The “Mother Sauces” of Leadership
What do béchamel, velouté, espagnole, hollandaise and tomato sauce all have in common? They are the classic “mother sauces” of classical French cuisine, meaning nearly all sauces start with one of these five. This concept – that from a few comes many – also holds true in leadership.
In my view, there are seven mother sauces of leadership that effectively encompass nearly all the attributes necessary to be an effective leader. Four of these are mostly innate – meaning they are intrinsic to an individual and more difficult to teach, although they absolutely mature as you grow. The remaining three are learnable attributes, where growth realized is in proportion to the effort.
The Seven “Mother Sauces” of Leadership
The mostly innate:
The mostly learned:
Think of all the countless “recipes” that can be derived from these leadership mother sauces. Drive plus humility tends to yield servant leadership. Communication plus intellect plus confidence yields effective pitches. Integrity plus standards yields taking no shortcuts.
Over time, one’s ultimate success as a leader will depend both on the depth and sophistication of mastery. Depth refers to the many sub-attributes within each of the seven, and sophistication refers to the various contexts where the attributes are tested (e.g., a small team, a department, a business unit or an entire enterprise).
The ultimate key to performance is developing strong self-awareness about your own levels of mastery and calibrating that view with feedback from those around you. A true commitment to getting better almost always results in continued growth.
Senior Director, Creative Services and Project Management | Inspiring creativity and quality while driving consistency and efficiency
7 个月I would put communication in the mostly innate bucket. While basic communication skills can be learned, the ability to connect with an audience is a gift.
Senior HR Exec. | Certified Coach | SEI | Capital One | Pepsi | Mobil
7 个月Interestingly, re "Drive plus Humility" was what Jim Collins called Level 5 Leadership. "The essential ingredient for taking a company to greatness is having an executive in whom extreme personal humility blends paradoxically with intense professional will." They have "the tendency to give credit to others while assigning blame to themselves ... (and a) ferocious resolve to do whatever needs to be done." "Under the right circumstances -- self-reflection, conscious personal development, a mentor, a great teacher, significant life experience" etc. -- they develop. (https://hbr.org/2001/01/level-5-leadership-the-triumph-of-humility-and-fierce-resolve-2) Jack Welch also added to the innate v. learned debate: "The essential traits of leadership are ... positive Energy ... the ability to Energize others ... the ability to make tough calls (Edge) ... the talent to Execute (get things done) .... and Passion (caring deeply)." He said Passion, positive Energy, and the ability to Energize are "pretty hard-wired." Whereas "Edge and the ability to Execute ... are largely a function of self-confidence" which grows with experience. (https://jackwelch.strayer.edu/winning/born-leaders-made-leaders/)
Growth and Revenue - Advisory Boards - Combining Cybersecurity, Artificial Intelligence Technologies and Training in Financial, Business, and Military Disciplines for the Business and Intelligence Communities
7 个月For top military leaders in the field, I wonder if the sauce is the same. As one example, in studying Patton, Montgomery and Zhukov . . . from my readings, I'm not certain humility was one of their strong suites? Different metrics?
Purpose Driven Education Innovator; Product Marketer
7 个月I don't know if it reaches the top 7, or is a sub-category of humility or communication, but I think Humor is a key attribute of many successful leaders. Makes one human, helps minimize the walls attached to titles, helps us all balance and realize most of us are not curing cancer. But a good list for sure. Thanks.