Hello from Belfast in Northern Ireland – we’re here for a special WHYS on Tuesday with around 100 young people from all over the world who are here for ‘Transatlantic Network 2020′. In true WHYS style we asked them what they’d like to talk about and here you can help us decide, Nelson in Nigeria is moderating across the four suggestions tonight. We’ll be uploading photos on Flickr and you can follow their ideas on Twitter. This is the first suggestion from the young people who want to be the leaders of tomorrow.
TN2020 participant Maire O’Neill from Donegal in Ireland asks can you train someone to be a leader or is it a natural instinct? Arturo Ortega from Los Angeles asks if experience is overrated?
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Environment is more important than genetics ie. nurture is more important than nature.
Yes, leadership can be trained eg.Armed forces.
If someone comes from a prominent family who are in a position of leadership they observe and inculcate the qualities of leadership at an earlier age plus they are deferred to automaticaly and their confidence is boosted,probably they also a get better education.
Hi, ths fascinating, I thnk its th best explanation. Kenya.
Leadership is a collection of personal traits. Some people have the required traits at birth and appear as natural leaders. Others have to spend the early part of they’re career find what they lack in the collection and learning those behavious. So yes, leaders can be born, but that is not to say you can’t teach yourself the skills.
Environment plays a key role in shaping personality, and thus the potential for leadership. Childhood experiences and early exposure to responsibility are major factors in an environment that develops and/or fosters the growth of leadership ability.
From experience, yes some people just grow up right and end up with the right mental equipment to be leaders, but that doesn’t mean at all that leaders can’t be trained.
We train people to be leaders all the time, anyone can be one, all it takes is encouragement and belief in oneself and ones vision
Todays is difficult to say leaders are born, because most of our leaders comes to power by force and many lost their lives under their regime. That means these leaders are created by the people who voted for them and later they killed those who voted for them; these are not leaders these are monsters.
Southern Sudan /Juba.
hello everyone,
Well i do think that to some extent leaders are born but its not al
Leadership is an inplanted ingredient to oneself to compliment the inhabited visiion. One is able to automatically become a leader when s/he has the burning desire and responds effectively to the mentoring and nurturing opportunities at hand.
Magoola Moses
Kampala- Uganda
hello everyone(my last post was not complete),
Well i do think that to some extent leaders are born but its not always is it true.
For example,Obama seems to be a born leader,McCain on the other hand seems to be a born ‘Fighter’.
Thankyou
Abhinav
I think there are certain personality traits that make a person a natural leader. I also think that people can push themselves and become leaders through their experiences…
Leaders are not exactly born. But the making of a leader begins with their upbringing from the family through early school and beyond which makes some people appear as “natural leaders” even before being into positions of leadership. This means if you are young and you intend to become a leader, start practicing some qualities of leadership right away before you are put into a position of leadership.
Bright Molande (Malawi)
based at University of Essex
I hope not. Can you imagine the next wave of “must haves”? Designer babies.
Doctor: Hello, may I take your oder?
Patient: Yes, I’ll like a baby with green eyes and dark hair, type a personality and I’ll pay extra for the president gene.
Doctor: We’re out of president’s gene’s until 2050. Would you settle for a senatorial or ceo gene?
i bloody well hope so…..i mean the idea of a gentically designed test tube baby leader factory is not to an appealing one. maybe they are space aliens…..
I don’t even want this topic to be discussed because if we finally weigh on the point leaders are born, some autocratic African leaders will settle upon that to rest in power for ever since ‘God has ordained them with the talents to lead’.
A leader is merely a person whom a group of peers have chosen to follow. Through good decisions or a combination of character traits, he/she has built enough credibility so that the other members trust his/her decision and willingly follow. But a leader is only as good as his/her last decision so, no a leader is not ‘born.’
Completely unrelated:
I wish Ms. Pelosi brought an air horn and dunce cap to Congress every day with her. The squabbling the senators engage in is like 1 level above pre-school. I say that if the leaders of this country choose to act like kindergardeners, they should be treated like such. Pull down their pants and spank them, or send them on time-out until they’re ready to behave like adults.
“Hello from Belfast in Northern Ireland,… Are leaders Born?”
Is that question in reference to that “Black” Irish candidate, Brock O’Bama?
Um, how else would they get here? I think they are probably born—yes.
I don’t even know what a leader is anymore. Apparently George Bush is a leader. Was he born that way?
I think if we are talking about politicians specifically, it depends on the country and the quality of the voters to determine what we mean by a leader or a ‘good’ leader.
What I mean by ‘quality of the voters’: If you take a group of free intelligent thinkers, the person who will lead them is going to be very different from the person who will lead a nation of average people.
It doesn’t take much to be a leader of a nation. There really isn’t much substance to it. You just need someone who can herd sheep—a Border Collie can even do it!
P.S. I guess there is hope for Sarah Palin… .
@ Scott
Re: Hope for Sarah Palin
Yes, yes, there is!
She’s got alot going for her! 
Are you talking about political leader? If so,yes really political leaders are born. Crappie leaders snatch leadership by force or crook and then they spend all their life giving other people headache.
You can tell a real political leader from a group of people. Look at Obama, he probably is the only real political leader in America today. tomorrow some one else may emerge.
Any way this is my opinion as an intellectual.
I have been refraining from comments about Palin because I initially thought that she had the schooling (in Journalism) and experience (as a sports announcer) to hold her own both as a woman and a politician, and ought to be given the opportunity to give it her best shot at representing Conservative Republicans as McCains pick for Vice President.
But from her interviews and the comments from the Very Conservative Kathleen Parker (name ?), I just have to say that there are far better Conservative Republican women who are already very well experienced in politics and who could represent and more importantly debate their opposition.
Way back when I was a kid and helping my uncle milk my Grandmas cows there was a saying about some cows that they were so stupid that they stepped on their own “teats”. Only they didn’t pronounce it “teats”.
Take from that what you will.
A true leader is self made yet there are those called leaders that are not leaders at all but puppets of the powers at hand.
Leaders are born but not always elected. Bush is not a leader, he is a businessman. America deserves what it has gotten by voting him in (twice). Leaders should have a vision for the future, Bush never presented one, McCain hasn’t either, but Obama has. As an American Obama supporter, I can only hope that we have come to our collective senses.
I want representatives, not leaders. They should do what the people wants, and not out of self interest like our current politicians do. This just attracts narcissists to office, people who want power and attention.
wow Scott M, you nailed it!
“What I mean by ‘quality of the voters’: If you take a group of free intelligent thinkers, the person who will lead them is going to be very different from the person who will lead a nation of average people.”
@ Steve
You know what, Steve, I think I’m going to agree. We elect representatives that reflect our interest and they should remember that.
@ The Redsox fan
RE: Obama is a “god like” figure
LOL– Whatever gets people to vote for Obama, I will go along with… LOL
yes, that “god like” thing was a real cringer.
Any body can be a leader!!!!! There should not be any family background, in any case what family backgrounds did current and previous leaders have?
If only one can have the mandate to govern, care and look at the world as a free place, environment and a democratic atmosphere, then he or she can be a leader.
Its about democracy,freedom, peace and nature.
What makes a leader in anycase? I pray leaders have good advisors and not a minority of a system of governance. Its the people and not individuals. My period ends!!!!11
True leaders are responsible at all the times;born leaders and verifies their potentials like what i believe to be in me;though very young at college level.
Morogoro,Tanzania