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A leader on the spectrum

epath13

epath13

the Fool.The Magician.The...
V.I.P Member
Just a question... Do you think that a person on the spectrum could become a good leader? Whether you say "yes" or "no", why do you think so? And, btw, by leadership I don't mean dictatorship :) Maybe you've got some examples of leaders with spectrum disorders.
 
I think it would depend on where the person was on the spectrum, what kind of person they are, and what kind of leadership role are they being asked to assume? Is it a formal, officially recognized leadership role, or is it the kind of informal "we are all leaders by example" type?

There are leaders who actively seek to be leaders and then there are leaders who don't seek to be leaders but have the role thrust upon them, say in an emergency or crisis because maybe they are the only calm heads around.

That said, I don't think many people on the spectrum are or want to be natural-born leaders. But there is no reason that with hard work and discipline they couldn't be good leaders.
 
It might depend on the field he's involved in.

I remember back in college and uni when we had our projects running with groups, I usually was appointed leader for rough outlining on planning and all. That went really well. Everyone was happy, hard work paid off and we were done in half the time (and have more free time afterwards).

But... as soon as a system likes to change it up on a weekly/daily basis, at least to me, that's too much change going on and I can't be a decent leader. I'm either a leader all the time, or I'm not a leader all the time. If I have to work with planning, I plan ahead... way ahead.

But that's just a personal experience of mine, regarding "leading" groups.
 
I remember in school, teachers tried to place me in leader positions, I had fun with it if there're not too many responsibilities. I usually got people to do all the work and tried to show that I work hard as well but in reality I didn't :) yeah, I did everything possible to get other people do things that I didn't want to do :) in college I decided right away that I would not agree to be in any kind of leadership position. But the only reason why I didn't want to do it was because I didn't find things that I would have to do important or interesting, so I didn't have any motivation to do the job. But in childhood, I did organize kids to do stuff that I found important or interesting. I got them to play games that I wanted to play. One time tried to start my own little business. A few of my friends and I found a spot in woods (where I wasn't supposed to go :) ) with lots of dock leaves (if you don't know what it is, it's sort of a herb, leaves growing on the ground, tastes sort of sour used in many Russian dishes), so I told them not to tell anyone so we could gather it and sell it on the farmers market. We thought we were going to be rich :) but my parents found out and the plan was blown. Another time I was trying to prevent fires in the woods by spreading flyers that we would have to make ourselves about dangerous behavior. But I didn't think the idea through (the production process). Unfortunately I didn't have any adult support in my ventures so with 1st troubles my motivation usually faded. After my band fell apart I started doubting in my leadership abilities, decided I'm better off by myself. But I always felt that I wanted to do something like that, to organize people to accomplish a common goal. In childhood I didn't even have to have good social skills to do all that stuff, just an idea that others would find attractive and lots of enthusiasm.
so back to the present: now I'm wondering can an adult on the spectrum be passionate enough about something that he/ she would overlook the deficiencies and get people to follow him/ her? ....
so basically it's about a person with a goal leading people... I'll try to see what else I can find out.
 
I have been a leader a couple times in my life. I never felt like a leader, I never felt or put myself above my workers. People who have worked for me said they loved to do so because I work hard with them, and most of all I am fair and honest. They liked how I would explain things and give reasons behind my my/companies actions.

I think if the work environment is not very high pressure and much of your workload can be made into routine (like task1 gets done monday..ect), and the people working for you are good workers, aspies can be very successful. We are fair, and while it may piss off an occasional worker, they often come to see that you don't play favorites, or politics. We can be hard workers, and good teams will want to keep pace with their leader. One rule I live by (and this is not a true statistic, just what I observed) your workers will only work about 70% as hard as their leader. I see many NT leaders who never want to come out of their office, and that often tears apart a good team.

My first leadership position I had was a night time kitchen patrol duty in the army. One night I was asked to do it and I said sure. It meant getting phone usage and pool table, which at boot camp was a big deal, for me it meant I could talk to my mom every night) I was put on pots and pans, the worse sort of jobs. Chemicals, hot water and scrubbing for about 4 hours a night. After the first night the team leader was caught with contraband and lots his KP privilege. I was then made leader. I was saying to myself, why me, the rest have been doing it for days/ weeks. Not one to rock the boat, instead of taking the best/easiest job (which everyone assumed I would do and was fine with it) I stuck to pots and pans. When the chems started working on my hands, and normally that person would rotate off, I kept at it. After breaking a finger and keeping it secret so I would net get held back, I did pots and pans. In the end I had a black and blue ring finger a couple sores and no fingerprints, but I had a team who respected me, not cause my personality, but on my merits.

Long story short, you don't need to be an NT or have great social skills to lead, if you make up for it in ability, merit and fairness.
 
Saragrl said:
I see many NT leaders who never want to come out of their office, and that often tears apart a good team.
Click to expand...
Reminds me of a Dilbert cartoon...
DilbertManagementByWalkingAround_5F00_027E1465.jpg
 
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I think an Aspie is just as good a candidate for leading as another person. Like others, if given a good example and are naturally inclined to try to be just and fair rather than a pushover or dictator, they should be fine.

I'm getting some mild exposure to management at the office since I'll be owning the business in a few years. My boss has set a pretty good example with leniency and firmness, so I'm just trying to copy him and also think back to a lot of my experiences to see if there's anything I can do better. I don't think I can be as passive about some things as he is, I have little respect for one woman who likes to prove her coworkers wrong on something only when she's in front of customers rather than discuss whatever it is with her coworkers in private. That's just dishonorable, shameful, and not really good for business. There is a very delicate line between being honest with your mistakes to customers so they trust you, but not being so honest they think you're incompetent and go somewhere else.
 
Based on the people I've known, on the Aspies I've known, I don't think it's the norm for the average Aspie to be the kind of person who wants to be a leader. Based on the people I've known, I'd think that's a more common ambition among NTs.
As for who can be a good or even great leader? Very few people. Very few. But the people both Aspies and NT I've known have never shown, in their lives or characters, any evidence in favor of either neurological state being more likely to produce someone who is such a good or great leader.
 
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