I didn't want to end my blog postings in a ranting, cynical fashion; however, one thing that college taught me was that challenging pervasive thought was part of the intellectual experience that college stands for. Take things further. Expand your horizons. With that being said...
I take exception to the textbook perpetuating the "physical attractiveness" component of becoming a leader. I understand that human beings are visual creatures. We spend a lot of time adhering to and pursuing what society and particularly, pop culture dictates as to what constitutes attractiveness. That said, I have a problem with the physical attractiveness theory that our book proposes because it perpetuates a shallow way of thinking and could potentially lower the self esteem of it's readers. People in college should be fostering big dreams and studying hard to achieve those dreams. Frankly there are so many bad leaders around that most rational working adults could care less how their leader looks. I cannot stress that enough. My boss is ugly, so is my CEO; however because we are emotionally secure and professional adults, we value them for their overall intelligence more than their attractiveness.
If this theory is true, then how do the authors explain the role sexuality plays in our views of leaders? Take the most attractive male leader than you can imagine. Would the fact that I'm heterosexual change my views of that leader? What about Ghandi? That dude is ugly and arguably one of the greatest leaders the world has ever known. How about Chairman Mao? Did people fall in line behind him because of his good looks?
I understand where the authors are going with this attractiveness mumbo jumbo. They want to point out, much like other college material, the perpetual dominance of the white male. Now that we have elected our first African Amercian President, I am relived that we can finally stop beating the "dead horse". Enough already. Find a new blanket intellectual theory.
Frankly we're all ugly. Let's focus our energies towards improving our emotional intelligence and our interpersonal skills.
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I think you make a good point that there is definitely too much focus on looks in our society. I agree that ugly people have leadership roles. I too have a less than attractive CEO in my company, in fact he is probably the worst looking one there. While this does not present a problem in our company, I think it was important to point out the aspect of looks in leadership. Or as described in the book, trait leadership. It did point out, however, that this view of leadership is not the current thinking among scholars. We know now that there is a lot more to leaders than what is on the outside.
ReplyDeleteThink of all the famous and prominent CEO's you can think of. We've seen them all in the news. I honestly can't think of an attractive one. In fact, when thinking about leadership, attractiveness does not even come to my mind. Many CEO's are older white men. I personally do not find any attraction to them and I doubt their looks play a role in how their employees view them as leaders. Your point is well-taken. People followed Ghandi and he was not attractive. People followed Hitler... and Chairman Mao and we have leaders like Abe Lincoln and George Bush... far from attractive. What matters in leadership is strength and inteligence and certainly not looks.
ReplyDeleteAs sad as it is, physical attractiveness plays a large role on selecting some leaders. People want someone to follow who is the shinning example of what they want their team or organization to be about. They want people to look at their leader and see power and control in him, inadvertently through attractiveness. So though it might seem extremely shallow to thin along these lines, the fact of the matter is that this is the way that humans work.
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