Steve,
Just two points:
1. A leader is someone who finds a parade ... and steps in front of it!
[I understand that it is possible to encourage people to create the parade
-- in fact, that's what my work has been for about 18 years. But even in
my work I have to admit that the "parade" was there, in the hearts and
souls of other people, before I ever showed up to help organize and
concentrate it.]
2. Your surprise at Drucker's denial that there are leadership traits is
understandable, but I think it may be due to a confusion of terms. I
suggest this because, later in your message, you talk about leadership
competencies. When Drucker speaks of "traits" what he means is something
like "personality traits" (i.e., not learned and mutable abilities but
more permanent inclinations and characteristics of people.) Warren
Bennis, who devoted his early career to searching for traits that could
identify who will be the leaders in an organization, gave up with a
similar comment to Drucker's (after many years of trying.) [In fact, I
wouldn't be surprised if Bennis is the motivation behind Drucker's
statement.] Trait theory has not been in much favor lately, for many good
reasons, but Drucker grew up with it as a leading theory for explaining
human behavior. Trait theory is part of the "nature vs. nurture" debate
that still rages. So, by "traits" Drucker means things that people are
born with, genetic inheritances -- not things that can be learned and
improved upon.
And, with that definition, I'd be surprised if you didn't agree that there
are no leadership traits -- leaders come in all shapes and sizes, all hair
colors, all ethnic backgrounds, even all ranges of intelligence.
--"John Gunkler" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>