Throw away that leadership competency

model
Keith Patching

Keith Patching is an Abstract

Independent Coach and Purpose – This paper was written for the attention of organisations wanting to develop leaders and
Consultant in Leadership create leadership programmes and it aims to highlight the fact that a leadership competency model will
and Organisation have an adverse effect on potential leaders.
Development at Design/methodology/approach – Research has been carried out through analysing existing literature
Jigsaw@Work, Wakefield, on leadership and reading autobiographies and biographies on leaders. Furthermore, the author has
UK. over 20 years’ hands-on experience of creating and leading development programmes and has used
his personal experience from these courses to add to his findings.
Findings – There are numerous successful management development models and tools. Many
organisations have subsequently wanted to use leadership competency models to achieve the same
positive results for helping to develop leaders. There are two main areas of research into leadership;
focussed and broad-based. Focussed research has consisted of concentrating on existing leaders and
looking at their behaviours and styles. This produces models of the ‘‘ideal’’ leader in different categories,
such as leader-as-hero, or leader-as-explorer. Broad-based research has looked at different styles
leaders use and picked the ‘‘best’’ qualities. These qualities are then used as a programme to follow and
complete. These blueprints are unsuccessful however as they hinder individuals rather than allow them
to develop. The whole concept of a leader is that they stand out from the crowd rather than following
others. By trying to follow existing models, these individuals end up copying rather than leading. The
most important element of a leader is integrity; it is not taking on a role, but is instead about the person.
Originality/value – This article will be of great value to organisations wanting to develop leaders. It will
demonstrate that following a competency model will act as more of a hindrance than a help, and that the
organisation needs to encourage the individual to develop his or her self-awareness rather than copying
existing blueprints.
Keywords Leadership, Training, Leadership development, Competences
Paper type Viewpoint

eadership competency models, although apparently a good idea, hinder rather than

L help individuals in the development of their leadership capabilities. Given the sound
history of modelling in so many other spheres and disciplines, it would seem that
extending this kind of benchmarking to leadership ought to be beneficial. Yet this thinking is
fundamentally flawed. Leadership competency models inhibit leadership development. In
this article, we will show why.

The value and benefits of management development

Since Frederick Taylor’s pioneering work in the management of organisations, great strides
have been made in designing and developing effective and efficient ways of organising the
efforts of people to produce results. Both practical and academic education teach
managers many truly effective lessons in how to marshal resources for the benefit of
everyone, from customers and shareholders to employees.

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Few people are able, intuitively, to know how to meet all of the complex demands of being a
manager. So marketing strategies, HR policies, financial and information systems, and many
more aids to doing the managerial job have been vital elements in the growth of businesses
and public sector institutions that deliver value and wealth to the community.
The success of such tools, methods and models in helping managers to manage is one
reason why many people seeking to develop leaders assume that similar tools, methods and
models will be appropriate in leadership development.

Two kinds of research into leadership

Few people try to deliver leadership development by plucking ideas out of nowhere. Anyone
who takes development seriously will have looked at research into leadership. Two classic
kinds of research into leadership are those based on the lessons that can be learnt from a
specific leader, activity or event (focussed), and those that can be learnt from a
wide-ranging exploration of leadership in many different fields and contexts (broad-based).
Focussed research into what real leaders do or have done uses a narrower definition of
‘‘leadership’’, concentrating upon leaders whose behaviours are sufficiently alike to enable
patterns to be defined. This produces a model of the ‘‘ideal’’ leader-as-hero, or
leader-as-consultant, or leader-as-explorer, or even leader-as-best-mate.
As one example of this approach, in the book Inspiring Leadership, based on lessons learnt
from the BT Global Challenge Round the World Yacht Race, the authors draw on what the
race can teach us to ‘‘identify the key attributes and skills that make effective leaders stand
out from the crowd [. . .] ’’. This book is typical of many, linking lessons of leadership to
mountain climbing, field sports, or aerobatics teams. Each is instructional and interesting in
its own right.
In some cases, these lessons are worked up into leadership competency models, tools or
instruments that seek to identify how closely real people actually match up to the ideals
illustrated in the book or story. From there, developers try to teach real people how to
emulate this ideal.
This approach defines leadership relatively narrowly. The aim is to use this definition of
leadership as a blueprint, and then to provide training so that individuals can learn how to
emulate this blueprint and adopt the behaviours, characteristics and qualities defined by
this blueprint.
Broad-based research recognises that leaders are different, and is used to develop models
of leadership that take ‘‘the best’’ from the lessons of this wide range of leaders. An example
of this approach is The Way to Win by Will Carling and Robert Heller (Carling and Heller,
1995). Drawing from a wide range of sources both in sport and business, the authors tell a
variety of different leadership stories. Once again, the information is interesting and
informative.
The authors extrapolate from these very different stories and conclude that ‘‘leadership
ability is founded on five strengths that are inward [. . .] [and] which achieve their effect
through [. . .] five outward processes’’. It is a simple step from here to define leadership
development as helping individuals develop these ten strengths and/or processes. Once
again, a favoured method for doing this is to build a leadership competency model based on
ten such qualities.

