What kind of leaders are we developing?

To paraphrase Gandhi (and Zhou En Lai) "What do you think of Western leadership?" "I think it would be a good thing..."  

It has been one of the most unedifying and unpleasant episodes in the political history of two major Western democracies. First Brexit; now Trumpit. Both of these campaigns have been characterised - and ultimately 'won' - through the performance of the most destructive forms of leadership we have seen in some time. Both campaigns relied wholly on marginalising and demonising minority and vulnerable groups, identifying and then vilifying them as 'outsiders'; and both campaigns abandoned any pretence of using rational thought to build evidence-based arguments ("I think we're all sick of experts") using instead rhetorical tricks and dog-whistle politics to galvanise support.

As desperate as I think this will prove to be for the most vulnerable and poor in both our societies, it makes for 'interesting times', for an academic interested in leadership and change.

So what this is telling me about leadership (and leadership development). And what (on earth) are we to do about this? Clearly, we have not moved away from our attachment to the charismatic leader figure. Trump, Johnson, Farage became easily photoshopped poster boys for any version of dissatisfaction - against the 'out of touch political elites', the impact of austerity policies, rapid social and technological change, globalization* (*delete where applicable/add your own here). That these three, in particular, are themselves larger than life representations and beneficiaries of these very things is conveniently ignored. It's the form of leadership that finds the parade and rushes to the front of it. It's a form of leadership practice taught in many business schools for over thirty years. From 'leadership 101' to MBAs, topics like Influencing Skills; Selling a Vision; Inspiring & Motivating; The Transformational Leader teaches the skills they have deployed. (I strongly commend Dennis Tourish's book The Dark Side of Transformational Leadership for a thoughtful explanation of where we are now).

It's time for us to take a long hard look at what business schools are doing (and selling).

1. The world IS complex. Such simplistic leadership may win in blunt instruments like referenda and elections; but it will not navigate us through the volatile, uncertain, emergent times that follow. The post-Brexit shambles illustrates this most clearly. The work is still to be done and will be done through a whole heap of different practices - negotiation, collaboration, compromise - by people exercising leadership in very different ways.

2. Leadership is inescapably gendered. It is impossible to interpret Trumps victory over Clinton as anything other than a triumph of masculinity. From the subtle - expressing leadership in terms of strength, control, fighting, winning, through to the blatant - belittling women's biology and straight up gender violence, misogyny was a core and deliberate tactic of his campaign. But we rarely talk about this in business schools. The neo-liberal version is this: if we fix women through 'development' and teach us how to play in the game better, we will find our way up the organisation pyramid - if we're good enough. And if we don't, well....

3. Our sources of information are - counter-intuitively - becoming narrower. The fourth estate - the media - is more powerful than ever. It has largely adopted the same leadership practices as the PosterBoys: find a parade and sell copy to the crowd. And the more you can call out the parade, the more copy you can sell to it. That our main media is currently in the hands of a wealthy elite, with their own shadowy interests, who benefit directly from globalization and austerity politics is - unsurprisingly - under-examined. When we are now bombarded with 'opinion' via social media, a fair, transparent media which helps us make sense of the noise in a balanced, reasoned way, becomes more important than ever. In social media platforms, it seems we only talk to and hear from 'People Like Us', creating a self-referential cycle of assertion, acceptance, amplification. Marketing and branding have become substitutes for evidence and reason. It is the opposite to good theorizing, in which we put our best work so far out there for critical appraisal and challenge and improve our human knowledge as a result.

It's time for new versions of Leadership and Executive Development. Here is my (draft) manifesto for change.  

First we need to stop focussing on developing leaders and build leadership across whole systems. We need to engage, not split; enquire, not advocate; empathize, not demonize. When people are disconnected from the institutions there to serve them, they stop trusting them. When people feel they have no voice or are not heard, they shout louder or walk away. When people feel powerless, they turn against others with even less power. A form of leadership that involves, connects, listens, thinks, feels, acts needs rebuilding and nurturing in all our human systems.

Second, we need to draw on transdisciplinary theories and practices and value serious theorizing. Hero leader biographies litter the leadership book stands. The mainstream leadership bodies of knowledge are untroubled, largely, by evidence from other fields - community engagement, conflict resolution, feminism, politics, sustainable development and so on, spending much more time on the conventional, 'objective' and abstracted stuff like economics, marketing, finance. We need to connect across theory and practices to challenge and then strengthen our work.

Finally, we need a serious dose of Critical theory and practice right at the heart of leadership development.  Critical Practice examines closely issues of power and politics; it requires us to inquire into our own mindsets and assumptions about how the world works; to consider issues of voice; participation; interests. People still talk about keeping politics out of organisation leadership. Leadership is deeply, inescapably, fundamentally political - all the time, not just in Political institutions. Whose voice counts? How are resources shared and used? What is just? What is fair? When we pretend it isn't, we push the politics behind the scenes and out of scrutiny. And then people like Farage, Trump and Johnson - rich, privileged, elite, political operators - get to stare at the camera wide-eyed and 'genuine' and we believe that they are 'telling it like it is'. Misogyny, racism, bullying goes unchallenged. Understanding gender, race, class, religion, sexuality need to be on the leadership agenda.

For a safe, fair, just, peaceful, sustainable world, we cannot carry on like this.