This document contains a 10 question true/false leadership knowledge test. The questions cover topics such as whether leadership is learned or innate, if it involves getting work done through others, and if changing conditions can influence behaviors. The document provides explanations for each answer and cites leadership experts. It concludes by noting that knowing leadership theories is not enough and that applying them through practice, coaching and goal-setting is important for development as a leader.

1. Do you know how leadership is changing?
Test Your Leadership Knowledge

2. Test your leadership knowledge
Within the last 30 years, leadership has
radically evolved from traditional
thinking.
Unfortunately, the majority of
professionals still act from traditional
assumptions that can cause more harm
than good.
Here’s the question:
Do you think from a traditional or 21st
Century perspective of leadership?

3. 1. Read the statement about
leadership.
2. Ask yourself: Do you agree or
disagree? The answer – True or
Misleading – is on the next page.
3. Read the short explanation.
4. Do 1-3 for each of the 10
statements.
5. After #10, total your correct
responses.
Good luck!
Test your leadership knowledge

4. Leadership is a set of strategic
practices that can dramatically
improve productivity
Do You Agree?
1 of 10

5. Misleading
Maybe leadership can be majestic
and world-changing, but real
leadership happens in the daily
moments.
 James M. Kouzes and Barry Z. Posner1
While leadership can dramatically improve
productivity and…
…while you can have strategies to develop
people in leadership…
… leadership itself is tactical.

6. Do You Agree?
2 of 10
Leadership is a mixture of
learned behaviors and
natural abilities

7. Misleading
Although it's true that some people are
born with greater natural gifts than
others, the ability to lead is really a
collection of skills, nearly all of which can
be learned and improved.
 John C. Maxwell2
Everyone is born with genetic makeup, but
leadership practices are learned behaviors.
Genetics may influence how quickly and
effectively you learn behaviors, but nobody is
born with leadership capabilities.

8. Do You Agree?
3 of 10
Leadership is about
getting things done
through others

9. Misleading (1 of 3)
The art of getting things
done through people3
This is Mary Parker Follet’s management
definition.
Leadership is about helping others develop
mentally and morally.
Not all managers practice leadership, and you
don’t need direct reports to lead.
For more about the leadership definition, read,
“What Is Leadership?” Is the Wrong Question.
4

10. Misleading (2 of 3)
Leadership is a choice. It is not a rank. I know
many people at the senior-most levels of
organizations who are absolutely not leaders.
They are authorities, and we do what they say
because they have authority over us, but we
would not follow them.
And I know many people who are at the
bottom of organizations who have no
authority and they are absolutely leaders, and
this is because they have chosen to look after
the person to the left of them, and they have
chosen to look after the person to the right of
them. This is what a leader is.
 Simon Sinek5

11. Misleading (2 of 2)
Leadership is not about getting people to do
stuff. It’s about getting people to think…
…I believe that what’s going to win in the 21st
Century and in the future is organizations that
allow everyone in their organizations to think.
 L. David Marquet6

12. Do You Agree?
4 of 10
The skill of listening is
often underrated and
misunderstood, and
developing listening
skills is more difficult
than expected

13. True (1 of 4)
Many don’t understand how to listen, and
Grenny et al. may have the explanation…
When a skill becomes automatic, arrested
development can occur.7
Having used listening all their lives, people
often believe that they have reached an
acceptable proficiency. What actually is
happening is that they experience a
developmental plateau.

14. True (2 of 4)
With arrested development, people fail to fully
develop skills, like listening, without realizing
that they aren’t proficient.
Listening seems simple, but it’s more complex
and difficult than believed. Listening:
• Is more than empathy
• Requires integrating skills such as
• Observation
• Clarity seeking
• Summation
• Reflection and evaluation

15. True (3 of 4)
The average speaker talks at a rate of 135
words a minute. But the average listener
comprehends at a rate 400 percent faster.
This means that when you are listening, your
mind unavoidably races ahead of the speaker.
You can't help but think other thoughts and
sandwich in random observations as the
speaker is telling you what she wants, thinks,
or is concerned about.
 Jason Jennings8
I vowed to treat every encounter with every person
on the ship as the most important thing at that
moment.
 Captain D. Michael Abrashoff9

