The main difference between level 4 and 5 leaders is that the latter have a participative leadership style.
In his well known book, Good to Great, Jim Collins describes level 5 leadership. Because this idea has become popular, we need to be clear about what it means.
Collins based his views on exhaustive research into a number of businesses that transformed themselves from just getting by to great performers in a short space of time. His research showed that the Chief Executives of such businesses did not match the usual macho image we have of great leaders. They turned out to be humble and modest though very single-minded. The idea of level 5 leadership has been very popular because it makes a virtue out of humility.
Level 4 Leaders
Level 4 leaders have their own visions of what the business needs to do to succeed. They decide on direction and then get people to implement their vision. This is what Collins refers to as "first what, then who." Level 4 leaders are very much in the conventional mode. They may be effective when it is not too difficult to decide what to do, but they struggle in more complex, high tech businesses that compete through rapid innovation. In these contexts, the world is too complex for any one person to be confident of what direction to pursue.
Level 5 Leaders
The reason these leaders are humble is that they see clearly their own limitations in a complex environment. So, instead of promoting their own visions, they get their best people together and grill them with penetrating questions to draw new strategies out of them. Hence the related Collins slogan: "first who, then what." Because Chief Executives can't decide what to do alone, they need the input of a team of smart associates. They get the best "who" into a room and together decide the best "what." This makes them participative leaders.
The essential difference, therefore, is that the level 4 leader provides direction while the level 5 leader is a facilitator who draws ideas for new directions out of others. Level 5 leadership is really a modern version of the participative leadership style that has been around for decades.
The Meaning of Leadership Transformed
This move by Collins seems innocent enough but it must be noted that he has thrown out a very old way of defining leadership. Traditionally, there have been two essential features of leadership. One is that leaders are those people who make it to the top in any group. The second feature is that leaders provide direction. Collins has cast aside the second feature in order to preserve the first. An alternative approach is to do the opposite. This means that the Chief Executives Collins celebrates are really not providing leadership at all. We need to recognize that facilitating a discussion does not become leadership just because the person in charge is doing it. Facilitation is really just a good management technique. The advantage of this way of defining leadership is that we can now say that anyone in an organization or outside it who successfully promotes a new direction has shown leadership regardless of whether that person is in charge or not.
Level 5 Leadership = Management
Collins tells us that his "great" organizations excel at facing reality. We also need to face the reality that the world is now too complex for Chief Executives to provide all the leadership an organization needs. They can provide some, of course, but so can front-line knowledge workers who succeed in promoting new products or services. Complexity means that Chief Executives do in fact need to be good facilitators, but we should recognize that, in so doing, they are wearing a managerial hat, not showing leadership.
This is important because, in our knowledge-driven age, we need all employees showing leadership. By redefining leadership as he does, Collins preserves the status quo that effective Chief Executives must be leaders whatever they do, but the cost is to throw out the essence of leadership which is to show the way, to promote a new direction.
