Unless you have been in the woods or you live under a rock, you know that Britain’s Royal Baby has been born. He is third in line for the British throne and, as of this writing, has no name. Because of this, and as some headlines have read, you may think that a leader was born this week.
This couldn’t be further from the truth.
Yes, this baby will likely someday become King.
But having a title doesn’t make one a leader.
Yes, he will get every advantage. He will have experiences and schooling and opportunities to learn skills that would serve him in a leadership role – but still, not a leader yet.
History (and your personal experience) is littered with people who had titles of leadership, yet didn’t lead successfully.
I’m not saying this infant can’t become a great leader – I’m simply saying it isn’t a guarantee.
Over the years I have often been asked, “Are leaders made or born?”
My answer has always been, “Yes.”
Leaders are born in that all of us are given strengths and natural tendencies in our DNA that we can use and leverage to become a successful leader. Since there is more than one way to be an effective leader, we can use who we are to move in that direction. And it doesn’t happen automatically.
The skills of leadership are exactly that – they are skills – which means they can be learned. And these skills are varied and complex, which means they must be consciously and continually learned if you want to be a successful leader.
The royal baby has some advantages that some of us might not have in becoming an effective leader. Yet, birth alone isn’t enough. History will tell us how it goes, but what we can know for sure is that if the yet-unnamed prince becomes a successful leader, he will have worked at it.
Leadership is verb (it is things we do), not a noun (a title we have).
Even if you are a royal baby.
If you are looking to build your leadership skills in a consistent and ongoing way, please take advantage of my free leadership gift to you.
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Great post – as a copywriter, I love the way you took the theme from a contemporary event.
It’s refreshing to hear someone admit that leaders can be born *and* made. Researchers are finding that more and more of our skills and talents are hard wired, while environment plays a big role too.
There *is* something to being born in the right time and place; for instance, the women professional athletes of today would have been ridiculed as tomboys or even freaks not so long ago. Bill Gates went to a high school with a sophisticated computer lab; a table tennis champ lived next door to one of the top coaches in the world. We should never discount luck.
There *is* something to having natural talent. We’re advised to build on our strengths which means we don’t all have the same abilities and gifts. I’m a complete ham about public speaking – totally fearless about speaking to any size group – but I have little tolerance or talent for small talk, especially at parties.
The key seems to be harnessing one’s gifts to take advantage of time and place – and that, too, is a skill.
Thanks for your comments and your feedback Cathy.
You are Remarkable!
Kevin 🙂
Your quote: “Leadership is verb, not a noun” is very thought provoking. My initial reaction was that leadership is, indeed, in grammatical terms a noun; however, in real life this cannot be true. Probably this commonly used word is just misleading, causing us to think of leadership as a static state. Nevertheless, leadership is not a fixed thing, rather it is a continuous process. We never reach the leadership level, but we can lead every day and get better at leading on the way.