The Battle of Old and “Green” Leaders

Source: http://meanspirited.net

Are older “masters” always a better choice than the younger “greenies”? In today’s society, leaders are being perceived differently according to their age and, therefore, skills and experiences.

As the article “Age and Leadership: The Wisdom of Elders and Elephants” published in Psychology Today website emphasizes, whereas most political leaders around the world “achieve their position in office when they are well in their forties”, many of the world’s best known revolutionary leaders “were considerably younger when they came to prominence”. Psychology Today is a reliable source as it has gathered renowned psychologists, academics, psychiatrists and authors in their field (over 750 of them) to contribute their thoughts and ideas on the lives of people.The magazine was first launched in 1967 and continues to be successful, which makes it clear that the website serves as a reliable source of information. In this brief essay, I argue that whenever groups encounter problems that require some knowledge about norms, values and old ways of doing things, they would most likely endorse an older leader. Young leaders come into play when old knowledge no longer applies, and people are confronted with new challenges and have to rely on new information.

• To start with, it is well known that the older the person is or looks like, the more other individuals tend to trust him or her. This can be illustrated by the example shown in the article which points out that the U.S. society has been choosing presidents that come from the older generations. One simply needs to look at examples such as President Bush who took his office when he was 64 years old, President Clinton who was 46 years old, President Bush who was in his 54th year and, finally, President Obama who was 47 years old when he captured the opportunity to work in the Oval Office. As I have seen happen quite often, older leaders are chosen when particular skills and experiences are needed, or, as the article points out, “age can be seen as a cue for wisdom” and “whenever groups encounter problems that require some knowledge about norms, values and old ways of doing things”, people will be more likely to choose an older individual.

• The concept of choosing older people as leaders can be related to the wildlife situation as in elephants’ world “the oldest individual in the herd, the matriarch, leads the herd across the desert to a waterhole that no one knows about except her”. This is quite logical, as the herd needs to follow that member who knows what he is doing if they want to survive. More importantly,the reflection of this situation can be seen quite easily in the "real life" of humans- everyone tries to follow that person who looks the most mature and ready to lead the crowd. 

• On the other hand, one needs to consider the famous revolutionary leaders as well, such as Fidel Castro, Napoleon and Emiliano Zapata who all started to rule when they were in their 30-ies. In fact, as the research studies indicate, “whereas the majority of CEOs of the 500 Fortune companies are between 50 and 59 years old, entrepreneurial leaders tend to be considerably younger, with more than half of them being younger than 35”. These results, however, are not surprising, as it is known that people tend to choose younger individuals when there is a situation that needs change, such as a government overthrow, instead of dealing with an older leader who might not have the same fresh ideas and enthusiasm as the younger candidate.

Finally, it is clear that people prefer the younger looking leaders for change and the older looking leaders for stability. Even though these situations might look very different, in the real world every single business or company needs to establish a certain balance that would allow it to be more successful in the future. That is, the enthusiasm of young and “fresh” leaders should not overwhelm the wisdom of the old “wolves” that are, in fact, essential to the overall business life as well.

Questions that I will be trying to answer in the future research:

1. What are the factors that could influence the person and make him a better leader?
2. What methods do leaders use in order to be more productive, reach better results and, therefore, be more successful?
3. Does the country the person lives in influence the level of success he or she can have as a leader?