16. True (4 of 4)
We may even believe that we are good
listeners, but what we are often doing is
listening selectively, making judgments about
what is being said, and thinking of ways to
end the conversation or redirect the
conversation in ways more pleasing to
ourselves.
 James C. Hunter11

17. Do You Agree?
5 of 10
Having a managerial
role makes it easier to
practice leadership

18. Misleading (1 of 3)
Having assigned authority can interfere in
leadership practices.
For many managers, it’s easier to rely on
authority and coercion to get things done.
Frequently, the habit of using authority –
something many are more comfortable using
– can be too tempting for the novice
leadership practitioner.

19. Misleading (1 of 2)
Managers who try not to use authority
unnecessarily can regress to using old
authoritative habits without realizing it.
Using authority to coerce doesn’t
complement leadership practices and can
result in causing long-term harm.
At an extreme, authority and power can lead
people away from leadership completely.

20. Misleading (2 of 2)
The more attention leaders focus on their own
wealth or power, they stop acting like leaders
and start taking on more of the attributes of
tyrants... the tyrant leader exists only to
preserve his wealth and power.
 Simon Sinek13
Titles have a smothering effect on leadership.
 Kevin and Jackie Freiberg12

21. 6 of 10
Leadership involves
helping others practice
leadership
Do You Agree?

22. True (1 of 3)
Leadership is not about attracting followers
who merely “follow” a “leader’s” direction.
Leadership is about developing people
mentally and morally, including developing
them on how to lead.
Ultimately, organizations should strive for
leadership at every career level.
This is what L. David Marquet advocates for: a
leader-leader structure.

23. True (2 of 3)
At [the leader-leader structure] core is the belief
that we can all be leaders and, in fact, it's best
when we all are leaders.
 L. David Marquet15
If you develop yourself,
you can experience personal success.
If you develop a team,
your organization can experience growth.
If you develop leaders,
your organization can achieve explosive growth.
 John C. Maxwell14

24. True (2 of 3)
And we've also found that in the best
organizations, everyone, regardless of title or
position, is encouraged to act like a leader.
That's because in these places, people don't
just believe that everyone can make a
difference; they act in ways to develop and
grow people's talents, including their
leadership capabilities.
 James M. Kouzes and Barry Z. Posner16

25. Do You Agree?
7 of 10
Problem solving is one
of the most important
behaviors of successful
leadership teams

26. True (1 of 2)
According to McKinsey and Company,
successful high-quality leadership teams
typically have 4 key behaviors:
1. Solve problems effectively
2. Seek different perspectives
3. Operate with a strong results orientation
4. Be supportive17
The first item involves 2 distinct capabilities:
1. Solving problems
2. Developing others in problem solving
For leadership, you need proficiency with both.

27. True (2 of 2)
Some corporations have made hiring the most
intelligent individuals a core strategy on the
basis that smarter people can solve problems
more quickly than the competition. But that
only works if the organizations can access
that intelligence.
When leaders teach, they invest in their
people’s ability to solve and avoid problems in
the future. It is one of the most power ways
that Multipliers [leaders] build intelligence
around them.
 Liz Wiseman with Greg McKeown18

28. Do You Agree?
8 of 10
Leaving your legacy isn’t
about ego or being portrayed
as a hero – it’s a reflection of
being an accomplished leader

29. Misleading (1 of 2)
Leadership isn’t about you and your
accomplishments. It’s about helping others
develop mentally and morally.
Heroes leave legacies, but…
…leadership differs from heroship.

30. Misleading (2 of 2)
Leadership is not what you achieve in the
moment. Leadership is what others
achieve the moment you leave.
 L. David Marquet19
Legacies aren’t inherently bad things.
Jack Welch and Steve Jobs have legacies
about their CEO accomplishments that have
influenced other CEOs and executives.
Their legacies have nothing to do with how
they practiced leadership.
Legacies have everything to do with their
managerial accomplishments.

