In these early days of the new administration, I continue to assess what, if any, my response should be to the election of a man that is so antithetical to everything I have learned and believe. One of the things I have decided I can do is write about what I see.

My primary issue today is not about radical policy, though I have numerous concerns about our new president’s radical policies and their impact on our soul as nation and their impact on the world. Historically in the US, our system of checks and balances from other branches of government, a free press, and an informed public that is watching and judging have kept the most radical, damaging policies from being implemented. Policy shifts in the US usually come incrementally and slowly in our form of government. Also with our form of government, while the majority rules, the minority has a voice. And, since I have ranging views on various issues and, as such, I can’t be cleanly put in a political “bucket”, I wouldn’t be completely lost at sea under a more conservative tack by our leaders. I am independent.

My issue today is also not about the legitimacy of the election. Though the new president’s opponent beat him by around 3 million votes in the popular vote count, that is not relevant to his legitimacy based on our how our election system works. The electoral college was put in place to give smaller states a disproportionate voice and it did just that in this election. I can’t speak to whether Russian meddling changed enough votes to change the outcome of the election. That is for others to research and speculate.

What I can speak to and what brings me despair is the topic of leadership. The president’s leadership persona violates everything I was taught growing up from my parents (humility, respect for others, treating others with dignity, honor, and southern grace). Further, his leadership persona runs counter to everything I have learned and experienced about leadership.

Jim Collins, arguably the preeminent researcher and writer on business leadership of the modern business era, coined the phrase “level 5 leadership”. He researched over 1000 companies and, in a statistically valid analysis, found a set of 6 common traits among the 11 companies that were considered “great” (great was defined by sustained growth in shareholder value over a 15-year period that substantially exceeded the company’s peer group). Every one of the companies that was classified as “great” had the common trait of level 5 leadership. Without rehashing the book, the level 5 leaders in these companies were defined by Collins this way: “compared to high-profile leaders with big personalities who make headlines and become celebrities, the good-to-great leaders [level 5 leaders] seem to have come from Mars. Self-effacing, quite reserved, even shy – these leaders are a paradoxical blend of humility and professional will.” Re-reading the one chapter on level 5 leadership in Collins’ book “Good to Great” sent chills through me.

I have spent 30 professional years now learning, studying, and practicing leadership in settings from companies, to NGOs, to churches. I have had the opportunity to watch and learn from great leaders, and not so great leaders, and I’ve had the chance to work with exceptionally bright people. In those 30 years, I have never, not once, heard another leader I was working with feel the need to tell an audience “I am really smart, ok?”. Who does that? Likely someone who is very insecure about whether they really are smart enough.

All leaders I know, including me, have insecurities. We suffer doubts about our success, our intelligence, our effectiveness as leaders. Great leaders, “level 5 leaders”, are increasingly self-aware. They know that those voices talking in their heads are these insecurities. Self-aware leaders are able to recognize and overcome those natural insecurities. Having a leader feel the need to tell me how smart he is doesn’t convince me he is smart; it just tells me how insecure and un-self-aware he is. Just after the inauguration the new president visited the CIA (a noble group of public servants and scary-smart people) and he felt the need to tell the audience gathered: “I am really smart! Ok?” This is not the first time that he has said this in public. Numerous times in debates and on the campaign trail he made this self-aggrandizing statement. When I saw what he said at the CIA event, I was dismayed that this person now occupying the most powerful and impactful leadership role in the world must be tremendously insecure, and lacks the self-awareness to recognize and overcome this insecurity.

Statements like the one he made at the CIA visit also confirm one of my greatest concerns: for the new president, this whole endeavor is about him, rather than the office of president, or country or the world. The awesome thing about the presidency of the US is that it has withstood many tests of fire for over 200 years, and the office is larger than any individual who has occupied the role. The office has withstood dark times such as Richard Nixon’s resignation, and the office has been big enough to be bigger than even our first president, or the 16th or 32nd president, or the numerous other great leaders that have held that office. I am not a historian, but I think if we looked at all previous 44 office holders we would see that the office finally humbled even the biggest personalities. It seems to me that to even run for president, much less be the president of the United States, you would have to have a strong ego but that would be tempered by being increasingly self-aware about your own insecurities and weaknesses. Again from Collins’ book:
“Level 5 leaders channel their ego needs away from themselves and into the larger goal…their ambition is first and foremost for the institution, not themselves”

Leaders don’t create followers by telling them how smart they are. Leaders create followers by inspiring them to achieve things they never previously believed they could (credit to multiple others who have previously articulated this definition of leadership). A leader telling a crowd how smart he is doesn’t inspire followership. It invokes pity. I pity him because I know what those insecurities feel like as a leader. I know what it feels like to look out over a group of people that you are leading and feel the insecurities creeping in: “what do they think of me?”, “do they think I am smart enough?”, “will they follow?”.

I am going to take a guess that Rex Tillerson is probably a scary-smart person and an exceptional leader. I haven’t studied his leadership persona yet, but he was running ExxonMobil, a successful global business with tens of thousands of employees worldwide. I’ll also guess that Rex Tillerson never stood in front of a group of employees at ExxonMobil and said: “I am really smart! Ok?”. He didn’t have to state it. I am sure that Tillerson has, at times, wrestled with himself and his own insecurities. I don’t know a leader who hasn’t. I would also bet that Tillerson has been on a long leadership journey with increasing self-awareness through intensive leadership development and coaching work.

So maybe that’s what our new president needs. A leadership intensive process and a personal leadership coach and that helps him develop self-awareness and grow as a leader and a human being. Even at 70 he is not too old to start the journey.