The Dilemma of Leadership - What you need now isn’t what got you here

No CEO rises to office because of their public speaking abilities, and nor would we want them to. Leaders rise on the back of functional achievement, but herein lies the dilemma – Whatever role speaking played in the past, for the figurehead leader, exceptional speaking has suddenly become a disproportionate element of success.

 

The job of the leader is to speak, but rarely with the goal of merely transmitting information. The CEO speaks with much higher purposes: to envision employees, to captivate investors, to inspire stockholders, to reassure nervous markets, to engage customers, to persuade governments.

 

Envision, Captivate, Inspire, Reassure, Engage, Persuade.

 

These are difficult goals, in areas where failure often carries a high price. Unconvinced customers, disenfranchised employees, nervous investors, wavering investors, skeptical governments.

 

While some leaders possess the exceptional skills they need to succeed, many more merely ‘get by’, and some display a troubling liability. Whatever your political affiliations, George W Bush and Al Gore were both sub-standard speakers, a fact that was obvious to observers, and painfully exploited by their opponents. In contrast, the oratorical skills of Reagan, Clinton (Bill), Kennedy, Thatcher and Churchill linger in the memory to this day.

 

We make many investments in our leaders but all too often this critical investment is completely ignored. Oratium provides a way to correct this common error.