Are Leaders Born or Made?

Are leaders born or made? Chicken and the egg kinda debate that we are never going to settle. However, this may help. This is what we mean when we say leaders are born.

There are people who don't need to undergo any kind of leadership training to know how to lead or manage people. It comes naturally to them because it is their innate talent. They are the born leaders. They fine-tune their talent as they go along but even without polishing it, they do it to almost near perfection.

Then there is the majority who are made leaders. It is not natural for them, therefore, rigorous training is required. However, because it is not something they are naturally pre-dispositioned to, they will never be as good at leading people as those who are born.

They will be able to develop and demonstrate skills, behaviours, and characteristics, often with great effort that weakens them in the long run, but they will never inherently possess leadership qualities.

It is similar to me being an introvert. My job requires me to be more on the extrovert side so, I have learned the behaviours related to extroversion and I can exhibit them quite well but it will never make me an extrovert.

Demonstrating extrovert characteristics and behaviours deplete my energy. By the end of the day, as my energy is steadily running out, the more I default back to my natural introvert behaviour. For this reason, a naturally born extrovert will always be better and beat me over time.

So when you are training your leaders, try to figure out which ones are the naturally born ones and the ones you need to make. Have that genuine conversation as this understanding will help them when they struggle in their role.

All they will need is a reset time and they will be able to continue exhibiting those leadership qualities.

#leadership#leader#born