Customer Reviews

On Becoming a Leader

5 star:		(23)
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3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

Charles Smith Submitted 2/18/99

Bennis, W. (1989). On Becoming A Leader. Reading, Massachusetts: Perseus Books

This book deals with leadership, how one becomes a leader, and the many people the author knows with leadership qualities. It is written in an easy to understand format that uses many formulas which people have used to obtain strong leadership qualities. Bennis points out three reasons for the importance of effective leadership. Leaders are responsible for organizational effectiveness, leaders must also provide stability to an organization and the need for integrity within an organization. Norman Lear, writer and director, is often referenced by Bennis. He believes that society is suffering from what he calls a "societal disease" of short-term thinking. This can be a stumbling block in the pursuit of total leadership. One of Bennis' premises is that that the context of leadership is a breaker not a maker and that most people fail to realize the difference. To be an effective leader one must see it as an end result, not a beginning. Learning from failure is also an important theme in the book. The author points out a person fictitiously called Ed and how he never really understood what it took to be an effective leader. While he had wonderful management skills, he was not trusted because he was unable to make people feel willing to follow. He had followers but they were not always willing followers. Norman Lear again provides insight to what he calls mastering the context of leadership. A leader must be self-expressive, listen to the inner voice, learn from the right mentors and give oneself over to a guiding vision. Bennis defines three ingredients that encompass leadership. A guiding vision is to know where one wants to go and how to get there. Another ingredient is passion. This occurs when a leader loves what he does and loves doing it. The third component is integrity. This follows the "know thyself" concept. If you know your strengths and weaknesses you will better know how to deal with certain tasks. There is great value in separating what people think and expect of you from what you think and expect of yourself, according to the author. Bennis discusses three types of learning that mold potential leaders. The first is maintenance learning described as using fixed methods and outlooks to deal with "recurring situations." The second is shock learning in which people are overwhelmed by events. These two types of learning are said to be more about accepting other's philosophies than about true learning. Bennis acknowledges the need to replace maintenance and shock learning with what he calls innovative learning, which requires one to be imaginative, an active listener and to participate in shaping events, instead of letting events shape you. Another concept is dealing with oneself. Bennis talks about learning from mistakes and looking back to see how mistakes could make a better future. These concepts are conducive to future growth. He also points out how failure is part of becoming an effective leader. It is necessary for growth and a lack of failure could indicate an unwillingness to take risks. Leaders must be able to deal with different personalities. Bennis discusses right-brained people, identifiable as intuitive, conceptual and artistic. He also identifies left-brained people who are logical, analytical and have technical backgrounds. In other words, a leader must be able to see through the eyes of an accountant as well as a researcher and mesh the two into a vision. Bennis calls this being whole brained. The author also talks the importance of trust building. He points out four traits necessary for trust to develop: consistency, congruity, reliability and integrity. With these characteristics, true leadership can take place. These important components of leadership are what kept Ed from being an effective leader. The author points out that trust is the foundation in which true leadership can be cultivated.

While I don't agree with all of Bennis' role models, he makes some very valid points about achievement, leadership, and human relationships. Like John Maxwell and others who have paid their dues, he mentions the importance of learning from failure. One of the many useful quotes Bennis provides is "it is not enough for a leader to do things right, he must do the right thing." Also like other writers in this genre, he says one of the fundamentals of leadership is to have a guiding vision. As a communicator, Bennis encourages potential leaders to codify their thoughts through writing. Writing eliminates ambiguity and helps one to focus. Leadership is viewed as a process in the sense that goal-accomplishment involves several incremental phases. He writes "the goal isn't worth arriving at unless you enjoy the journey." A process of self-reflection is outlined and discussed in the middle section of the book. This is followed by some advice on how to investigate the world at large. Travel, reading, and involvement are three keys to learning the environment in which one is to contribute. Bennis has some ideas worthy of followup. His book is worth reading.

When the author sticks to discussing leadership, I found this book very readable and easy to understand. The book is written in a very easy to follow format and he explores the personal side of leadership. He presents some very altruistic ideas the sound very good, however, aren't always practical in the real world. This book would have received a higher rating for me also if Mr. Bennis would have refrained from all the political commentary throughout the beginning of his book. His repeated support for a former president while being less than flattering of the current president put too much of a political overtone in the beginning and really turned me off. It wouldn't matter if I agreed with Mr. Bennis or not, it simply didn't have a place in what would have otherwise been a very good book.

It's hard not to read the pearls of wisdom written in this book. Bennis does a fantastic job of expressing his thoughts and concepts on leadership. This book is not a one - two step solution on becoming a great leader. Bennis really attempts to drive down into the depths of what it takes to be a `self made leader.' He talks about learned childhood behavior and how it can effect the humane psyche. He also talks about unlearning old habits and reinventing oneself. Basically, drilling down into how to express yourself without any influence from external factors (society's influence). According to Bennis, this is critical in defining your place as a leader. He drives home how one can live, work, and think on his own terms without any influence. Good stuff...

