At present, it is common to hear different opinions regarding the existence of a leadership crisis or an absence of leaders. There are, according to this view, many directors, administrators and managers, but few leaders. However, it would be necessary to evaluate if this is really the case or if we are facing a change in concepts and needs around leadership.
Throughout history, there were different types of leadership: from the conquerors, in the most distant times, to the most recent leaders of the information and knowledge age, passing through the merchants, the organizers and the innovators, in other times.
The style and definition of leadership have changed according to circumstantial and historical needs. What is the current leader? Surely there are countless opinions, but it is also true that there are common characteristics and virtues necessary over time, such as service, influence, trust, transmitting a vision and achieving the best of each of the followers.
To know what we mean, we can take into account some definitions. These two initials speak of a relationship: while the first focuses on the leader, the second emphasizes the follower.
- “Leader is one who has the ability to make other people behave in a certain way to achieve an expected result spontaneously; free from coercion ”.
- “Leader is someone you would follow to a place where you wouldn't go just by yourself”, Joel Barker.
Another definition refers to the possibility of training leaders:
- "Leaders are not born: they become so through their personal efforts, through a long process in which they acquire the difficult ability to move for others, transcending their own selfishness", Juan A. Pérez López.
As you can see, in a changing and complex world it is becoming increasingly difficult to gather all the characteristics, virtues and knowledge of a leader. But far from looking for superheroes, today we need leaders who make leaders, who with great humility and greatness know how to share and generate areas of permanent learning, with the capacity for consensus. Today's leadership is shared and alternative, it changes hands according to the one who knows the most and according to needs.
As Z. Bauman says, in “Liquid Life”, we used to educate as if we were preparing a projectile: it was loaded with information and launched at the target. Today, the objective is constantly changing, therefore we have to educate as if we were preparing an intelligent missile, which receives and discards information constantly. Therefore, it is not enough with a leader, we need several and working as a team.
Perhaps this is why today we hear talk of leadership crisis, when what really changed is the model. There are too many leaders, we see them in NGOs, in companies, in education and in politics. However, they need to learn to form teams where they complement each other.
We are too small to generate changes in solitude; We need to form teams to achieve them, and a team of leaders will achieve superior leadership. As C. Darwin said: " It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one that best responds to change."
Recommended authors:
- Otto Scharmer, who investigates "collective consciousness" and the "U theory".
- Thomas Malone, with his “Distributed Model” of Leadership.
