Rant of the Week

Maxwell's Ephemeral and Useless Leadership Wisdom

 

There is only one real irrefutable law of leadership:  Anyone who doesn't already have what it takes to be a good leader will not know what it is they need in order to become a good leader. 

And the obvious corollary: anyone who already is a good leader does not need leadership training and would be better off spending this time productively... doing something.  Like have a sex change operation if you are a woman, because Maxwell doesn't ever refer to a good leader as "she" or "her".

Here it is -- in the simplest possible terms:   all "leadership training" sounds great in the workshop and works perfectly as long as you don't let reality intrude.  That's all there is to it.  The minute you leave the seminar and immerse yourself into the real world again you will find that your problems are no simpler and the answers are no clearer.   And if you had weaknesses as a leader before the seminar, you will have the same weaknesses afterwards.  I guarantee that. 

However, a considerable number of people make a considerable amount of money trying to persuade middle managers and executives otherwise. 

Almost without exception, none of these "leaders" have any real-world accomplishments: they are all preachers, essentially, or what they used to call "snake-oil salesmen": glib speakers who charm and amuse you and persuade you that you can purchase that glib goodness itself and take it back to your place of employment and do magical things that you could never have done otherwise.

Not only are they unashamed of their lack of real world accomplishments -- they sometimes seem to revel in it. 

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