(31) Leadership and Life Long Learning

One of my favourite change management books is Leading Change by renowned management guru John Kotter. I was introduced to this book when it was prescribed in my MBA curriculum. Though I will later publish a separate blog post summarising that very influential book, this particular post is about the last chapter of the book titled, Leadership and Life Long Learning. The message in this chapter was so powerful that it left an indelible mark in me forever. I found the book at a colleague’s desk recently and the memories of its last chapter came gushing.

A Prototype of the Twenty First Century Executive

The chapter begins by addressing the needs of the twenty first century organization. It states that the key to creating and sustaining the kind of successful twenty first century organization is leadership — not only at the top of the hierarchy but also throughout the enterprise. The twenty first century employee needs to know more about leadership and management than did his twentieth century counterpart. Without these skills, dynamic adaptive enterprises are not possible.

In the twenty-first century, we will see more of these remarkable leaders who develop their skills through lifelong learning, because that pattern of growth is increasingly being rewarded by a rapidly changing environment.

The Value of Competitive Capacity

The importance of lifelong learning in an increasingly changing business environment was demonstrated by a study by Harvard Business School that involved 115 students.

The study explained why most of them were doing well in their careers despite the challenging economic climate after they graduated. The two elements that stood out were:

• Competitive drive
• Lifelong learning

These two factors seem to give people an edge by creating an unusually strong competitive capacity.

Competitive drive helped people create lifelong learning, which kept increasing skill and knowledge level, especially leadership skills, which in turn produced a prodigious ability to deal with an increasingly difficult and fast moving global economy. People with high standards and a strong willingness to learn become measurably stronger and more able leaders at age fifty than they had been at age forty.

The very best lifelong learners and leaders seem to have high standards, ambitious goals, and a real sense of mission in their lives.

The Relationship of Lifelong Learning, Leadership Skills and the Capacity to Succeed in the Future — A Graphic

The Power of Compounded Growth

In the book, Kotter provides examples of many men who by sheer consistency in effort over prolonged time demonstrated phenomenal transformations in their leadership abilities.

In one particular example, Kotter mentions about a certain X who between the age of thirty and fifty, grows at the rate of 6 percent — i.e. every year she expanded her career-relevant skills and knowledge by 6 percent. Her twin sister, say Y, during her next twenty year grew by the rate of 1 percent. Perhaps because Y was more smug and complacence after her early success. The question is how much difference did it bring to each of them by the age of 50?

For X and Y, the difference between a 6 percent and 1 percent growth rate over 20 years is huge. If they have 100 units of career-related capability at age thirty, twenty years later, Y will have 122 units, while X will have 321. Peers at age thirty, the two will be in totally different leagues at age fifty.

Listening with an open mind, trying new things, reflecting honestly on successes and failures — none of this requires a high IQ, an MBA degree, or a privileged background. Yet remarkably few people behave in these ways today, especially after thirty five and especially when they are already doing well in their careers. But by using these techniques, people like X keep growing while others level off or decline. As a result, they become more and more comfortable with change, they actualise whatever leadership potential they possess, and they help firms adapt to a rapidly shifting global economy.

Habits of the LifeLong Learner

Mental Habits that support life long learning:

• Risk Taking: Willingness to push oneself out of comfort zones
• Humble self-reflection: Honest assessment of successes and failures, especially the latter.
• Solicitation of opinions: Aggressive collection of information and ideas from others
• Careful listening: Propensity to listen to other
• Openness to new ideas: willingness to view life with an open mind

Even though these habits are simple, most of us don’t develop them because in the short term, its more painful. Risk taking brings failure as well as success. Honest reflection, listening, solicitation of opinions, and openness bring bad news, negative feedback as well as interesting ideas. In the short term, life is generally more pleasant without failure and negative feedback.

Lifelong learners overcome a natural human tendency to shy away from or abandon habits that produce short term pain. By surviving difficult experiences, they build up a certain immunity to hardships. With clarity of thought, they come to realise the importance of both these habits and lifelong learning.

The very best lifelong learners and leaders seem to have high standards, ambitious goals, and a real sense of mission in their lives. Such goals and aspirations spur them on, put their accomplishment in a humbling perspective, and help them.

Twenty-First-Century Careers

The more volatile economic environment, is also producing careers that look quite different from those of twentieth century.

Successful twenty-first century careers are more dynamic. There is less linear movement up a single hierarchy. There are fewer people today doing one job the same way for long periods of time. The greater uncertainty and volatility tend to be uncomfortable for people at first. Bust the benefits can certainly be significant. People who master more volatile career paths, usually become more comfortable with change and are better able to play more use roles in organisational transformations. They more easily develop whatever leadership potential they have.

That Necessary Leap Into the Future

Many people don’t think about growth. They don’t think about personal renewal. They don’t think about developing whatever leadership potential they have. Kotter through his deep experience thinks that people who are making an effort to embrace the future are a happier lot than those who are clinging to the past. Its not easy. But people who are attempting to grow, to become more comfortable with change, to develop leadership skills — these men are driven by by a sense that they are doing what is right for themselves, their families and their organization. Their sense of purpose spurs them on and inspires them during rough periods.

And those people at the top of the enterprises today who encourage others to leap into the future, provide a profoundly important service for the entire human community.