Leadership is often seen as a “soft” skill, hard to measure, and really only obvious with the benefit of hindsight.
Perhaps not, the potential success of leaders can be at least partly assessed by looking at what makes people unsuccessful as leaders.
As a test, when considering someone as a potential leader you could do a lot worse than score the person on the traits listed, and if sitting on a selection committee, get the members to evaluate a candidate separately on a set of scales that reflect the particular requirements of the appointment role, then compare notes. At least then you will see the areas of agreement and those for further investigation and debate.
Equally, within a context of an agreed strategy and expected results, the same scale could be used as a tool to evaluate executive performance.
Perhaps our “leaders” in Canberra should consider some objctive evaluation in about 3 hours, rather than relying on self interest, and allegiences based on all but the long term good of the country. Always the optimist!
