that programs are useless and unrealistic is a pretty narrow minded blanket statement that does not necessarily provide an accurate portrayal of ALL of the programs that are actually in existence and are in fact providing substantial benefits to individuals in their personal and professional lives. Like anything though, there will always need to be the poor programs out there, so that there are benchmarks to compare quality programs against. :)

[Luis Cea Prospero]

Amigo Fernando
Otra vez el portugués!
Termine prácticamente mi EXMBA2006 y lamentablemente me quede sinceramente con la sensación que se seguirá educando o instruyendo la gente para que actué y tome el rumo de su vida sin arriesgar a NADA! Perfectos Autómatas Cerebrales"
Cuando el "riesgo" es de echo el mejor motor del progreso!
You can loose and you can win! but you will never stop trying!
Imaginemos un pobre entorno donde no se arriesga a nada?
Necesito de ayuda! Toda mi vida de emprendedor arriesgue todo por tener una "Luz" que me indicaba el camino, que me daba la comida donde no existía, que me hacia seguir adelante, siempre adelante y ahora, encontró-me con la sensación de que para la mayoría de la gente yo soy un "terrorista" un "catalizador", cuando lo que busco es solamente abrir y rasgar caminos-conceptos y que todo dinámicamente siga mucho mas para adelante!
Es triste mas tengo la sensación de que la "gente" se acomoda fácilmente! Estaremos nosotros a criar una mediocridad generalizada para poder fácilmente aplicar las lenguajes empresariales y de esa forma mejor gobernar?
Si si, necesitamos de "ejecutantes" mas donde se premia la creatividad ¿ La unicidad y la autenticidad sin medos?
Enfim! Solo quiero que nunca se pierda la sensación mas auspiciosa de la vida; EL MEDO y que pelo menos, académicamente, se premie para que no seja una barrera para la Arte de Hacer o seguir adelante!

Un grande abrazo
Luis

[Ivan Ivanovitch]

Leadership is one of the “buzz” words at the present time. Business schools promise to potential students that they will miraculously turn them into leaders during their MBA programs. There is hardly any business school on the Financial Times’s top 100 that doesn’t proclaim such objectives. The promise “to develop future leaders” is one of the marketing tools used by the business schools to attract students (and their tuition dollars/euros). It gives another dimension to the more mundane promises of higher post mba salary, ROI, networking possibilities, etc.

Business schools want to appeal to needs other than greed, and the desire for grandeur seems to be an effective one. But business students have to know what waits for them after the mba is a relatively well paid mid-manager’s position (if they are lucky). There is nothing wrong with aspiring to be a leader, but people may be misled and disappointed when the reality sets in.

Ivan Ivanovitch, MBA 2005
Schulich/Instituto de Empresa

[Alejandro Álvarez]

I gladly agree with Fernando Bartolomé. When I was reading the previous posts from José Luis Alvarez on Shared Leaderships... I was getting frustrated because all the info was focused on "The book I wrote...", "the book that someone wrote..." all of them teachers (or gurus as Fernando said latter)!!!

I am sorry but I do not agree with this all-academic-point of view of dealing with leadership.

Please, do not try to teach what a good leader should be like... but help us study or own "Good Leaders" and bringing home those "special things" we discover(Good Leaders meaning that there are so many Leaders that were good at one point of time... with one duty... Think of Churchill at the end of WWII and how he was kicked out)

Please, do not lose your goals of being productive to the business... out of your Business Schools!

[Luis Cea Prospero - IE EMBA2006 S2]

Felicitaciones Estimado D.Fernando

Mas me encanaria anadir algo, lamento usar una antologia mas considero ser la herramenta mas efectiva para este caso:
Caballos de Corrida, ensenar-los a correr, se consigue. Ensenar-los a saltar, no es tarefa facil mas se consigue! Mas ensenar un bom caballo a ser un verdadero Puro Sangues es lo dificil!
Un Puro Sangue es un Puro Sangue!!
No puede haver ilusiones!!
Esta penso se seja la filtragem natural de las cosas!
Ensenar a ser un Leader no significa que se sera un verdadero Leader, existen herramentas de caracter personal, social y cultural que son igualmente o mas prioritarias para esta "Best Practice Performance" y hay que saber aplicarlas.
Leadership no altos quadros empresariales no es solamente tener la habilidad de saber usar las herramientas, mas si tambien saber usar las ferramentas de su formacion personal, social y cultural.
El conocimento tecnico es una actividade que en cada minuto se puede tornar obsuleta, no entanto la habilidad Social y Politica "Savoir Fair" es una que no se perde tan facilmente.
Enfim, penso que se esta haciendo um perfecto trabajo de como abrir las ventanas del conocimento empresarial, mas al final es el filtro natural de las instituiciones corporativa y nuestras capacidades tecnicas y habilidades sensoriales que deciden.
"to be or not to be" a Leader! ;o)

[Fernando Jimenez]

Si abandonamos la idea de formar líderes y nos limitamos a formar directivos, estaremos dejando que nuestros graduados pierdan de vista modelos de comportamiento, que han llevado a muchas empresas a conseguir el liderazgo en los mercados. Es cierto que es más práctico, más objetivo, más palpable desarrollar programas y prácticas enfocadas a la formación de directivos de una determinada área de la empresa, profesionales que sin duda van a desarrollar su labor de manera excelente. Creo que es una obligación de las escuelas de negocio el enseñar las "best-practice" y sinceramente entre ellas debemos intentar contar con verdaderos líderes, más que con directivos, por muy eficientes que sean.