The books premise is laid out in Bennis' own terms, with supporting leadership behavioral backing point throughout the book. He gets most of this behavioral input from a series of interviews taken from various leaders; such as, John Sculley (Apple Computers) and Sydney Pollack (Director).

What I liked about this book is its simple truth. Bennis makes a lot of since, plain and simple. I do feel however that there is a lot of filler text. The book could easily be condensed by a third.

Definitely worth the money...

The book On Becoming a Leader by Warren Bennis was originally published in 1989, however over the years it was credited with being one of the best books on the topic of leadership, so the author has added a new introduction in an attempt to make the book just as valuable in 2005's world as it did in the world of the late 1980's.

The New Introduction does help make the reader have a feeling that the book is current but after only a few chapters and a review of the front cover of the book it is easily noticeable which other parts of the book are almost fifteen to twenty years out of date. For instance the front cover highlights that the book is "Recommended by Vice President Al Gore to All His Advisers", yet in the New Introduction Bennis goes on the chastise President Clinton over his lack of the third leg of the tripod of legacy, integrity.

The book also goes on to question the presidency of George H.W. Bush, when most American's are not only aware of his presidency, but are living in his son, George W. Bush's, presidency.

Despite the elementary contradictions offered by Bennis it is important to note the many benefits of the book that outweigh the trivial timeframe aspects. This book is filled with many important suggestions to the reader on how to become a leader. The most important of which is recognizing that neither any textbook nor any author can ever teach anyone to be the "perfect" leader. W. Bennis begins the book by highlighting the importance of the presence of leaders in an attempt to show the reader that it is needed for them to take the initiative and develop themselves into a leader. This is done by stating the fact that every organization is in need of a leader that can show integrity to the other members of the organization and that good leaders are needed to take those organizations to a future of success and greatness.

The second theme found in On Becoming a Leader and that reappears constantly throughout the book is that only the reader can determine what is it that makes them happy and it is up to the reader to leave all of the excuses behind that are preventing the reader from accomplishing his goals. The important distinction between being "driven" and leading appear in at least three different chapters of the book. Bennis defines being "driven" as a desire to accomplish something individually while he defines leading as the ability to express yourself freely to the point that whatever it is you want to achieve you can share that with those that are under you to convince them that they want to follow you, rather than sit back and watch your "drive" accomplish everything. It is important for leaders to know that without Constancy, Congruity, Reliability, and Integrity they will not have any genuine followers and that only those individuals that are paid to follow you will follow you for the only reason of achieving that paycheck.

The third and final theme found in the book is one of Reaction and Reflection. A leader must determine what it is they want to achieve, determine a path to that goal and constantly re-evaluate their actions to achieve that goal. The more frequently someone thinks about their actions and contemplates how those actions help or hinder them on the path to their goal the better leader they will become. A leader sees the world how it is and sees it how they think it should be at the same time. This "Double-vision" brings the important changes the leader thinks need to be made to make it easier for him and his organization to reach their goal.

Becoming a leader by simply reading a book or listening to a speaker's workshop is impossible. However, every reader of On Becoming a Leader by Warren Bennis learns that is it up to the reader to work for his/her goals, the sooner they can determine what they want to achieve and the longer they work to revise/adjust how they are working towards that goal the better leader they will become. Understanding that leadership is more of a social science, than a physical science helps the reader accept the contradictions of the book and thus they become more willing to listen to the instructions of the author.

On Becoming a Leader is a well-organized and thought out book on leadership. Since it is the only leadership book I've read, it is hard for me to compare it to anything else, but I can see why they consider it a "standard". The book pointed out many "truths of life" that I agreed with but never put in words before, like "most of us are shaped more by negative experiences than by positive ones" from page 108. The author suggests doing something positive to start each morning in order to deflect the impact of our negative experiences. Definitely something I"ll put to use. Bennis uses examples of real people to make give his point impact. This and other writing techniques add to his easy style of writing, making this novel a breeze to read. I wish the book had more ways the reader could practice the skills he or she was reading about. In the end, I would recommend this book to anyone who needed to lead something or just be a more influential and listened to person in general.

If it wasn't for the first two chapters, I probably would have given this book five stars. The first chapter is completed outdated and the second chapter is monumentally bad. (I would honestly recommend skipping them). But the rest of this book is pretty good, essentially a collection of anecdotes and quotations of leaders experiences. I particularly liked the time Bennis took to review how leaders' failures can be turned into great learning experiences. I also like how Bennis describes leadership as a path to self-expression. I agree wholeheartedly.

