Article 3 of 4 – Are Leaders Born or are Leaders Made?
Do people become 100% leaders without any formal training – by accident? Certainly they become 100%, but it is not by accident – it may not be formally planned but it is certainly by design. Experience begets experience and enough experience eventually will help a leader become a complete leader.
Back to my little Kenyan – born with 1/3 natural leadership talent, because she exercises her 1/3 on the playground she naturally learns she can make things happen, she likes making the other kids happy, the other kids like her and respect her and she begins to develop skills she uses to influence people – it’s a natural progression – that does and has happened for the entire time people have been on this earth. As an adult she will eventually reach her natural max of 2/3, genetic & experience. But without conscious deliberate effort, concentrated practice and understanding of her lacking skills, she may never become a 100% leader.
I propose that in the final – third of the leadership development evolution is where the greatest potential lies. Because it’s a little hard to put hard numbers on the leadership development scale, permit me to illustrate this point as I compare it to where a good athlete, an NBA class basketball player a 2/3rds guy becomes a superstar hall-of-famer – a 100% guy.
Just one example and one of my favorites is Utah Jazz Forward Karl Malone. Karl played 18 seasons with the Jazz in the 80’s, 90’s and early 2000’s. He appeared in the playoffs every season in his career, was a two time NBA Most Valuable Player, 14 time All-Star, 11 time All NBA Team, two time Olympic Gold Medalist, and has scored the second most career points in history! Yes, that’s ahead of Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson. He is only behind Kareem Abdul Jabar by 1,459 points but ahead of the other guys by over 3,000 points. They’ll never catch him.
So Karl is remarkable, so what?
A lot of factors can be attributed to a player’s personal stats and his team’s success but one stat belongs to the player and reflects his own personal improvement – Free Throws! The basket never moves, defends itself or has a good or bad game. It’s distance from the foul line is always the same. The only difference between making a free throw and missing one is the player.
As a child, the first time Karl touched a basketball and looked up at that hoop ten feet above his head he was probably already a 1/3 guy. A born basketball player.
Though Karl worked to improve his game on the playground, throughout his school and professional career, with hard work and great coaches and great experience, I propose he joined the NBA as only a 2/3 player. Karl was like what Sorcher and Brant described as a “reasonably complete package” and wasn’t likely to change much. And why should he change? He was making millions. What difference would that last 1/3 make anyway?
Why can I say he was not yet a 100% player, just take a look at his rookie card. Karl only scored half of his free throw attempts. Karl took the next few years to work that percent of free-throws-made from 49% to over 70%. 11 of his 18 years he was over 75% for a career average of 74.2%.
Again you may ask, “So What?” Lets look at the math to see “what.”
Karl attempted 13,188 free throws. He made 74% of them. That’s right, of his 36,398 total career points, 9,787 of them came from the free throw line. That’s over one fourth of his points.
To keep this simple we won’t spend time considering how his skill at the free throw line may have affected the rest of the stats. But certainly it must have.
So here is what that means: If Karl had remained a 49% free throw shooter, (a 2/3 player) he would have come up short in the scoring department. Of 13,188 free throw attempts, 49% equals 6,462 points or a deduction of 3,324 points. So you say – “Cry me a river, if he hadn’t practiced he would only be the third best all time scorer in the world.” No, he would have been traded to some silly team back east and then we in Utah would have cried a river.
Back on point. Just as Karl concentrated and practiced that one measurable skill, his entire career was changed – how much may be difficult to measure, but at least 3,324 points worth.
It’s the same with leadership development. When we can identify our weaknesses or see opportunities where we can develop, if we do so we can improve. Whether we begin as a 1/3 guy or 1/10th guy, with experience and work we can become more.
So if Sorcher and Brant are right and workers enter the workforce maxed out, I propose they are maxing out at well under the 67% – 2/3rds – maybe that is why so many weak leaders are running companies.
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