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Skyline Business School |
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Skyline Business School |
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Issue:9
The Seven Ages Of The Leader
A new leader faces high expectations and a lot of problems when he or she comes into an
existing organization. Furthermore leaders have to face the misgivings, misperceptions and
the personal needs of those who are to be led. The followers in the organization always
keep an eye to see if the new leader is measuring up.
Every leader at some point in time in his or her career must go through a number of
passages each of which has an element of personal crisis. A business school does not
prepare people for these crises. These crises can be utterly painful, but they offer
valuable lessons as well.
Shakespeare in his book, 'As You Like It', spoke about the seven ages of man.
In short, these stages can be can be described as infant, schoolboy, lover, soldier,
general, statesman, and sage. The same applies to all leaders.
One way to learn about leadership is to look at each of these developmental stages and
study the issues and crises that are faced by leaders in each of these stages.
The Infant Executive
For the young man or woman on the verge of becoming a leader, the world that lies ahead is
a mysterious, even frightening place. Few leaders complain, but many wish they had someone
to help them solve problems and ease them into this transition. Instead, a fortunate
beginner leader gets a mentor, a concept that has its origin in Greek mythology.
The fact that a mentor has the qualities of both man and woman shows the richness and
complexity of the relationship, suggesting a deeper bond than that of a teacher and
student.
In the real world, good mentors are hard to find.
One mark of a future leader is the ability to identify and try and obtain the support of a
mentor who will change his or her life. Ideally mentors should be recruited by people and
not searched for.
The message for the "infant executive" is to recruit a mentor who can back you
up when you feel lonely and unsupported in your first top job.
The Schoolboy, With Shining Face
A leader's first experience is an agonizing education. Worse still, leaders have to learn
how to do the job in public, subjected to unsettling scrutiny of everything they do.
The focus is always on the leader as if he or she is onstage, and everything the leader
does is subjected to comments, criticisms and interpretations (or misinterpretations).
First acts as a leader in the organization would either win people in favor of the leader
or turn people against the leader. These initial acts may have a long-lasting effect on
how the group performs.
It is, therefore, always best for a new leader to make a restrained entry. This kind of an
entry helps in gathering information and to develop relationships wisely. It gives an
opportunity to learn the culture of the organization and to benefit from those who were
already there.
A quiet entry allows the others in the group to demonstrate what they know and allows the
leader to establish the contributions of the others. It also allows the leader to state
that he is a leader, and not a dictator.
A leader often becomes a screen onto which followers project their own fantasies about
power and relationships.
Therefore the first challenge for a leader is to try and not take followers' assessments
too personally. The second, but tricky challenge is to accept the fact that their
assessments may be accurate.
The Lover, With A Woeful Ballad
In this stage leaders are described as "sighing like furnace", as they
struggle with the problems every organization presents. For a leader who has come up
through the ranks, one of the tough jobs is to narrate to former colleagues who now report
to the leader.
Today's leaders instantly recognize the fact that it's difficult to set boundaries and
fine- tune working relationships with former colleagues.
Most organizations, with the exception of the military, reiterate the fact that they are
at least semidemocracies, however autocratic they may be.
Relationships change when a person is promoted from within the ranks. A new leader may
never be able to speak as openly as he/she may have done before, and his/her friends may
feel awkward with him/her around them.
Leaders coming into new organizations are often subjected to by an unconscious conspiracy
to preserve the existing state of affairs. Problem after problem will be presented to the
leader - plenty of new ones and a lot of old ones left unresolved by previous
administrations - and responding to them will restrain the new leader to pursue his/her
own agenda.
Almost all leaders find themselves at some point in their careers of having to ask others
to leave the organization. This is always a painful task because it usually devastates the
person being asked to go and the time is never favorable.
There's little guidance available for leaders on how to do this awful business in a humane
way. However, the one thing that leaders must always remember is that they have people's
emotional lives in their hands.