31. Do You Agree?
9 of 10
Intimacy builds
trust

32. True (1 of 3)
According to Oxford Dictionaries, intimacy
means close familiarity or friendship.20
Kouzes and Posner cite a study that
compares groups of acquaintances and
groups of friends. The friends:
• Completed 3 times more projects than
the acquaintances
• Performed with 20% more effectiveness
• Experienced 2.5 times more satisfaction
in their roles21

33. True (2 of 3)
[about Southwest Airlines] Employees who
wear masks and avoid the kind of intimacy
that may consider a sign of vulnerability and
weakness don't last very long.
 Kevin and Jackie Freiberg22
The deeper the relationships, the stronger the
potential for leadership.
 John C. Maxwell23
Intimacy is a way to:
• Connect with others
• Improve communications
• Build positive feelings towards others

34. True (3 of 3)
Building trust is a process that begins when
someone (either you or the other party) is willing
to risk being the first to open up, to show
vulnerability, and to let go of control.
Leaders go first.
To become fully trusted, you must be open to
and with others. This means disclosing things
about yourself in order to build the basis for a
relationship. This means telling others the same
things you'd like to know about them - talking
about your hopes and dreams, your family and
friends, your interests and your pursuits.
 James M. Kouzes24

35. Do You Agree?
10 of 10
If you change the
conditions in which others
operate, you often can
change their behaviors

36. True (1 of 3)
There’s a popular belief that you cannot
change people, but you actually can influence
others to change their behaviors.
After reviewing 30 years of change literature,
Grenny et al. discovered that less than 1 in 8
change efforts achieve desired results.
Here’s the problem: Most professionals are
unskilled at influencing change. Typically,
they use only 1 preferred influence technique
to change complex behaviors.
Those accomplished at influencing behaviors
leverage multiple influence techniques.

37. True (2 of 3)
Grenny et al. identify what they call Six
Sources of Influence ™. Here’s what they
discovered:
When combining 4 or more influence
techniques (1 from each of the 6 sources),
you are 10 times more likely to sustain
substantial behavioral change when
compared to using 1 influence technique.
Many professionals responsible for change
spend little time developing their ability to
influence change (arrested development).
Hence why they tend to use 1 influence
technique.

38. True (3 of 3)
To our astonishment, most of the leaders had
used only one or two [influence] methods. Not
to our astonishment, most of their change
efforts had failed.26
 Joseph Grenny, Kerry Patterson, David
Maxfield Ron McMillan, and Al Switzer
We call this ability to create changes in
human behavior influence and the people who
do it influencers. At the end of the day, what
qualifies people to be called “leaders” is their
capacity to influence others to change…25

39. How well did you do?
Your Leadership Knowledge

40. How well did you do?
For your total correct answers, If you scored…
9 – 10 …then you’re knowledgeable
about how leadership is changing
6 – 8 …then you have some awareness
of how leadership is changing
1 – 5 …then you have a traditional
mindset about leadership

41. Here’s a key point (1 of 2)
Knowing everything about leadership isn’t
enough to practice leadership effectively.
Without deliberate practice supported by
feedback, coaching, and goal-setting, few can
transition theory to application.
Imagine 2 novices spending a day practicing
tennis. The first has a coach, but the second
doesn’t. By the end of the day, who do you think
improves the most?

42. Here’s a key point (2 of 2)
Getting people to agree with the principles of
servant leadership is an easy task. Getting
people to change and get the principles into
their game is another matter altogether. The
greater challenge is how to move the principles
from their head to their heart, and from their
heart into making it their habit.
It can be a long journey from head to habit.
Becoming an effective leader is precisely
analogous to becoming an accomplished
musician or athlete. Has anyone ever learned
to swim reading a book?
 James C. Hunter27

43. Want to learn more?
Check out a preview of the Nine
Practices book on Amazon.com.
In this highly praised guide, learn
about how leadership is radically
changing and how you can apply
this at your work and in your
personal life.

