Is charisma inbuilt or developed?

Author: Iloka Benneth Chiemelie

Published: 10th of June 2014

In the modern business setting, charisma is very important because it helps to enhance the understanding of how people behave the way they do as well as how their behavior can be changed to meet desired outcomes. Charismatic leaders are described as leaders that are capable of influencing the behavior of other people in order to align their attitude towards set goals. Such kind of leaders have high influential power that they deploy through their charming attitudes and behavior. Another form of leadership that is closely related to charismatic leadership is transformational leadership, which is based on changing people’s view about something in order to enhance their overall productivity. However, the question still remain whether people are born with charismatic leadership qualities or such qualities are developed in the course of time.

On a general understanding, one will argue that all non-physical attributes of human are developed are no inbuilt. For instance, a child could be stubborn while living with his parents but developed to become obedient while living in a boarding school (am a clear example of this). If such is the case, one will agree that charisma just like every other non-physical attributes of human is developed and not inbuilt.

As a support, I explored the theory of development and discovered that the way leaders behave is influenced by their environment (De Hoogh et al., 2005; McColl-Kennedy & Anderson, 2002; Schein, 1992); which implies that charisma is developed and not born with. For instance, when a leader enters a demotivated system, the leader can adopt charismatic leadership in order to enhance the motivational level of the system. What is the leader doesn’t have the charismatic qualities? The leader can enroll into a number of training and development programs to develop the needed charisma for enhancing a demotivated system. Thus, it is concluded that charismatic leadership is developed and not inbuilt.

References

De Hoogh, A.H.B., Den Hartog, D.N., Koopman, P.L., Thierry, H. Van den Berg, P.T, Van der Weide, J.G., Wilderom, C.P.M. (2005). Leader motives, charismatic leadership, and subordinates’ work attitude in the profit and voluntary sector. The Leadership Quarterly, 16, 17-38.

McColl-Kennedy, J.R., Anderson, R.D.(2002), Impact of leadership style and emotions on  subordinate performance. The leadership Quarterly, 13, 545-559.

Schein, E. H. (1992). Organizational culture and leadership (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey Bass.