Every organization, group, and relationship is subject to the tyranny of self-interest. Organizations prosper when leaders inspire people to transcend their own self-interests and sacrifice for the common good. After thousands of years, we should have mastered this most central skill. We have not. After many decades of scientific work on leadership, our professional schools should instill this skill in every student. They do not. Most professional schools claim to teach leadership but totally ignore the engine of leadership: the internalized commitment to moral power that makes influence transformational. Assumptions of normal organizing in professional education and practice hinder the development of transformational leadership.
Reflection
Why do we not master the central skill?
What does our leadership training instill in our people?
What would our leadership training change if the central purpose was to transform self-interest?
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Organizational and economic incentive structures do not reward transcending self-interests and sacrificing for the common good. The design and metrics of many professional schools, as well as any institution competing for resources, facilitate competition and self-interest, not common good.