Why blueprints do not work for leadership

The problem is that leadership development that is based on these kinds of research does
quite the reverse of what it sets out to do. It prevents leaders from developing their
leadership. Instead it develops their ability to follow. By starting with blueprints based on
what other leaders do, this approach encourages potential leaders to copy, not to lead.

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 ‘‘ Ironically, a great deal of what well-meaning professionals are
doing in the name of leadership development is stifling that
very leadership. ’’

Models based upon the narrowly defined ‘‘leader-as-sailor’’ or ‘‘leader-as-mountaineer’’ try

to teach real people how to emulate an ideal but they lose along the way, the potential
leadership of all those who do not comfortably fit into a ‘‘leader-as-x’’ category. They could
be brilliant leaders in their own right: imagine Gandhi in a round the world yacht race.
Starting with the broad-based model, other developers try to teach people how to become
all things to all people, being at the same time strong-willed and absorbent to the ideas of
others; determined and flexible; tough and caring; decisive and consultative; responsible
and radical. Mother Theresa and Vlad the Impaler rolled into one.
This may be good management development, but it is not leadership development.
Ironically, a great deal of what well-meaning professionals are doing in the name of
leadership development is stifling that very leadership. Nascent talent in promising
individuals is smothered by such ‘‘competency models’’, 3608 instruments, and
well-researched lists of the ‘‘habits’’ of other leaders.
In our practical research and development work, we have come across many potentially
successful leaders who have been adversely affected by well-meaning attempts to get them
to follow such blueprints.
One Chief Executive of a local authority had been taught to be very accommodating and
collegiate, and exercised this pattern of behaviour with both the Leader of the Council and
with her senior team. But it was not her natural style. The reputation she developed was of
vacillation, weakness and indecision. She began to lose respect, and the more she tried to
do what she had been taught to do, the more the reputation was reinforced.
Another Chief Executive of a European financial institution had been urged to delegate more,
and he made every effort to suppress his natural tendency to take control and act with
authority, leaving more and more issues in the hands of his direct reports. Throughout the
organisation, he was deeply mistrusted. He was seen as playing with people’s livelihoods
and failing to show leadership.
A Senior Analyst in an investment bank was desperate to emulate the bank’s heroes and be
even tougher and more competitive than the people around him. He came across as
self-centred, ruthless, and lacking in team spirit. Ironically he was naturally extremely
team-oriented and caring. But again, he had been encouraged to try to adapt himself to a
model that was ill-suited to bringing out his innately excellent leadership qualities.
What is most frustrating for individuals such as these and many others who have tried their
best to mould themselves into leadership blueprints that were unsuited to them, is that the
more they tried to do what they had been urged to do, the more their motives were
questioned by those around them. And the motives ascribed to each of them were motives
that, in fact, were way off their own personal agendas. They share the unfortunate attribute of
being misunderstood.

Learning from leaders

Think of a few leaders. Now consider the question, ‘‘Are they just like the people around
them?’’ Most people’s answer will be ‘‘No’’. If these leaders were just like the people around

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them, then the chances are that they wouldn’t have been leaders. They’d have been – well,
just like everyone else.
Gandhi led successfully because, unlike other Indian radicals, he didn’t fight the Raj;
Roosevelt led successfully because he didn’t buy into the ‘‘rugged individualism’’ that so
many of his peers thought was the only defence against totalitarianism; Bill Gates led
successfully because he didn’t believe that there was only one ‘‘environment’’; while Martin
Luther King led successfully because rather than listen to colleagues who advocated
militancy, he made people believe in a dream.
Leaders are different, not only from the people around them, but also from each other. So
why are so many people who say they are in the field of ‘‘leadership development’’ (or even
‘‘leadership training’’) unable to grasp this simple fact? Why do they continue to try to
develop ‘‘leaders’’ by trying to make people just like someone else? It would appear that the
answer to this lies in the well-intentioned but mistaken belief that models are as suited to
leadership as they are to management.
Unlike management, leadership starts with the leader. His or her character and values are
the foundations from which he or she can, with integrity and honesty, make decisions,
exercise discretion and take action. Leaders are neither right nor wrong. They are, when
effective, influential and persuasive, and they create the environment in which their decisions
work. They work because, believing in their leaders, those who follow them make sure that
they work.

If not competency models, then what?

Who taught Bill Gates to be so devastatingly competitive, or Sir John Harvey-Jones to be so
responsible, or Ricardo Semler to be so collegiate, or Richard Branson to be so
adventurous? (Some of the books that explain the styles and approaches of these leaders
are listed at the end of this article.)
If these and the leaders referred to earlier in this article have anything in common, it is that
each acted with integrity. Each of them truly believed in what they said and did, even though
those beliefs were, in many cases, fundamentally different from the beliefs of others,
including those of other successful leaders. Moreover, their beliefs and values were reflected
in their character. Character and values pointed in the same direction, with the result that,
whether they were liked or loathed, they were consistent and effective.
Being a leader is not taking on a role – it is personal. Leadership development, to be
effective, has to be personal. Development that starts with the needs of an organisation,
or with the ‘‘values/mission statement’’ of an organisation, or with a competency model is
not leadership development. It may have a very important role to play, but it is something
else.
To unleash the leadership potential in an organisation, you have to come from the opposite
direction, and genuinely put the individual first. The developer’s role is to help identify,
explore, and unlock the talents of very different characters, and then to help meld those
characters into an integrated whole; one in which individuals do not try to become people
they are not, but in which those fundamental differences of character can be brought
together into a more effective combination.

