Last Updated Mar 16, 2010 3:30 PM EDTLinda Hill is the co-chair of the Leadership Initiative at the ...

1. Want to Be the Boss Someday? Teach Yourself to Lead
Last Updated Mar 16, 2010 3:30 PM EDT
Linda Hill is the co-chair of the Leadership Initiative at the Harvard Business School and a former
chair of the Organizational Behavior Department. She's the author of many books, articles and e-
learning programs on leadership and professional development. She spoke with us about how bosses
learn to lead -- and why aspiring leaders need to take their career development into their own hands.
BNET: How do people learn how to lead? What are the misconceptions about the ways people do
this?
Hill: One of the things I had to face as a professor is that people do not learn how to lead at school.
As an institution, our mission is to educate leaders to make a difference in the world, but you don't
learn to lead at school, but rather, on the job, when you're faced with real problems with real
consequences. That being said, by having students in sections that they stay with their entire first
year, we do try to create some experiences from which they can be drawing leadership lessons,
particularly how to lead when you don't have formal authority in a peer environment.
So, what schools really should do for
you is to give you the tools to learn better on the job and to learn from life experience. With that
framework in my head at all times -- which can be pretty humbling because you want to think you
are teaching people what they need to know when they are right there in front of you -- the main
thing I try to get across is that throughout their career, people need to take charge of their own
development. You need to really think through what type of experiences you are going to try to have
professionally, because you can only learn what you get the chance to do. Be very strategic when
you assess a new career opportunity and think about what you are going to be doing on a daily basis.
You need to be forward-looking as you assess this. What trends do you see? Are you developing the
kinds of skills your organization will need a few years down the line?
The other part of this equation is what you get to do is definitely based on who you know. This can
be very frustrating to people because sometimes you don't get access to opportunities. But, unless
they know you, you're not going to get the chance to work on interesting things.

2. BNET: How do you make sure you are
recognizing the opportunities along
the way and drawing the necessary
lessons?
Hill: Yes, just because you are having
an experience doesn't mean you are going to learn from it. It's not by accident that we call
experience "trial and error learning." This goes back to whom you have relationships with. Can you
get good feedback from others about your impact? You need to have a range of different people
around you who will give you insights into yourself and your impact so you can develop over time.
BNET: You've worked with and interviewed literally hundreds of top executives. Did any of them
have interesting approaches as they tried to learn to lead?
Hill: Something I want to emphasize about many of these executives I see is that their exercise of
focusing on their learning agenda is in no way a selfish exercise; they also focus on the way their
organization and the people they work with can benefit. We developed [some educational materials]
a few years ago about Craig Weatherup ,the man who was the top executive of Pepsi North America.
His boss, the CEO of Pepsi worldwide, had essentially taken a year off to study how the great leaders
around Pepsi had been developed and shaped. He also wanted to learn who the best teachers in the
organization were. The CEO of this big global corporation thought that these questions were so
important, he needed to take time off to study them.
Weatherup talked about another experience, when he was sent to Japan in his early 30s to set up
Pepsi Japan. He didn't speak Japanese or know much about the culture. It was a crucible kind of
experience, because there was so much uncertainty. He made a number of missteps. What he
appreciated was that his boss stuck with him. The boss didn't punish him, but tried to be a sounding
board as he worked through what he could do differently the next time. Later, he started to use this
kind of inquiry when he helped people adapt to new roles.
Next week, we'll learn more about how leaders develop and the importance of "managing up."
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