The Bearded Soldier
As time passes leaders grow comfortable with the roles assigned to them. This comfort
brings with it confidence and conviction, but it also can break the connection between the
leader and followers. There can be two consequences; either leaders may forget the impact
of their words and actions, or they may assume that what they are hearing from followers
is what needs to be heard.
Though the first words and actions of leaders are the most closely attended to, the
scrutiny never really ends. Followers continue to pay close attention to even the most
offhand remark, and the more effective the leader is, the more careful he/she must be.
Followers don't tell leaders everything. The fact is, however close the leader may be to
his followers few people tell their leaders about what is their requirement in the
organization.
Many leaders use their position to crush competitions. A leader perhaps unconsciously
tries to prevent people working under him/her from coming up.
In contrast, authentic leaders are generous. They're humane and may experience jealousy
occasionally at watching someone accomplish something they cannot.
But they are always willing to hire people who are better then they are, because they know
that highly talented subordinates can help them shine.
"Therefore the real challenge for a leader is to nurture those people whose stars may
shine as brightly as - or even brighter than - the leader's own."
The General, Full Of Wise Saws
A really tough challenge for a leader at the peak of his/her career is not only allowing
people to speak the truth but also actually being able to hear it.
A current example can be seen in Howell Raines, the deposed executive editor of the New
York Times. Among the many ways he blocked the flow of information upward was to limit the
pool of people he groomed and, thus, the number of people he listened to. Raines was well
known for having a small A-list comprising of really good people in the organization and a
large B-list made up of everyone else.
In this stage challenges are different, because leaders in their careers are brought with
a view to bring about changes thus their actions have a direct and immediate impact on an
organization's long-term chances of success. Hesitations in making decisions can be
disastrous, however leaders must understand the mood and motivations of the people in the
organization before taking actions.
Corporate stories are full of leaders who have failed to achieve greatness just because
they failed to understand the circumstances they were working in and were not able to get
the support of their subordinates.
A model of success can be Carly Fiorina's effort when she took over Hewlett-Packard. She
had three shortcomings. First she was a woman, second she was an outsider, and third she
wasn't an engineer. The person who was her biggest critic was none other than the son of
company founder - Walter Hewlett. But Fiorina cleverly honored the company's illustrious
past, even as she prepared for change, including the merger with Compaq. The first annual
report under her leadership included a vision statement that started with the word
"Invent", paying homage to the pioneering spirit that had created HP while
simultaneously rewriting the "rules of the garage". She appreciated the threat
presented by Walter Hewlett but continued her work by not overreacting and thus when the
moment came, the board members removed Hewlett.
The Statesman, With Spectacles On Nose
In this stage leader's power begins to decrease. The leader is often hard at work
preparing to pass his or her knowledge to younger people in the organization.
The leader may also be called upon to play important temporary roles, because of the
knowledge and perception possessed by him/her that come with age and experience.
When Joseph Lelyveld was called upon by Arthur Sulzberger, the New York Times publisher to
take over from Howell Raines as editor can be an example where a person (Joseph), with a
lot of experience has been called upon to perform interim roles for an organization.
The Sage, Second Childishness
It is in this stage that a leader feels the need to prepare the next generation for
leadership i.e. being a mentor.
The true nature of mentoring is the fact that it is an initiation of a valuable
relationship between two individuals - one with a lot of knowledge and experience whereas
the other with a purpose to learn.
When leaders mentor, they know that what they have achieved will not be lost, that they
are leaving a professional legacy for future generations to follow. In a mentoring
relationship the elder partner works diligently in an ever-changing world, while the
younger partner observes what does and doesn't work in an organization.
"This stage is called "Second Childishness", where age of leaders today, is
not a factor. Rather, it is a joyous discovery of childhood at its best."
Reviewed from Harvard Business Review -
January 2004
by Rahul Roy,
BBA-MAHE, Level 1
Comments and questions: info@skylinecollege.com
URL: http://www.skylinecollege.com
