Every high school senior has one goal in common when applying to college: displaying leadership qualities.
Every higher learning institution has this as an “expectation” of applicants. Then, these same institutions all claim they develop students to be great leaders by the time they graduate. They may describe it in a different manner. They may even define leadership different. However, they all claim to be a great institution for building future leaders.
Now, how many of these institutions actually have a course in leadership as a core requirement? Very few. A tiny percentage of schools offer programs to minor or major in leadership studies. Even fewer actually require students to study a single course in leadership to graduate.
To be clear:
1. High schools don’t teach it
2. Universities expect it of applicants
3. Universities do not require students to study it
So, where do we expect future leaders to develop their leadership skills?
Is it any wonder why we have a crisis of leadership? It seems like academia plays a key role in our failure to build effective leaders.
What do you think? Do we have a leadership failure in academia?
And far too often when they do provide “leadership” training it’s actually about management, not leadership. I agree, there is a leadership failure in academia. Thanks for a spot-on post, Ben!
Thanks Daniel – great point about the management training.
Excellent question, excellent comments!
Where do we expect
leaders to develop their leadership skills? One source is role models.
Modeling successful leaders such as great teachers, mentors, coaches,
leadership champions and yes — parents (during the early years), makes a
tremendous impact on growing next generation leaders.
Not
only does “servant business leadership” need to be taught, so does
“personal leadership”. How many schools, businesses, religious
institutions and other organizations offer training in personal
responsibility, accountability, life planning and personal finances?
Some do, more is needed. If a person can’t lead their own personal life,
how effective will he or she be in leading others?
Going back
to the early days, character, a major trait in servant leaders, is
highly influenced by role models in the family. Good parenting is
paramount. It’s not all up to the educational system. Parents and other
influential adults have a huge impact on character development.
High
Schoolers may have access to introductory business courses, yet most
get very little education and opportunity to develop leadership skills
unless they run for student council or lead other school activities.
Circling
back to college, while the college classroom can’t be everything to
everyone, it would help to offer more courses in leadership development
basics. It would also be great if there was a mechanism to connect
students to mentors, coaches and champions. More internship
opportunities working alongside proven servant leaders would be
valuable.
The quest to growing great leaders is an ongoing
journey with loads of challenges. It’s starts very early in life where
character begins to form, moves into the educational arena where peer
pressure comes into play, onward into work place politics, and beyond…
Developing
both personal and business leadership skills requires sound solutions.
We need more servant leader role models to grow the next generation.
All great points, Mona. As I read your comment, one thought echoes in mi mind: “It takes a village”. Thanks for sharing!