It doesn’t seem to matter which side of the political spectrum someone is on; a huge number of people complain that the world is a mess. A sure way to improve things is to enhance the quality of our leadership. This includes self-leadership, interpersonal leadership, organizational leadership, and leadership at all levels of government (Clark et al., 2014; Darwish et al., 2020; Nepstad et al., 2006).
The world has just gotten too unhealthy, chaotic, and dangerous. We can do better!
For the sake of simplicity and readability, this blog will focus on three outstanding pieces of literature: The Father of Modern Management, Peter Drucker’s 1954 book, The Practice of Management; the 2019 book, Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders? (And How to Fix It) by organizational psychologist and best-selling author Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic; and the 2025 Harvard Business Review article, Just Because You Want to Lead Doesn’t Mean You Should, by Senior Editor at Harvard Business Review, Eben Harrell.
Peter Drucker
The Practice of Management is widely considered to be Drucker’s most influential of his 39 books. Many of his concepts, although written 72 years ago, are still in wide use today. One example is that several survey studies show that some 60% of governments at all levels use Management by Objectives or some form of it (Rodgers et al.1992).
In the book, Drucker writes that leadership is
- “Of the utmost importance; there is no substitute for it” (p.158).
- He defines leadership as not magnetic personality (charisma), which, he says, can just as well be demagoguery,
- and it is not about making friends and influencing people –that is salesmanship.
- A leader holds high standards of performance and respect for the individual and
- their work.
- These words apply to a leader: “Wishing won’t make it so; doing will” (P. 160).
About who not to promote to leadership, he says that before promoting someone to a leadership position, make sure they have integrity of character. He defines lack of character as:
- focusing on a person’s weaknesses rather than their strengths,
- being more interested in the question of “Who is right“ rather than “What is right?”,
- considering intelligence as more important than integrity,
- being afraid of strong subordinates, and
- not setting high standards for their own work.
Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic
Most leadership positions are held by men, and Chamorro-Premuzic believes that most of them are ineffective, causing low levels of trust, engagement, and productivity in organizations. He does not advocate that women should replace ineffective men, but that the ineffective men should be replaced with more competent people, and that will increase the percentage of women in leadership positions.
Chamorro-Premuzic answers the question, “Why do so many incompetent men become leaders?” He says that the answer involves confidence, charisma, and narcissism. People tend to confuse competence with confidence. Just because a charismatic person sounds and acts confidently, that does not mean they are either confident or competent. We tend to love charismatic people because they are charming and entertaining. But that does not qualify them to be leaders. Angela Merkel, the former Chancellor of Germany, was humble and boring, but by most accounts, an amazingly effective leader.
It is hard to resist the lure of narcissists. They talk big, and people want to believe that they can or will do what they say they will. The problem is that they see leadership as an entitlement. They lack empathy and self-control and tend to take excessive risks because they have convinced themselves they can walk their talk.
The bottom line of improving leadership is for decision-makers to avoid people who are confident, charismatic, and narcissistic, and instead look for men and women who have humility, competence, and integrity. This will take some effort to overcome biases and our own fallible intuitions. If women start to outnumber men in leadership positions, it is completely justified, since studies show that women score higher than men on measures of competence, humility, and integrity. These decision makers need to manage their bias that men make better leaders and not rule out candidates for leadership positions, who don’t have the traditional or stereotypical male attributes.
Eben Harrell
Because someone wants to be in a position of power has no bearing on whether or not he or she would be a competent leader. A burning desire for power often turns out badly. The opening paragraph (p. 1) of Harrell’s article reads:
A team of researchers led by Stanford University’s Shilaan Alzahawi thinks it has at least part of the answer. The team asked 472 participants at an executive education program to self-report their level of ambition. The participants were then rated by peers, subordinates, managers, and themselves on 10 leadership competencies, including their ability to motivate others, manage collaborative work, coach and develop people, and present and communicate ideas. The results showed no relationship between ambition and leadership aptitude (Alzahawi et al. 2024).
Harrell cites other potential findings related to the Alzahawi study:
- Prior to the study, it was common for many people to believe that greater leadership ambition might also be an indicator of leadership competence.
- Leadership roles come with large increases in compensation, autonomy, and status, and the desire for those things can cause people to arrive at conclusions about themselves that may not be accurate.
- A recommendation from the Alzahawi study is that organizations de-emphasize ambition as a factor in the promotional selection process and even seek out people with leadership potential who are not actively seeking a leadership position. However, forcing people into leadership roles could be counterproductive.
Conclusion
Be wary of promoting narcissistic, overly confident people into positions of power. And mistaking charisma for leadership is commonplace and is warned against by many scholars and practitioners in the leadership field. The desire to be in a position of power has no relationship to leadership competence.
Being afraid of strong subordinates is ubiquitous. It leads to micro-management, that toxic behavior that bosses sometimes pass off as strong leadership.
The characteristics to look for in potential leaders are humility, integrity, competence, and a commitment to serving people. It might be a good idea to recruit people in your organization for leadership who demonstrate good leadership characteristics. It’s worth mentioning that (Drucker 2008) recommends volunteerism as a way to find meaning. Finding a volunteer job on the resume of a potential leader might indicate that he or she has a servant’s heart.
And keep in mind the words of Robert Greenleaf, who coined the term servant leader: A leader is a servant first, and not someone who needs to assuage a power drive or to acquire material possessions (Greenleaf 1970).
References
Alzahawi, S., Reit, E.S., Fly\nn, F. (2024). A legend in One’s Own Mind: The lLnk Between Ambition and Leadership Evaluations. PNAS Nexus. Vol. 3. Iss. 8. August 2024. https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgae295
Clark, J. R., Murphy, C., Singer, S. J. (2014). When do Leaders Matter? Ownership, Governance and the Influence of CEOs on Firm Performance. The Leadership Quarterly. Vol. 25. Iss. 2. April 2014.
Darwish, T. K., Zeng, J., Rezaei Zadeh, M., and Haak-Saheem, W. (2020). Organizational Learning of Absorptive Capacity and Innovation: Does Leadership Matter? European Management Review, 17: 83–100. https://doi.org/10.1111/emre.12320.
Drucker, P. F. (1954.) The Practice of Management. Harper Business.
Drucker, P. F. (2008). Managing Oneself. Harvard Business Press.
Greenleaf, R. K. (1970). The Servant as Leader. The Robert K. Greenleaf Center.
Harrell, E. (2025). Just Because You Want to Lead Doesn’t Mean You Should (2025). Harvard Business Review. January-February 2025.
Nepstad, S. E., Bob, C. (2006). When Do Leaders Matter? Hypotheses on Leadership Dynamics in Social Movements. Mobilization: An International Journal Vol. 11. Iss. !. 1-22. 13 July 2006.
Rodgers, R., Hunter, J.E. (1992). A Foundation of Good Management Practice in Government: Management by Objectives. Public Administration Review. Vol. 52. Iss. 1. (Jan/Feb 1992).