Individuals as leaders
Even those who try to mould potential leaders into shapes determined by their
competency models or blueprints agree that one of the basic tenets of effective
leadership is self-awareness (even if that is merely a starting point to trying fundamentally
to change that self). So a key attribute of anyone aspiring to be effective in the field of
leadership development is to be able to help individuals towards genuine self-awareness.

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 Self-awareness is far from easy, and demands from a potential leader the courage to
confront his or her personality and character with total honesty. Being true to oneself means
sifting through one’s own values, beliefs and style and recognising those elements which are
truly part of who one is, compared to attitudes and styles that have been grafted on by family,
society, organisational pressures, or what one has been taught by consultants and
educators.
Developing leadership capability, if it is to be honest and effective, means building a
leadership strategy upon the firm foundations of the person a leader truly is. This is a task
that may take several attempts. In our experience, many people, when asked to explore the
core of their being, really do struggle to separate out aspects that are deeply part of their
characters from those which form various aspects of a more or less desirable persona or set
of personae.
As self-awareness develops, so will each individual’s strategy for leadership, since that
strategy will be a manifestation of the individual’s character, values, and self. Leadership
development, therefore, is not about creating an ideal and then trying to get people to act
according to that ideal. It’s about working with individuals, their beliefs and characters, and
helping each of them to evolve his or her strategy for leading.
Developing leaders is a risky business, because, unlike the development of managers, you
cannot start from a leadership competency model or from the premise that there are right or
wrong ways of doing things. Leadership does not manifest itself in the emulation of a set of
predetermined behaviours, in the following of a blueprint. Following is not leading.

Developing leaders in organisations

The problem with this approach, however, is that by starting with and building upon each
individual separately, leadership developers potentially let loose a Tower of Babel of
potentially conflicting beliefs and values. Why should any organisation make an investment
in people whose beliefs may be contrary to each others’ and possibly even those espoused
by the organisation?
The answer is that any organisation, big or small, has the potential to benefit from
releasing the energies, the beliefs, and the capabilities of all kinds of leaders – warriors,
sages, adventurers and guardians alike. Another of the key attributes of a successful
leadership developer is the ability to help individuals and groups to draw upon the
resources of disparate and diverse individuals to share ways forward that benefit from this
very diversity.
Effective leadership development demands a set of skills and an approach, which is
diametrically opposed to those suited to training, or even to management development.
Leadership development is not management education for the more senior; it is an entirely
different territory in which to be effective, a practitioner has to throw away the tools and
techniques acquired from years of training.
True leadership development has to be centred on individuals, not blueprints, or
competency models, or any other hoops you want people to jump through. If you want to
help develop leaders, throw away your competency models and stop trying to teach.

‘‘ Developing leadership capability, if it is to be honest and

effective, means building a leadership strategy upon the firm
foundations of the person a leader truly is. ’’

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Reference
Carling, W. and Heller, R. (1995), The Way to Win: Strategies for Success in Business and Sport, Little,
Brown and Company, London.

Further reading
Branson, R. (1998), Losing My Virginity: The Autobiography, Virgin Publishing, London.
Cranwell-Ward, J., Bacon, A. and Mackie, R. (2002), Inspiring Leadership: Staying Afloat in Turbulent
Times, Thompson, London.
Dallek, R. (1995), Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Foreign Policy 1932-1945, Oxford University
Press, New York, NY.
Dyson, M.E. (2000), I May Not Get There With You: The True Martin Luther King, Jr, The Free Press,
New York, NY.
Gandhi, M.K. (1958), The Collected Works, Publication Division of the Government of India, New Delhi.
Harvey-Jones, J. (1989), Making it Happen: Reflections on Leadership, Fontana, London.
Heller, R. (2000), Bill Gates, Dorling Kindersley, London.
Patching, K. (2005), Leadership, Character & Strategy: Exploring Diversity, Palgrave Macmillan,
London.
Semler, R. (1993), Maverick! The Success Story Behind the World’s Most Unusual Workplace, Century,
London.
Wallace, J. and Erickson, J. (1993), Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire, John
Wiley & Sons, Chichester.

About the author

Keith Patching is an Independent Coach and Consultant in Leadership and Organisation
Development. He is a published author and fellow at Cranfield School of Management and a
key member of Jigsaw@work’s leadership team where he designs and delivers leadership
development programmes. He has worked on hundreds of uniquely tailored leadership and
management development programmes over a period of 20 years. Keith Patching can be
contacted at: Leadership@jigsawatwork.com

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