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Your Turn Finding the Leaders dents benefit from exposure to some leadership training. Even students who never assume upper-level leadership roles may develop more initia- tive simply by learning more about how true leaders think. But after teaching more than 15,000 students, I have found stu- dents without the character traits of leaders don't usually make their way to the top. With this in mind, we then often forget is that most peo- ple in life are followers. True leadership is a relatively rare commodity. Few people ascend to the top and chart their own way. Only a small percentage of students enrolled in top- flight MBA programs will demonstrate strong leadership potential. Those destined to go all the way to the CEO's office are rarer still. I don't deny that most stu- Can leadership be taught? My experience suggests that the answer is equivo- cal. Yes, leadership can be taught— but, no, it can't be taught to every- body or by everybody. I've found that not every student can learn to be a leader because not every student possesses the characteristics essential to good leadership. The fact we, as educators, by Albert W. Niemi Jr. uals who demonstrate the ability to separate themselves from the pack early on, we then can offer them selective, advanced programs in leadership to help them hone and strengthen their leadership skills. Identifying those who will become the leaders of tomorrow isn't that difficult. First and fore- holics. They give their hearts and souls to their companies. Third, they always are two steps ahead of their colleagues. By staying ahead of the pack, leaders command the respect of their colleagues. Would you want to follow someone who was easy to catch? And finally, great lead- ers are compassionate and know how to treat people with respect. In early leadership training cup is not at least half-full on the worst day, you're simply not going to make it. No one wants to follow a whiner." Second, leaders are also worka- should ask a different question: If leadership skills can be taught to, and best learned by, those who pos- sess the inherent attributes and char- acteristics of great leaders, how do we recognize those students? Once we learn to recognize those individ- 54 BizEd MAY/JUNE 2004 most, they are the optimists. The people who make it to the top in business are those who always see the good news in their companies; they are the purveyors of hope. If students can't sell hope and opti- mism to a group, it's going to be difficult, if not impossible, for them to get that group to follow them. I tell our students, "If you're not optimistic, if you can't see the silver lining in the darkest clouds, if your during the MBA program, including courses in finance, economics, accounting, and statistics. This kit of tools is fundamental to success. But eventually, a leadership program must begin to separate the leaders from the followers. More important, a leadership program must be taught by proven leaders, who are best suit- ed to recognize leadership potential and teach those who possess it. For example, this past semester at oncile ourselves to the fact that, when it comes to learning to become a good leader, not everyone is going to make it. We can design our programs in leadership so that all students start on a level playing field, learning the nuts and bolts courses, we must begin to detect these leadership "vibra- tions" from our students. In this way, we can identify the positive people from the naysayers. We can see those who are driven to succeed and who command the respect of their peers. As educators we must rec-