Great book not just for managers, but also for those being managed. It clearly articulates how to improve yourself, through a variety of motivational stories and excellent advice. Make sure to read the last chapter, though! The one ding I had while reading the book was that a lot of the advice wasn't actionable -- until I reached the last chapter, which closed off the book with a clear path forward for the reader.

As the tile indicates, this is a book on leadership development - "the hows: how people become leaders, how they lead, and how organizations encourage or stifle potential leaders." The premise upon which this book is based is best put by Warren himself - "...leaders are people who are able to express themselves fully. By this I mean that they know who they are, what their strengths and weaknesses are, and how to fully deploy their strengths and compensate for their weaknesses. They also know what they want, why they want it, and how to communicate what they want to others, in order to gain their cooperation and support. Finally, they know how to achieve their goals. The key to full self-expression is understanding one's self and the world, and the key to understanding is learning - from one's own life and experience."

The book then goes on to further elaborate on each of the areas highlighted above. The key differentiator between this and other leadership books is that this one promotes unleashing leadership from within, rather than describe what a person should strive to be. To me, this is the only way to develop sustainable authentic leaders. Another area of focus is that of experience. Warren stresses the importance of experience as the primary and ultimate development vehicle for leaders. Education is all its forms is important - but does not substitute the need for experience whether successes or failures. The book brings to life all of the aspects discussed through the stories of many successful leaders from a variety of sectors.

A must read in the area of leadership and personal development!

Below are some excerpts I found particularly insightful:

1- "Becoming a leader isn't easy, just as becoming a doctor or a poet isn't easy, and anyone who claims otherwise is fooling himself. But learning to lead is a lot easier than most of us think it is, because each of us contains the capacity for leadership. In fact, almost every one of us can point to some leadership experience."

2- "There are three basic reasons why leaders are important. First, they are responsible for the effectiveness of organizations...Second, the change and upheaval of the past years has left us with no place to hide...Third, there is a pervasive, national concern about the integrity of our institutions."

3- "There are four steps in the process behind Norman Lear's success in mastering the context: (1) becoming self-expressive; (2) listening to the inner voice; (3) learning from the right mentors; and (4) giving oneself over to a guiding vision."

4- "If most of us like Ed, are creatures of our context, prisoners of the habits, practices, and rules that make us ineffectual, it is from the Norman Lears, the people who not only challenge and conquer the context but who change it in fundamental ways, that we must learn. The first step toward change is to refuse to be deployed by others and to choose to deploy yourself. Thus the process begins."

5- "Leaders come in every size, shape, and disposition...Nevertheless, they all seem to share some, if not all, of the following ingredients: The first basic ingredient of leadership is a guiding vision...the second basic ingredient of leadership is passion...The next basic ingredient of leadership is integrity...Two more basic ingredients of leadership are curiosity and daring."

6- "All the leaders I talked with agreed that no one can teach you how to become yourself, to take charge, to express yourself, except you. But there are some things that others have done that are useful to think about in the process. I've organized them as the four lessons of self-knowledge. They are -One: You are your own best teacher. - Two: Accept responsibility. Blame no one. - Three: You can learn anything you want to learn. - Four: True understanding comes from reflecting on your experience."

7- "Self-awareness= self-knowledge = self-possession = self-control = self-expression. You make your life your own by understanding it."

8- "So innovative learning must replace maintenance/shock learning. The principle components of innovative learning are: -Anticipation: being active and imaginative rather than passive and habitual - Learning by listening to others - Participation: shaping events, rather than being shaped by them"

9- "Leaders, then, learn from their experiences. Learning from experience means - looking back at your childhood and adolescence and using what happened to you then to enable you to make things happen now, so that you become the master of your own life rather than its servant. - consciously seeking the kings of experiences in the present that will improve and enlarge you. - taking risks as a matter of course, with the knowledge that failure is as vital as it is inevitable. - Seeing the future - yours and the world's - as an opportunity to do al those things you have not done and those things that need to be done, rather than as a trial or a test."

10- "No leader sets out to be a leader. People set out to live their lives, expressing themselves fully. When that expression is of value, they become leaders."

11- "...Having measured the differences between what you want and what you're able to do, and between what drives you and what satisfies you, and between what your values are and what the organization's values are - are you able and willing to overcome those differences?"

12- "Entrepreneur Larry Wilson defined the difference between desire and drive as the difference between expressing yourself and providing yourself."

13- "The means of expression are the steps to the leadership: 1- Reflection leading to resolution 2- Resolution leading to perspective 3- Perspective leading to point of view 4- Point of view leading to test and measures 5- Tests and measures leading to desire 6- Desire lending to mastery 7- Mastery leading to strategic thinking 8- Strategic thinking leading to full self-expression 9- The synthesis of full self-expression = leadership"

14- "There is magic in experience, as well as wisdom. And more magic in stress, challenge, and adversity, and more wisdom. And the letters JOB after one's name mean infinitely more to the wise than all rhe BAS, MBAS, and PHDS."

