Your Talent And Character Are…
A Leader Needs To Understand The Difference Between Talent And Character
Your talent and character and the talent and character of those that you lead is extremely important when it comes to many things. If you personally as a leader lack talent your character can make up for it to some degree. If you have a lot of talent and poor character the end result usually end up to not be a positive one. The truth is that we all have talent and character that can be used for good or bad. But what a leader must understand more than anything else is that one is the anchor to the other. I will unpack what I mean by that in this post so keep on reading to see how talent and character differ.
Talent
As noted in the opening of this post we all have talent in certain areas whether it be in academics, sports, or anything in between. Talent can open up many doors of opportunity, especially if your talent over shadows others with the same talent. In Strengths Finder 2.0 author Tom Roth argues that in order to truly have a strength you need to invest in your natural talents to develop them into strengths. He provides an example about talent and character. The example is about Rudy, the small feisty walk on football player who ended up earning a spot on the Notre Dame football team. Roth argues that his limited natural talent would only take him so far in football, which I agree with. But what he missed to call out is that Rudy’s character was his strength and his fearless attitude, work ethic, spirit, dedication, and never say die attitude were his natural talents that manifested into strengths and that is why he was able to accomplish what he did. Rudy had both talent and character that inspired his teammates and coaches to let him play a few snaps. He showed great personal leadership to achieve his dream. We all can be inspired by his efforts and successful leadership.
Character
We all must have character. Strong character is about integrity, strong moral ethics, doing what is right, humility, honesty, credibility, trust, the list can go on and on. A leader cannot in anyway lack character when leading or attempting to lead. Character is and should be your anchor to your actions. History shows us great examples of character. It also shows poor examples of character. From endless scandals involving politicians, to professional athletes who possess amazing talent being imprisoned, character is not a negotiable.
Talent And Character
I am going to say this next sentence twice to hopefully have it sink in. Talent is a gift, character is a choice. Talent is a gift, character is a choice. Talent and character are rooted together, they are interdependent. You can have all the talent in the world but with no character you will never realize the full potential of your talent. You can have the strongest character in the world but without talent you will have a very low ceiling in terms of what you can accomplish. Talent and character go hand in hand and when one slips the other suffers. Character however is the center piece, talent comes next. All leaders need both talent and character and also need to work at strengthening both of them on an ongoing basis. People will not willingly follow a leader who lacks talent and they absolutely will not willingly follow a leader who lacks character. Would you in your right mind?
Closing Thoughts On Talent And Character
I have seen a lot of talented leaders who sorely lack strong character. I have also seen leaders with strong character but lacked to turn their talents into true strengths. Talent and character are what you make of them. You can sit on your natural gifts and fuzzy character and hope for the best or you can leverage your talent and character to bring you to new heights as a person and as a leader. What do you think about talent and character? Do you think a leader can thrive without talent and character being interdependent?
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These are some great points about character and talent. Both are essential components when leading. Reaching your leadership potential requires both of these things.
Thanks for the comment Dan, both are critical for all leaders to excel
James