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Why would ambition not be necessary? Shouldn’t every single leader be striving to be better personally and always want their teams to be in a better situation than they were in the year before?
Your second sentence doesn't really have anything to do with ambition. At least not to me
I won several leadership awards, genuinely cared and supported my directs, and was meticulous about the quality and operations of the work and team's output. Several factors influenced why and how I operated, and ambition wasn't a large driver
Boil ambition down to its simplest and it’s the desire to make progress from where you are today. Without having and demonstrating ambition, we stay where we are. And that means we don’t get opportunities to grow into leadership roles (or at least we’ll be waiting a long time before it’s handed to us), while it makes it incredibly hard to lead your team if you can’t provide them with a purpose and a reason for your and their existence - the what we’re here to achieve and why we want to achieve it.
Ambition can be selfish and narcissistic - it can be success/progress at any price, which I would class as being a bad thing. But for a greater good focused on creating something that impacts more than just the leader - it’s critical.
I agree with the article; I think we often think of ambition as being selfish or narcissistic - which is usually toxic for a team - but if the ambition is for the team, it makes all the difference in the world.
I've worked with managers who are driven to just get the job done, and with some who refuse to fire or even mentor under-performers, and neither of those things are conducive to the long-term success of the team.
As a leadership assessor, one of the traits we look for in leaders is “high power” or ambition. The natural tendency to assume leadership responsibility, go after highly visible leadership role/titles, and desire to climb the ladder. We assess this via how the leader describes their career desire + psychometric assessment + 360 survey data.
Ambition isn’t a habit. It’s in you or not. To be an effective leader, you need to be ambition. Both in support of your own goals but in pursuit of helping the organization achieve its goals.
Every leader I’ve ever met, worked for, or worked with was an ambitious individual in their respective field.
I would consider ambition absolutely necessary in a leader. Sometimes you see portrayals of someone as a reluctant leader, but I never take that too seriously. If you're reluctant you wouldn't be there. I suppose because the word ambition has so many various connotations, people avoid talking about it. But it's essential.
I agree ambition is necessary. I also believe one can be a reluctant leader.
For the first, ambition is a hunger, a drive, to push forward. It can show in a positive way, which encourages growth in the team and empowers. It can also show in a negative way, with narcissism and shoving others down to elevate oneself.
And reluctance to take lead can come from several sources. You can be ambitious and hold yourself to a high standard while also preferring to work in the background or find someone else to galvanize behind. In that case what tends to happen is that you end up pulling others along with you (leading them) because of your personal kinetic inertia.
You can have an experience where taking lead burned you but you still find yourself stepping up. Or you can have someone who doesn’t believe in themselves but still inspires others.
I definitely think that it is. Especially as a woman because it seems like being ambitious is somehow frowned upon. If we work too many hours we are bad moms, we can't be driven and have a family. But every leader I know had to be ambitious to get where they are today.
The problem with ambition is that many say they have it but many don’t. Your ambition cannot be measured. You may have more ambition to do and be better while someone else with less ambition does it better. I would not include ambition on a resume. There’s nothing wrong with being ambitious. It’s just not a resume worthy attribute.
Ambition can be measured. We assess ambition using Hogan Assessment's HPI. By combining a psychometric assessment of ambition with a 360 survey, candidate interview, and review of the candidate's career history (including motives), ambition, or lack thereof, becomes readily apparent.
https://www.hoganassessments.com/blog/its-time-to-stop-vilifying-ambition/