Leaders Are Readers
By Brian Nixon, Special to ASSIST News Service
ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO (ANS – January 12, 2017)
-- “Not all readers are leaders, but all leaders are readers.” This
quote by Harry Truman has been used by many to advocate the importance
of reading to leadership -- in any given field. Pastor and author,
Warren Wiersbe, summarized it as, “readers are leaders” [1]. But the
question is -- is it true? Are leaders readers? Whether or not we can
validate that great leaders in the past were voracious readers (think of
Queen Elizabeth of England or King Charlemagne of Europe), we do know
that many modern leaders such as Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill,
Teddy Roosevelt, and Martin Luther King, Jr. were readers. And though
I’m sure there are some fine leaders who aren’t consistent readers, we
do know that reading provides many important benefits for the brain.
Research points to the power of reading. According to an article in Cambridge Medicine,
research shows that “the kind of ‘deep reading’ that can sometimes
happen when we lose ourselves in a book can actually make new neural
pathways in our brains” [2]. Reading also helps with attention span,
mental decline, memory, stress, sleep, depression, and a host of other
benefits [3]. Without a doubt reading is good for your health.
But
does it make you a good leader? One way to tell would be to compare the
benefits of reading to qualities of leadership. And to find the best
qualities of leadership one must turn to groups that specialize in
leaders, such as Forbes and Entrepreneur.
According to Entrepreneur,
qualities such as focus, confidence, transparency, integrity,
inspiration, passion, patience, innovation, open-mindedness, and
authenticity help define a great leader [4]. And Forbes lists honesty,
delegating, communication, confidence, attitude, creativity, and
commitment as some of the characteristics [5]. And in an article by Anne
Latham for Forbes, she narrows the qualities down to three: respect, self-awareness, and clarity [6].
It’d
take a brain scientist to correlate the two fields, comparing the
benefits of reading to leadership. Luckily some have done this. In an
article for Harvard Business Review, John Coleman states,
“Reading can also make you more effective in leading others. Reading
increases verbal intelligence (PDF), making a leader a more adept and
articulate communicator. Reading novels can improve empathy and
understanding of social cues, allowing a leader to better work with and
understand others -- traits that author Anne Kreamer persuasively linked
to increased organizational effectiveness, and to pay raises and
promotions for the leaders who possessed these qualities. And any
business person understands that heightened emotional intelligence will
improve his or her leadership and management ability” [7].
Leadership aside, there’s research that shows reading can make you happier as well [8]. In an article for The New Yorker,
Ceridwen Dovey writes, “For all avid readers who have been
self-medicating with great books their entire lives, it comes as no
surprise that reading books can be good for your mental health and your
relationships with others, but exactly why and how is now becoming
clearer, thanks to new research on reading’s effects on the brain. Since
the discovery, in the mid-nineties, of “mirror neurons” -- neurons that
fire in our brains both when we perform an action ourselves and when we
see an action performed by someone else -- the neuroscience of empathy
has become clearer. A 2011 study published in the Annual Review of Psychology,
based on analysis of MRI brain scans of participants, showed that, when
people read about an experience, they display stimulation within the
same neurological regions as when they go through that experience
themselves. We draw on the same brain networks when we’re reading
stories and when we’re trying to guess at another person’s feelings.”
Dovey
continues, “Other studies published in 2006 and 2009 showed something
similar -- that people who read a lot of fiction tend to be better at
empathizing with others (even after the researchers had accounted for
the potential bias that people with greater empathetic tendencies may
prefer to read novels). And, in 2013, an influential study published in Science
found that reading literary fiction (rather than popular fiction or
literary nonfiction) improved participants’ results on tests that
measured social perception and empathy, which are crucial to “theory of
mind”: the ability to guess with accuracy what another human being might
be thinking or feeling, a skill humans only start to develop around the
age of four.”
These
are fascinating facts and revealing research into the influence reading
has on an individual. So it appears that there is weight behind the
statement that “leaders are readers.”
Because
of this, do yourself a favor -- if you’re a leader or not, find a
quality book and read it. You’re health, headship, and happiness may
depend on it. And if all else fails, it will, as one library website
stated, “Seriously damage your ignorance.”
1) On Being a Leader for God
3) http://www.msn.com/en-gb/health/mindandbody/why-reading-is-good-for-the-brain/ar-AAdUrDU or https://www.scribd.com/doc/192848367/What-Reading-Does-for-the-Mind-Anne-E-Cunningham
Photo captions: 1) Readers are Leaders image. 2) Book image. 3) Reading can seriously damage your ignorance. 4) Mark Ellis.
About
the writer: Brian Nixon is a writer, musician, artist, and minister.
He's a graduate of California State University, Stanislaus (BA), Veritas
Evangelical Seminary (MA), and is a Fellow at Oxford Graduate School
(D.Phil.). To learn more, click here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Nixon.
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