Demystifying Leadership
Hello Leaders,
I assume your reading of this is because you are interested in leadership and were curious about the title, “Demystifying Leadership.” I welcome a conversation about this concept. What I’m talking about particularly in this article is the things I’ve encountered from posts, infographics, or otherwise that do not sit well with me. I’m sure you’ve also experienced these things and others I don’t mention here, but again, welcome the conversation. Please leave comments; maybe we can go deeper into this conversation.
First, I want to present a definition of leadership to guide this conversation. And it’s totally fine if your definition varies a bit from what is presented here, but this helps give a lens to the conversation I want to have. Let’s define leadership as a process where an individual influences a group of individuals to make the right things happen the right way to achieve a common goal with lasting effects. It’s long, I know, but straightforward and encapsulates the complexities of leadership encountered along the way.
Working with this, I also want to assume you are a leader. We may not all sit in the highest positions, but that doesn’t disqualify you from leadership. Positional leadership is just one form, and we can all be better leaders, so we read things like this article to help us. This isn’t the article if you’re looking for a way to gain positional leadership and power. This is a conversation to demystify the role of leadership.
1. Focusing on your health makes you a better leader.
While this is inherently true, it applies universally to most things about your life. Eating better and exercising improve all facets of your life and should be prioritized for several reasons. But is it attached to leadership? No. Why not? Because it does not help to influence a group of individuals to accomplish a goal together. This often comes across as self-interested, which, by the provided definition, does not work. A self-interested leader is incapable of being interested in common goals. Those are personal goals, which are more than fine by the way. They are really good things, but I fail to see how they are leadership elements.
2. Leadership and Management are not the same.
While this is again inherently true, there’s also a point in leadership that needs good management. In fact, to be a poor manager in a leadership position would make aspects of your leadership poorer because of poor management skills. Is it a different skillset? Yes and no. Returning to the definition of leadership, it is evident that leaders must have good management skills to guide followers or constituents well. Management dictates the efficiency of operations within the organization. Good leadership will use the managerial tool to effectively direct the organization or department to accomplish the common goals. The ideology of goals even alludes to this in that goals are proponents of operations. Leadership in whole is value-laden, management is operation-laden, but it sits under leadership.
3. Leadership is a position in an organization.
Higher positions in organizations innately come with more leadership responsibilities; however, just because one achieves a higher position does not ultimately qualify them for leadership. We’ve all been under authority and questioned how someone got the position they were in. Likewise, some might ask why we’ve received our position. Like management, a skilled worker could be promoted to a position without the necessary skills, thus creating chaotic and toxic situations. That’s because the lower position requires a specialized skillset, and the next requires a managerial or political skillset. Leadership usually encompasses multiple skill sets, and a good leader will utilize all that is available to them. Poor leadership operates only in one or two of these things. Bolman and Deal’s Reframing Organizational Leadership deals with this extensively.
4. Power in leadership is a bad thing.
We’ve painted power as a bad thing for a long time. Maybe it is because we dislike authority or abuses of authority. However, authority is only one type of power, and yes, it can be used well. Going back to the school days, bullies used power to overwhelm their victims. But, in response, the person who stood up to the bullies also operated in power and, in doing so, empowered others. When power (authority, knowledge, social, etc.) is distributed, not freely but purposefully, instead of withheld, it allows others to act. Power exists whether or not we like it, and can be a helpful tool when used wisely. When used abusively, it creates chaos and toxicity, especially at the authority level.
5. Leadership is lonely.
I see this idea promoted extensively. I’m curious where it comes from, when again, if we go back to the definition of leadership presented here, it is essentially a value-laden and collaborative framework. Doing a simple search, it seems there is some truth to this statement, but some serious caveats must be considered. Likewise, loneliness is an epidemic that affects many workers in general, not simply those in leadership. I don’t want to discredit those who feel lonely, but I do want to acknowledge that with the definition given, loneliness doesn’t have to be a thing. With the theme of this article, demystifying leadership, loneliness seems to be assumed as a part of the package of leadership, but, in my opinion, as a leader, that doesn’t have to be the case.
To wrap things up, I just want to say that these things I’m bringing to the conversation befuddle me. And maybe that’s the point. Maybe those pricks of emotional entanglement that these points cause us to feel also cause us to click, buy into, and follow. But I struggle immensely to see the leadership in them. Though they are not bad things, except loneliness, they strike us each into wanting to believe them. But are they real, or merely projections of the people who post them? Or are they the preconceived notions algorithmically proven to be clickable posts? I’m not sure. But I’m also not sure they belong in the category of leadership they’ve been placed in, for positive or negative reasons. From my perspective, some areas of leadership are neglected, and I would like to bring them up, and likely will soon. But equally so, I believe these highlighted areas are misplaced and/or misrepresented. I’d love to hear your thoughts on these and other areas. Let’s start the conversation and potentially reorient our perspectives on leadership.
References
Bolman, Lee F., and Terrence E. Deal. *Reframing Organizations: Artistry, Choice, and Leadership*. 4th ed. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2017
Do Better. 2024. “How can we end the epidemic of loneliness in leadership?,” September 2, 2024. https://dobetter.esade.edu/en/loneliness-leadership.https://dobetter.esade.edu/en/loneliness-leadership. (This reference shows there are several reasons to explain the loneliness that authoritative and/or positional leaders feel and ways to avoid them)
Pendell, Ryan. 2025. “1 In 5 Employees Worldwide Feel Lonely.” Gallup.Com, March 25, 2025. https://www.gallup.com/workplace/645566/employees-worldwide-feel-lonely.aspx.
Agree with all your points. There are a lot of catch phrases and buzzwords and popular tropes in leadership "advice." The distinction between leadership and management is one of them. Of course they're slightly different—but one of the quickest ways to be a poor leader is to be a poor manager.