15- "There are four ingredients leaders have to generate and sustain trust: 1- Constancy. 2- Congruity. 3- Reliability. 4- Integrity."

16- "...When they asked top executives what advice they would give to younger executives, there were three basic themes: 1- Take advantage of every opportunity. 2- Aggressively search for meaning. 3- Know yourself."

17- "There are ten factors, ten personal and organizational characteristics for coping with change, forging a new future, and creating learning organizations. 1- Leaders manage the dream. 2- Leaders embrace errors. 3- Leaders encourage reflective backtalk. 4- Leaders encourage dissent. 5- Leaders possess the Nobel Factor. 6- Leaders understand the Pygmalion effect in management. 7- Leaders have what I think of as the Gretzky factor, a certain touch. 8- Leaders see the long view. 9- Leaders understand stakeholder symmetry. 10- Leaders create strategic alliances and partnerships. "

Note: The review that follows is of the fourth ("Twentieth Anniversary") edition that was published on March 2, 2009.

Where have the 20 years gone since this book was first published? It remains among the most valuable and most influential primary sources on the subject of effective leadership at a time when the need for it has never been greater. However, although the core principles and the development of them that Warren Bennis examines in this book remain essentially the same, the perils and opportunities to which those principles can be applied throughout the global business world have increased in number as well as changed in nature since 1989. That is why Bennis felt the need to revise and update the material while adding an Epilogue.

Previously, I read the first and third editions of this book and each time was reminded of a situation years ago when participants were outraged about the playing conditions on the course (perhaps Shinnicock) on which the U.S. Open golf championship was once held. The greens were too fast, the rough was too high and deep, the pin placements were "impossible," etc. After a U.S. Golf Association official was informed of the criticism, he explained that "we're not trying to embarrass the world's greatest golfers, we're trying to identify them." Bennis seems to be making the same point about how great leaders are developed. More specifically, as he and Robert Thomas assert in Geeks & Geezers (2002), there are "crucibles" from which some emerge as leaders but most others do not. They developed a theory that describes, they believe for the first time, how leaders come to be. "We believe that we have identified the process that allows an individual to undergo testing and to emerge, not just stronger, but better equipped with the tools he or she needs both to lead and to learn. It is a model that explains how individuals make meaning out of difficult events -- we call them crucibles [in italics] -- and how that process of 'meaning making' both galvanizes individuals and gives them their distinctive voice." They cite and then discuss a number of individuals who underwent that process and, as a result, eventually became highly-effective leaders. Bennis and Thomas conclude their book with an especially apt quotation from Edith Wharton: "In spite of illness, in spite even of the arch enemy, sorrow, one can remain alive long past the usual state of integration if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity, interested in big things, and happy in small ways." These are indeed words to live and grow by for both Geeks and Geezers.

Those who aspire to become leaders - or to become more effective leaders - will find much of value in this latest edition even as some readers will question Bennis' selection of at least a few of the exemplary leaders such as Herb Alpert, Norman Lear, and Sydney Pollack. However, my own opinion is that effective leaders can - and should - be developed at all levels and in all areas, not only within an organization but indeed throughout an entire society. I do agree with other reviewers that some of Bennis' social commentary indicates a political bias that is irrelevant to his stated objectives. Granted, Harry Truman once described politics as "the art of getting things done" and great leaders are certainly results-driven pragmatists. In that sense, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, Mohandas Gandhi, and Nelson Mandela (to name but a few) were master politicians. That said, each demonstrated most (if not all) of the qualities that Bennis admires, notably a compelling ("guiding") vision, a passion for excellence, and impeccable integrity. None of those qualities is political in nature. However, all of the aforementioned leaders considered them essential to achieving political objectives.

In the Epilogue, Bennis recalls an incident that occurred in 1945. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had recently died and "crowded, grieving masses surged along Constitution Avenue in April 1945, waiting for his funeral cortege to pass by. As his hearse neared, a well-dressed, middle-aged man standing in the throng fell to his knees, sobbing desperately until finally regaining his composure. A stranger by his side asked, `Did you know the President?' The man could barely reply. `No . . . but he knew me.'" What's Bennis' point? To become a great leader, you must "know" those whom you ask to follow you. Agreeing with Abigail Adams that "great necessities call forth great leaders," Bennis notes that with the inauguration of a new U.S. president in 2009, "it is easy to forget that we need more than one gifted leader at a time. At the founding of the United States, when our population was less than 4 million, we had six towering leaders: Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison, Franklin, and Adams. Now that we number more than 304 million people, we are surely capable of yielding at least 600 world-class leaders in this country alone."

When concluding the Epilogue with a question, "Will you be one of them?" Warren Bennis offers both an invitation and a challenge, and he does so at a time when the need for more and more effective leaders was never greater.