A grown man that throws tantrums, belittles subordinates, and never admits when his company has made a mistake is not what I would call a born leader.

"A grown man that throws tantrums, belittles subordinates, and never admits when his company has made a mistake is not what I would call a born leader."

So, one could easily compare him with Stalin, Hitler, and other people like these who happened to have similar habits? Well, the life story of well-adjusted sociopaths...

That's exactly what I'd call a born leader. These types of people do not show any weakness and refuse to compromise on their vision.

All three of the attributes I listed are weaknesses. Born leaders don't often lose their temper in front of subordinates.

You should read "How to Make Friends and Influence People" It contains quite a few examples of what true leadership is.

>All three of the attributes I listed are weaknesses.

According to whom?

>"How to Make Friends and Influence People"

Leadership isn't about making friends; it's about getting people to obey. Hitler, Stalin and Steve Jobs all knew this well.

>According to whom? Anyone with a brain. Steve Jobs wasn't successful because he found it appropriate to act like a 2 year old in a business environment. He was successful in spite of it.

>Leadership isn't about making friend; It's about getting people to obey.

I agree that leadership isn't about making friends, but the other half of the book's title is "and Influencing People," which is about getting people to do what you want them to, which is exactly what you said leadership is about.

Hitler and Stalin were not good leaders. Sure, you can force people to do things if your commands are backed up by the promise of torture and death, but that's not leadership by any stretch of the imagination.

You can be successful for a number of reasons. Most good leaders are successful, but success alone isn't an indicator of leadership ability. Good leaders are far too rare for every successful organization to have one.

>Hitler and Stalin were not good leaders. Sure, you can force people to do things if your commands are backed up by the promise of torture and death, but that's not leadership by any stretch of the imagination.

Hitler and Stalin weren't born with the ability to have anyone tortured or killed. They didn't inherit generals and secret police under their command. These power structures they built themselves over the course of their respective political careers. Their ability to rally people to their respective causes was formidable.

For another example of belligerence and downright nastiness as a leadership quality: look no further than the military. Drill Instructors are legendary for the intimidating and degrading treatment of their subordinates and yet I find it very hard to argue with the results. By and large, they're able to produce unshakably loyal soldiers.

I'm a 3rd generation Soldier that was in the Army for a decade, what you are describing is called toxic leadership, and it destroys organizations. Slowly, the military is starting to admit that its ineffective when your subordinates aren't a bunch of mouth breathing illiterates.

Also, most Soldiers are loyal because most people who aren't already patriotic wouldn't have much of a reason to go through all the bullshit. Anyone who thinks that you can get brainwashed by 9 weeks of mild exercise and ass-chewings delivered by a group of regular people who are paid to pretend that they are mad at you must have had a pretty easy life. Basic training is the codecademy of military discipline.

>I'm a 3rd generation Soldier that was in the Army for a decade, what you are describing is called toxic leadership, and it destroys organizations. Slowly, the military is starting to admit that its ineffective when your subordinates aren't a bunch of mouth breathing illiterates.

Totally different situation. You're talking about maintaining high morale with career soldiers. I'm talking about rousing up a bunch of conscripts and packing them off to war. Historically, these types of people made up the bulk of the armies and didn't live long enough to cause trouble for the organization.

Go read the biography of Harry Cohn, one of the founders of Columbia Pictures.

Even as a founder of a company, Steve Jobs is by large not of much use without somebody like Steve Wozniak.

And is Steve Wozniak more than a career engineer without Steve Jobs? I think it's more accurate to say they are both exponentially more valuable in tandem than solo.

And Steve Wozniak isn't of much use without computers. I guess that makes him pretty useless as a programmer.

Except for the fact that Wozniak is mostly known for building a computer, not programming it.

Rereading his biography today I came to the exact same conclusion.

If you can't think of any way to use someone today with the skills of Steve Jobs, the fault might not lie with the person who has those skills.

Don't forget some companies are big and old enough to no longer have the initial vision and can differentiate into other markets with employees that are leaders like Steve. Maybe a good example would be Eisner with Disney