Leadership or Loudership

Originally written on 04 April 2009.

In a recent copy of Time magazine (16 March 2009) there is an article called “Why Bosses Tend to Be Blowhards”, which mentions that a recent study looks at the fact that what often appears to be good leadership is in fact ‘loudership’. The latter term is something they coined to describe the fact that those who are perceived to be good and/or creative leaders are at times just the first to speak or the loudest voices. The interesting thing is that perception of leadership is at times not affected by the actual lack of competence on their part.

Now I don’t know about you but I’ve come across a few of these ‘leaders’ over the years. In fact I wonder if I have been that kind of ‘leader’ at times. So I guess there are numerous age-old questions regarding leadership still remain. While I could comment on certain experiences I have had (I’m not going to go there) I look at the political landscape of South Africa at the moment, then again one could also look at the world. Those in power or those who hold sway don’t necessarily have the best ideas or the best intentions, nor do are they necessarily the smartest – I don’t think it’s necessary to name names for this to be understood.

One suggestion is that if you someone is doing something stupid that you should make a noise and join the loud party. What do you think? Some might say it’s better to keep your mouth shut and hope the worst of it will blow over. Personally, I’m not sure what the best approach is. In fact, I’m not sure there is a blanket best approach. But it’s an interesting idea coming out of this research, don’t you think?