There Is No Such Thing as an Essential Leadership Trait. But There Is One That Defines It.

Abstract The author is a behavioral scientist who became well known for creating a “dining experience” known as The Influencers Dinner, which he describes in the article. He notes that the many diverse leaders he has collaborated with over the years did not necessarily have commonality in their skills, even as they were quite effective in their leadership. He believes people follow leaders because they think they can lead them to a better tomorrow: “When we interact with someone who makes us feel there's a new and better future, we follow them.” Referencing historical examples such as Churchill and Mandela, he writes: “If you can consistently leave people with hope, anticipation, or even excitement, then you are practicing the core characteristic of leadership.” He says that most leaders do not have the qualities of both vision and charisma, and some have neither. He follows with the takeaway to not “waste time trying to contort yourself into a generic competency model.” He devotes considerable space to the reasoning, attention, and resources of “team intelligence,” which is “about the habits, attitudes, and skills that make groups smarter and more effective together than they ever could be alone.”