Who Becomes a Leader? (It Could Be You): Larry Singell at TEDxBloomington

Good morning, so today I'm here to talk about who

becomes

a

leader

. This research began a long time ago in a galaxy far away, when I was six years old at my first family reunion. My father came from a large family of nine brothers and sisters, all of whom were fruitful and multiplied in such a way that we

could

have 11 in an 11-a-side football game with substitutes and we did, and the education of my family members varied dramatically from my grandfather, who did not complete high school until my father who had a PhD in economics and upon reflection, this was really the beginning of my interest in economics, my interest in

leader

ship and even my preparation to become a Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, this sparked my fascination with what economists are referring to. as human capital, the investments that people make in education throughout their lives, which makes them more productive, what I learned by observing this large group of human beings, all with approximately equal abilities, were two things: first , you are what you know, your universe and its size. is defined by your education, this has profound effects on what your opportunities and choices are and that's the second thing and this effect is magnified for people in leadership positions because their choices and opportunities affect those of others and my research in the investigation of others. have confirmed this finding leaders are made, not born, preparation for leadership occurs throughout a person's life and career.

John Wooden, one of Indiana's most famous native sons, actually began his career as a teacher and admits to becoming increasingly frustrated with his parents coming over. to him and I said little Johnny, I assure you as a student his age, when in reality I knew that Johnny was a B student if he worked hard and then he thought about what constituted success and how it was achieved and he came up with the The next notion of success is the peace of mind that is the direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing that you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming in our John Wooden.

Success wasn't about results, it was about productive effort, this was the beginning. of his famous coaching philosophy, the pyramid of success, John Wooden was a successful leader because he lived by the philosophy, he never stopped seeking to improve, he was committed to learning now, my reference to John Wooden is not random. I love basketball and that probably explains how I ended up in Indiana and that definitely explains how I ended up studying leadership. You see, I went to grad school in Southern California in the 1980s. This was the era of Showtime with the Lakers led by Magic Johnson and a tenacious defense and precision offense led by the Celtics and Larry Bird Magic Johnson and Larry Bird were great leaders because not only were there great individual players but they also made their teammates better.

How do they do that? They did it by knowing their teammates' abilities and getting the ball to them where they

could

. they could be successful good leaders give the ball to their teammates in places where they can be successful now while I loved basketball my wife didn't fully understand this until we moved as newlyweds to the south California and I started watching what she saw as an endless stream of NBA Basketball and really the first disagreement of our marriage, she walked in while I was watching the basketball game and said how can you justify spending so much time watching basketball when you have so little time?

I thought about it for a second, looked at her directly, looked at her eye and said honestly: I'm doing research after she says that the disagreement ended up unresolved and then I asked my eight graduate student colleagues, you have to help me here, How could I justify what seemed like an absurd statement that I was investigating and my team, the Los Angeles Lakers, was coached by Pat Riley. Now Pat Riley typifies what was true for most coaches in the game. He was a former player who was good but not great. More successful by courage than by gift, so I started thinking about how I could get data so I could study the investments players make during their career that affect whether they are coached, not now the basketball data unfortunately wasn't up to par. homework, but baseball. data where statistics are king.

I was able to find every player that started his career between 1950 and 1965, follow his entire career and be able to see the opportunity to coach after him and what I observed in that baseball data was what I observed that day looking. basketball and what turns out to be true in many professions, including mine, in the Academy, is that we are doing well there, but great talents do not usually occupy leadership positions, so in the baseball data one of the things I discovered was that people who are really good hitters, particularly those who had to work hard to become good hitters, were more likely to be coaches and the reason why that is so bad as a skill that can be taught;

However, good hitters, people who hit a lot of home runs were actually less likely. to train, why? Well, number one is a skill you can't teach and number two, it turns out that it increases your opportunities outside of the game of baseball a lot more than it turns out that you can sell serums. The same thing happens in the academic world. One of the things I discovered is that the best academics do not become administrators and remember I am a dean, however, you have to be good enough to be able to recognize talent and good enough to be respected by talent to be able to be able being a manager so this is important greatness is something that is accessible to very few but kindness is accessible to many with hard work you don't have to be great to be a leader you have to be good kindness is hard don't do it Get me wrong, It takes many years of effort and commitment to excellence and this is my last point and that is that, in fact, leaders often make very specific types of investments throughout their lives, for example, in the bat and baseball, One of the things that was discovered is that people who play catcher at second base were more likely to train because it required regular investments not only in their own success but also in the success of their teammates, they had to be able to work with others.

The same thing happens in the academic world. I have observed that my colleagues have spent very different amounts of time in terms of their dedication to teaching. Teaching, if taken seriously, requires the ability to learn to communicate. Communication is a general skill. It's a skill that will increase your productivity not only as a teacher not only as an academic but also as an administrator and what I found is that people who are good teachers are more likely to get into administration and more likely to be successful once they get in, So this is my third principle, general rather than investments in specific skills. lead to leadership, particularly those who depend on working with others, this is important to me at the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences because this is the liberal arts model, the liberal arts model focuses on general skills, he says, Hey, how can we question critical thinking? logically communicate clearly act creatively live ethically rather than a set of professional skills know why as a labor economist I can tell you that's important why it's important because half of the jobs that will exist in the next 20 years don't exist yet, you can Not preparing for them as a profession, so what that means is that in a world of rapid change, the general skills that are developed through a liberal arts education will define who the leaders of the next generation will be.

Being a good accountant is a very valuable thing, but it's not what makes you a leader, okay, so who

becomes

a leader? Well, what my research shows is that these are made, not born, they are good, but not great, that they make general investments rather than specific investments, what that means is that no one in this room is absolved of the burden of leadership , leadership is accessible to everyone, not everyone will necessarily take advantage of that opportunity, but all it requires is kindness and kindness requires hard work, so if you are ready to put in the time, you can be a leader in many possibilities.

You are already a leader and responsible for the success of your organization, if you think about what you do, you have leadership responsibilities in your job, so who becomes a leader? Well, in the next century, the problems we will face are going to be complex and multifaceted, they will not be solved by a single individual at the head of an organization who is capable of directing what happens; those problems are simply too difficult to solve, they will be solved by relatively flat organizations and that flat requires trusting our The previous talk talks about the notion of trust.

You need to have relatively flat trust in organizations and give those people the opportunity to be leaders, and it will be those leaders who pursue excellence individually that will lead to success. So who becomes the leader, it is likely to be you. jump that's all you