The United States at 250: What the American Experiment Can Teach Us About Leadership

In 1776, the founders of the United States of America wrote that a government derives its power from the consent of the governed. What core leadership principles are necessary for a successful democracy? The characteristics of effective leaders apply well beyond governments to every kind of organization.

On episode 153 of The Science of Personality, cohosts Ryne Sherman, PhD, and Blake Loepp observe the 250th anniversary of the United States by exploring what the American experiment can teach us about democratic leadership principles.

Before it’s possible to discuss principles of leadership, we must first define leadership correctly. So, what does it actually mean to lead?

Core Democratic Leadership Principles

At Hogan, we distinguish between leadership emergence and leadership effectiveness. Emergent leadership has to do with holding leadership titles and seeming leaderlike. Effective leadership means the ability to build and maintain a high-performing team. Thus, effective leaders serve their team and work for their team’s success.

“Key characteristics that show up among effective leaders are competence, humility, integrity, and judgment. These haven’t changed in thousands of years,” Ryne said.

• Competence concerns understanding the organization and the work to be done.
• Humility concerns sharing power and recognition. Humble leaders acknowledge the work of their teams rather than taking sole credit. They don’t seek their own gain but that of their organization.
• Integrity concerns building trust. Someone with integrity does what they say they’ll do. They also reward and punish people’s behavior equally. If a leader rewards one team member but does not reward another for the same behavior, the team may not trust the leader.
• Judgment concerns making sound decisions. This includes a decision-making process that is fair and rational. Someone with good judgment can also acknowledge mistakes and correct a decision.

Effective leaders display these characteristics no matter the size and scope of their organization, whether a youth sports team, a multinational corporation, or a federal government. At the government level, however, the stakes for success or failure are very high. They can easily include life or death. “The leaders of the biggest organizations have the most consequences for the most people,” Ryne said.

Humility

Within groups, people compete for status and its benefits. High status therefore tends to attract people who prioritize individual benefits rather than good of the group. This phenomenon relates directly to emergent leaders who want to gain leadership positions. George Washington, the first US president, was not an emergent leader. Not only did he decline to hold the title of king, but he also chose to step down as president after just two terms. Washington’s behavior as a leader conveyed benefits to the group, not to himself.

Ryne explained the impact of Washington’s decision not to run for president for the third time: “He thought, ‘If I stay on any longer, this is creating the same system of monarchy that the US colonists rejected.’” Despite encouragement to remain in office, Washington set an incredible precedent for letting go of power. Nearly all US presidents after him voluntarily stood aside after serving two terms until a constitutional amendment officially capped the presidential term limit.

Balancing Ambition and Humility in Democratic Leaders

Washington’s example raises an apparent paradox. It can seem counterintuitive to select leaders who are reluctant to lead. “A critical component [for effective leadership] is being both ambitious and humble at the same time,” Ryne said. “Oftentimes those two are at odds with each other.”

Emergent leaders are ambitious for their own gain. Effective leaders are ambitious for the success of the group. “They prioritize the group over their own needs and wants,” Ryne said. Someone ambitious and humble often seems hardworking and motivated on behalf of others. Abraham Lincoln, the 16th US president, was a hardworking, driven leader who formed a cabinet of political rivals rather than those who were loyal to him personally. Lincoln’s approach illustrates what group-oriented ambition looks like in practice. By surrounding himself with people who would oppose rather than confirm his thinking, he challenged his viewpoint to meet the needs of the country.

How Democratic Systems Select Better Leaders

Lincoln’s team of rivals raises a bigger question: how should democratic systems select leaders in the first place? Selection by primogeniture (the right of the firstborn to rule) informed many types of social and political groups throughout history. This method is problematic because it rewards leaders for genetic selfishness, keeping the benefits of status for their descendants.

In contrast, democratic governments—while still fallible—are designed to select the leader who is best, not necessarily the one who is most charismatic. “History tells us that selecting leaders based on their qualities, skills, effectiveness at leading, and ambition for the group is best,” Ryne explained. “Those people tend to be pretty humble.”

Integrity

Selecting ambitious, humble leaders solves only part of the problem. Leaders must also demonstrate integrity once they hold power. In the context of personal ethics, integrity is about being true to your word. In the context of democratic leadership principles, integrity broadens to include honoring the rules that limit your authority. US history is full of elected officials who worked to change the scope of their office, despite the original design of the US government to provide checks and balances on power.

Ryne observed that within the last few decades, the US executive branch has assumed more power from the judicial and legislative branches. For instance, only Congress, the legislative branch, has the power to declare wars. Nevertheless, both democratic and republican presidents have involved the country in many conflicts without a formal declaration of war from Congress. Rather than an executive leader who seeks more power, Ryne said, “We need a president who says to Congress, ‘You’ve got to write some laws to limit my power even further, and I’ll sign them.’”

Integrity in a democracy isn’t only about resisting the pull of power while in office. It also means honoring the outcome when voters take that power away. John Adams, the second US president, showed this type of integrity when he lost the presidential election in 1800. For the first time in US history, a president lost, accepted the result, and facilitated a peaceful transfer of power. Constitutional continuity was more important to Adams than remaining in office.

When Democratic Leaders Lack Integrity

Although there are a lot of positives in democracy, it’s not without flaws. “It’s so difficult to distinguish between emergent and effective qualities,” Ryne said. “Humans tend to vote for whoever provides the most compelling vision, not necessarily who has the most integrity.” Given algorithm-driven newsfeeds, widespread misinformation, and confirmation bias, it seems even harder to evaluate humility and integrity of political candidates.

When elected leaders lack integrity, institutions must absorb the cost of their characters. Lyndon Johnson, the 36th US president, is widely viewed as narcissistic, largely because of his habit of dominating conversations. That same trait also made him an intensely persuasive leader. During his tenure, Congress passed major legislation he supported. Johnson’s record shows that the cost of a leader’s character isn’t always straightforward. As Ryne noted, assessments of his legacy are mixed. While some credit his programs with great results, others call them disastrous. Depending on how big the leader’s decisions are, it can have enormous costs for the organization.

Judgment

A leader with integrity respects the limits of their authority. But what happens when a leader accumulates enough power that those limits begin to erode? If power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, or so the adage goes. The Hogan view on power is not that it corrupts but that it reveals.

When someone holds power, they tend to stop self-monitoring. Complacency may bring out derailers, which are behaviors that can hinder success. How those behaviors impact a leader’s decision-making depends on the degree to which they continue to self-monitor. “We don’t necessarily think that it’s power that corrupts the person. That person always had those tendencies in them whether they showed up or not,” Ryne said.

In general, society cannot trust a leader who has unchecked power in perpetuity. No one person can make the best decision every time. “Decisions have to be made by the collective through a congressional voting process that’s often slow,” Ryne said. “There’s a reason it takes a long time to pass a bill into a law in the United States. It’s not that everybody has to agree, just that there’s enough agreement to go forward.”

Leadership in the Next 250 Years

The 250th anniversary of the US brings into focus the importance of leadership for preserving democratic institutions for the next 250 years. The core leadership principles of humility, integrity, and judgment will remain a priority.

While acknowledging that democratic processes have not always resulted in the best leaders across the different branches of government, Ryne said that getting the right people in charge is the most essential issue: “I am persuaded that the reason the United States of America has lasted as long as it has is because of the people in charge.”

Listen to this conversation in full on episode 153 of The Science of Personality. Never miss an episode by following us anywhere you get podcasts. Cheers, everybody!

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