Origins

Even among other topics in the social sciences leadership is unique as an academic discipline. This unique nature is reflected in the greater influence that the conditions that surrounded the origins of our leadership theories has on these theories when compared to the influence of leadership itself. Unlike other areas of academic study leadership is not a “standalone” concept or entity. The study of leadership did not begin with the discovery of leadership, as is the case with other areas of academic interest, but with interest in the outcome of leadership.

The first students of leadership were interested in determining what it was that enabled one individual to control the behavior of a larger group of individuals. It is possible that for some the interest was entirely academic. More than likely these individuals were interested in exerting the same level of control over others. They hoped that by studying the characteristics and behavior of those individuals they could replicate their success or avoid their failures.

It is no accident, then, that great man theories lie at the heart of all our leadership theories. We still call them leadership studies but DeGrosky (2011) has pointed out that the ancients who first made this their study -- individuals like Plato, Aristotle, Sun Tzu, Seneca, Lao Tzu and others -- examined the lives of the effective leaders of their time. Naturally, the first studies focused on emperors, kings and generals and the nations and armies over which they exercised their power and control. From these individuals they drew inferences as to the nature of leadership.

Many improvements have been attempted since those great man theories were first developed, but the focus on the individual was never lost, even when we moved from viewing leadership as a one-dimensional, internal and individualistic process and recognized that leadership is a relationship between individuals and not a characteristic of the solitary leader. Leadership continues to be viewed as an invention of human beings.