44. About Gary A. DePaul, PhD, CPT
Gary A. DePaul has two decades of
experience as a practitioner and
scholar of leadership, has worked
in fortune 500 companies, and
consults with organizations to
improve leadership practices.
Gary speaks at conferences,
companies, firms, associations,
and association chapters.https://www.garyadepaul.com

45. Endnotes1. Kouzes and Posner, The Leadership Challenge, 342-43.
2. Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, 25.
3. Ideas on Management, Mary parker Follett (1868-1933).
4. Photograph source: http://www.management.com.ua/hrm/hrm146-follett.jpg (accessed October 29,
2015).
5. TED, Simon Sinek: How Great Leaders Inspire Action.
6. Marquet, Live Event, Skillsoft Books24x7, 2014.
7. Grenny et al, Influencer, 126.
8. Jennings, The Reinventors, 143.
9. Abrashoff, It’s Your Ship, 44.
10. Kouzes and Posner, The Leadership Challenge, 118.
11. Hunter, The Servant, 104.
12. Freiberg and Freiberg, Nuts!, 303.
13. Sinek, Leaders Eat Last, 140.
14. Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, 249.
15. Marquet, Turn the Ship Around!, xxvii.
16. Kouzes and Posner, The Leadership Challenge, 14.
17. Feser, Mayol, and Srinivasan, Decoding leadership.
18. Wiseman and McKeown, Multipliers, x.
19. Marquet, No Title Facebook Post.
20. Oxford Dictionaries, Intimacy.
21. Kouzes and Posner, The Leadership Challenge, 289.
22. Freiberg and Freiberg, Nuts!, 302.
23. Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, 17.
24. Kouzes and Posner, The Leadership Challenge, 222.
25. Grenny et al, Influencer, 6.
26. Ibid, 292.
27. Hunter, The Servant, xxiii.

46. References
Captain D. Michael Abrashoff. It’s Your Ship: Management Techniques from
the Best Damn Ship in the Navy. New York: Business Plus, 2002.
Claudio Feser, Fernanda Mayol, and Ramesh Srinivasan. Decoding
leadership: What really matters. McKinsey Quarterly, 2015.
http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/leading_in_the_21st_century/decodin
g_leadership_what_really_matters. Accessed January 8, 2015.
L. David Marquet, No Title Facebook Post.
https://www.facebook.com/ldavidmarquet/photos/a.423828260989518.
89519.423471681025176/963470767025262/?type=3. Accessed
October 24, 2015.
Ideas on Management. Mary parker Follett (1868-1933).
http://ideasonmanagement.blogspot.com/p/mary-parker-follett-1868-
1933.html. Accessed October 29, 2015.
James C. Hunter. The Servant: A Simple Story About the True Essence of
Leadership. New York: Crown Business, 2012.

47. References
James M. Kouzes and Barry Z. Posner. The Leadership Challenge: How to
Make Extraordinary Things Happen in Organizations, 5th edn. San
Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2012.
Jason Jennings. The Reinventors: How Extraordinary Companies Pursue
Radical Continuous Change. New York: Penguin Group, 2012.
John C. Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership: Follow Them and
People Will Follow You. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2007.
Joseph Grenny, Kerry Patterson, David Maxfield, Ron McMillan, and Al
Switzer, Influencer: The New Science of Leading Change, 2nd edn.
New York: McGraw Hill Education, 2013.
Kevin Freiberg and Jackie Freiberg, Nuts! Southwest Airlines’ Crazy Recipe
for Business and Personal Success. Austin: Bard Press, 1996.
L. David Marquet, Captain, US Navy (Retired), Turn the Ship Around! A
True Story Turning Followers into Leaders. New York: Penguin Group,
2012.

48. References
L. David Marquet, Live Event: Turn the Ship Around! How to Create
Leadership at Every Level. Skillsoft Books24x7, 2014. http://sp8-
1.skillport.com/skillportfe/main.action#summary/VIDEOS/RW$9227:_ss
_video:65944. Accessed January 10, 2015.
Liz Wiseman and Greg McKeown. Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make
Everyone Smarter. New York: Harper Business, 2010.
Oxford Dictionaries. Intimacy.
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/intima
cy. Accessed October 24, 2015.
Simon Sinek. Leaders Eat Last: Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others
Don’t. New York: Penguin Group, 2014.
TED. Simon Sinek: How Great Leaders Inspire Action.
http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_actio
n. Accessed December 24, 2014.

49. Special thanks
Special thanks to Joel Rodriguez,
Ed.D., for providing valuable feedback
on how to improve this experience.