Crucibles of Leadership by Robert J. Thomas – Great Leaders Are Made of This?

In this rather crowded market of management books on leadership, two things I find intriguing about Robert Thomas’s new title “Crucibles of Leadership”.  First, the concept of an experience-based leader development.  Second, using the medieval alchemists’ vessel – crucible – as an analogy to the defining moments that are capable to transform us.  Can this book deliver what it promises: How to learn from experience to become a great leader?  That depends on how much you can get out from this book that comes in three distinct parts; each part may have a better appeal to a certain group of readers with different learning styles and backgrounds than others.

Part One – Experience Matters

I in particularly enjoy reading the first part of the book, “Experience Matters – But Then What?”.  Having played music as a hobby, I can certainly relate to the author’s analogy to how the artists practice while perform, and perform as though it is part of their practice routine.  And this idea of constantly learning and reflecting upon what we’ve experienced appears to be one of the focal points of the book.

I am also intrigued by how the author identifies different types of crucibles – defining moments that transform our lives in either a positive or negative way – and how different types of crucibles may emerge more frequently in a particular course of our career than the others.  For instance, we are likely to learn from the new unknowns at our younger years than say, setbacks that happen more often during our mid career.  The gems, to me, are the tabulated information throughout this part one of the book on how to benefit from different types of crucibles.  They add much clarity to the case studies illustrated.

According to research, in many fields, it takes ten years of deliberate, intentional practice to take us beyond novice and adept and to achieve the status of expert.  And to be an expert is to be able to adapt, innovate, and to move between genres or to inject originality.  To apply this to leadership development is something I have not previously thought of.  But how?  That is the next part.

Part Two – Personal Learning Strategy (PLS)

Some people may better appreciate this part of the book than others as it is more instructional.  You are asked to self-assess your capabilities in three dimensions: adaptive capacity, engaging others, and integrity and to craft your own PLS using the template provided.  Based on how you see yourself at peak performance within a certain time frame, where you are today, and what motivates you, the PLS prompts you to think of a set of action points to push yourself forward.  This part of the book even contains a timetable to guide you in assessing your progress and to review and amend your PLS periodically.

It seems like hard work, doesn’t it?  Going back to part one of the book, to be an expert require years of deliberate and intentional practice.  Hence, there is no exception to leadership development I believe.  And before we move onto the the last part of the book, how many of you have asked yourself the question: Why lead?  I personally think that author has hit the nail on the head.  Once we know why we want to lead, we know where our motivation lies.

Part Three – The Big Picture

For those who are working in the line of organizational effectiveness as well as at the senior management rank, you may benefit a great deal from this part of the book.  There are interesting case studies on how organizations can benefit from the preparing, deploying, and renewing existing and prospective leaders by means of a more active and creative use of experience.

Since the author Robert J. Thomas is executive director of the Accenture Institute for High Performance Business, I am curious about how PLS is implemented in Accenture, the global consulting company, today.  So I contacted my old friend from Accenture, where I spent a good number of years working as a consultant.  According to my friend, the terminology used internally may be different, but the concept used in his career planning and review is similar.

My personal thought is that though you may not in the position to influence and change how your organization develops leaders, by being aware that there are organizations out there that adopt a more experience-based approach, this may help you to move towards an environment that better suit you, especially when you start to build your own PLS and wish to see it links to an organization’s reward and recognition program.

In Summary

“Crucibles of Leadership” is certainly a book for those who appreciate a structured and disciplined approach to learn from experience.  Even if your current organization may not fully buy into this approach (if it does, all the better), it doesn’t stop you from having your own Personal Learning Strategy and in time to come, you may find yourself a more suitable environment to excel.  And for those who are in the position to enhance the organizational model, this book can be a good reference point.