Of Leaders and Leadership

Recently, a very good friend of mine, a scholar and director of a center for African leadership and development in an African university, inboxed my Facebook asking me to "couple up some words of wisdom on leadership [for him]--just half a page?--before the end of today." Oh my! Then he added for an emphasis a request for an African twist. "As usual, please pepper it with your ilu Igbo [Igbo proverb]."Here's what I "coupled up" for him:

Good leadership is the heart of any functional human establishment. It is, according to a Somalian proverb, like a good head that is the key to a healthy body; the vision, without which a people perishes (Proverbs 29:18).  The renowned Nigerian novelist and critic, Chinua Achebe, blamed the decaying state of his own people, Nigeria, on bad leadership. “The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership,” he categorically declared.

The question of leadership has occupied humanity for millennia. From ancient histories to contemporary times, sages, philosophers, and social scientists have grappled with it. Theories abound in an attempt to distill its essence. Some anchor it on a leader’s traits, behavior, or style, while others situate it on the leader’s environment, management skills, or relationship with others. The different theories imply a nuanced understanding based on context and personality.

W. E. B. Du Bois

Who’s a leader then? The Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary defines a leader simply as the “one who leads.” And to lead, it says, is “to accompany and show the way to; to conduct, guide, esp. to direct or guide by going on in advance; to cause to follow in one’s path.” So, a leader is “one who guides others in action or opinion; one who takes the lead in any business, enterprise, or movement…”

History is replete with men and women who, although different in their personalities and approaches, have taken the lead, shown the way, and guided the actions or opinions of others: Nelson Mandela. Oprah Winfrey. Steve Jobs. W. E. B. Du Bois, Kwame Nkrumah. Mahatma Gandhi. Martin Luther King, Jr. Margaret Thatcher. Abraham Lincoln. Cleopatra. Julius Caesar. Alexander the Great. The list goes on.

However, Vince Lombardi insists that none of these leaders was born a leader. Leaders are made. And like every other thing, they are made through hard work. Wendell Willkie identifies education as the most essential ingredient in the making-of-a-leader process. It follows then that with hard work and disciplined training anyone can become a leader, for as a Nigerian proverb says: “When a child washes clean its hands, it dines with the elders.”