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Is a narcissistic leader a bad leader?
/in Sharpening Your Personal Leadership Skills/by Tom DoescherIn our last blog, we suggested that in an effort to grow and develop as a leader, it’s important to read books and listen to folks who have different points of view. Our latest example comes from reading Narcissistic Leaders by Michael Maccoby. He presents a pretty compelling case, and explains why what he calls “productive narcissistic leaders” have made significant contributions to the world. Maccoby, a psychoanalyst born in 1933, would label the following individuals as productive narcissistic leaders: Abraham Lincoln, Henry Ford, John D. Rockefeller, Herb Kelleher, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Jack Welch, among others. He calls them “change the world” personalities, and says they have the following strengths: a vision for changing the world, independent thinking, a willingness to take risks, passion, and charisma. They are/were also voracious learners, knew how to persevere, were alert to threats, and possessed a sense of humor.
Probably what most of us observe are their weaknesses, which Maccoby would list as: not listening, oversensitivity to criticism, paranoia, anger, putting down others, a sense of over-competitiveness, over-control, isolation, exaggeration, lying, lack of self-knowledge, and grandiosity. In our August 21, 2012, Food For Thought article entitled “Was Steve Jobs a Great — or Even a Good — Leader?” we discussed many of these weaknesses. We also pointed out that Jobs changed six industries, including personal computers, phones, tablet computing, music, digital publishing, and animated movies.
For those of you who are working with a productive narcissistic leader, we would highly recommend that you take a look at Maccoby’s book. In our next blog, we’ll consider his tips for successfully working with a productive narcissistic leader.
Do you listen to or read points of view that are different than yours?
/in Sharpening Your Personal Leadership Skills/by Tom DoescherWe recently read a book written by an author whose economic positions are diametrically opposite from ours. We read it because there is one aspect to our position that bothers us, and we wanted to find out what he had to say on that point. Although the author didn’t offer a solution we would endorse, we gained a much better understanding of where he is coming from — and that solidified and deepened our commitment to our original position. Too often we observe leaders who just parrot their mentor or hero, as it may be, and do not have as deep a knowledge of the subject matter as we believe they should. We think such a lack of knowledge and understanding hurts these leaders’ effectiveness with their team members.
When is the last time you read a book or listened to a speaker who has a viewpoint that’s different than yours?
Crucial Conversations, Part 3
/in Sharpening Your Personal Leadership Skills/by Tom DoescherThis is the final installment (read part 1 and part 2) of our key takeaways from a wonderful book entitled Crucial Conversations. Here goes …
We would still highly recommend reading the book, unless you live in a cave by yourself and have no contact with other people. When we reflect on the really great leaders we personally know, we realize they are all experts at deftly handling crucial conversations.
Let’s all commit to improving our crucial conversation skills this year.