The Accountant – Business as Usual?  –  Spring 2020 (MIA Publication)

“IT IS IN TIME OF CRISIS THAT GOOD LEADERS EMERGE“
– RUDY GIULANI (MAYOR OF NEW YORK CITY DURING THE 11TH SEPTEMBER ATTACKS ON THE TWIN TOWERS)

We all know we are living in a period of unprecedented crisis. However, leaders play an extremely important role during a crisis. In such difficult times, people look upon such leaders to lead from the front, show confidence and steadiness and take complete charge of the situation. Having said so it is useful to focus on one of the trends that has recently influenced leadership across the globe. Nearly 30% of Millennials hold managerial-level roles. Surveys from a variety of sources show that millennial managers value learning and growth experiences more than previous generations.

So, as we see that good leaders are extremely important in times of crises and that the chance of having a young leadership is on the increase, is it not logical to then ask the question - Are good young leaders born or made?

This is a question that many scholars, psychologists, and everyday people have asked before our time, and will even after we are gone. Some have argued that great leaders are born. Still others have argued that great leaders are made. So, which is it, traits or skills that makes someone a great leader?
In 1955 Robert Katz wrote an article for the Harvard Business Review called “Skills of an Effective Administrator” (Northouse, 2016, p. 43). Within this article Katz described three skill sets of an administrator. The skills were technical, human, and conceptual. Technical skills are the knowledge about specific type of work, human skills is how to work with people, and conceptual skills are the ability to work with ideas and concepts. The argument is people can learn these skills.

There are various other studies that found that the individuals’ perceptions of leadership were associated to traits. Let us take the known well case of John F. Kennedy. John F. Kennedy, one of the greatest leaders of the modern era. People found him to be charismatic, intelligent, masculine, and self-confident. Were these traits the reason he was a great leader?

John F. Kennedy was a poor student when he was younger. It was not until he was an upperclassman at Harvard, that he got serious about his studies and that “he began to realise his potential”. He later joined the U.S. Navy and commanded a patrol torpedo boat. On August 2, 1943 during an act from the Japanese, an injured Kennedy led survivors to safety until help could arrive.

John learned the skill technical, human, and conceptual skills in every step of his education right up through and into the Navy. Do you believe that Kennedy would have been the man he was without the educational background, and the experience in the Navy?

Some may say yes and others would say no. During his youth, Kennedy was more interested in sports and women. It was not until he took his studies seriously that Kennedy start to become the man he was going to be.

“Skills are what leaders can accomplish, whereas traits are who leaders are” (Northouse, 2016, p. 44). We can see that is true with Kennedy. There is no denying that he was charismatic, intelligent, and self-confident. These were his traits, the person who he was. He learned to work with people, and with ideas. John developed the skill that great leaders need.

If leadership can be defined as the sum of what we know, what we do and how we are, it is clear that leaders cannot be solely ‘born’. We are not born knowing everything about leadership or about how to enact leadership. That said, in the way we are with other people (our being), we may be seen to be ‘leadership material’ from a young age. Is this because we are born that way? Or does the latest research about the learning power of the brain at very early ages suggest otherwise?

Professor David Rusch, part of a team researching leadership development at the University of Illinois (2014) suggests leadership development is based on three traits – readiness, willingness and ability – and can be described as: ‘A three-legged stool, students first become ready to learn about being a leader; then they become willing to learn the skills necessary to practice leadership; and finally they’re able to lead because they have the skills and the motivation to do it. You can’t really move on to the other legs of the stool until you’ve achieved a certain amount of this readiness.’

So, are great leaders made or are they born? All the research seems to indicate it is a little of both. We can see that people love young persons for who they are, for her or his traits. It is however not until they start to learn skills to go along with those traits that a real young leader starts to be born. If a person has the skills but no leadership traits, could they be a leader? If they have the traits but no skills, could they be a leader? It is possible, but to be a great leader, you need both skills and traits. Here are some critical findings.

• Who becomes a leader? As the most widely cited meta-analysis in this area shows, people who are more adjusted, sociable, ambitious, and curious are much more likely to become leaders.

• How early can we predict potential? most of the commonly used indicators to gauge leadership potential — educational achievement, emotional intelligence, ambition, and IQ — can be predicted from a very early age.

• Does gender matter? Less than we think. Some studies have shown that women are slightly more effective as leaders on the job, but this may be because the standards for appointing women to leadership positions are higher than those for appointing men.

• Why do leaders derail? It is not the absence of bright side qualities, but rather their coexistence with dark side tendencies, that makes leaders derail. Indeed, as Sepp Blatter, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, and Bernie Madoff demonstrate, technical brilliance often coexists with self-destructive and other destructive traits.

So, what is the final takeaway with regards young leaders? We need to be alert at identifying the traits that make a good young leader, but these have to be matched by skills. Let’s focus on this as good young leaders is definitely a resource we need in these times of crisis.

Silvan holds a degree in Banking & Finance from the University of Malta and an MBA from the University of Reading, specialising in Corporate Finance and Business Leadership. Silvan has been involved in many sectors of the economy holding various managerial and Director roles. Silvan is presently working as a Director for Advisory Services at EMCS.