About Leadership.so

I'm writing this quarterly long-form newsletter as a meditation on what I'm learning about the science of leadership. Over the years, I've felt that the popular literature on leadership has become increasingly snake-oily, with articles espousing learning paths that often have no basis in evidence.  I've grown to become wary of these write-ups, especially when I see content full of platitudes and jargon, completely devoid of any actionable advice. The ubiquity of this low-quality but free content, disproportionately affects consumers from the lowest income brackets.

I'm wondering, instead, if the path to approach learning about leadership, and how to become a better leader, is to turn to the most ancient way humans have learnt – through reading stories and reflecting on them. Combining the collective wisdom of those who have come before us and have charted a path through some of the most turbulent times in history seems to me, to be the surest way of gleaning real pearls of wisdom. Even when such stories are not completely accurate, in fact, especially when they are not accurate, we have a lot to learn, because then, we learn what these leaders wanted us to know, about what ought to be rather than what was.

Stories inform, but evidence confirms. With this in mind, I've also tried to understand, to the extent my quant skills allow me to do so, current research knowledge in leadership theory and practice. I believe that combining the wisdom of collective human experience across millennia, along with the power of theoretical and empirical science is where knowledge is at its most useful. And so that is what I attempt in as clear a manner as possible, for myself, so that I can come back to these notes and learn from them without spending too much cognitive load. I hope this approach is useful to you, the reader as well.

About Me

Hi there, I'm Srikanth. Through the course of my career as a teacher and then as a management consultant and now as an internal strategist, I've had the opportunity to experience firsthand, how important leading and the leader are to goal success. In this newsletter, I hope to synthesize what I really wish I had with me, when I began my journey towards entrepreneurship - relevant and immediately usable tools and an understanding of the underlying science of leading, to become the leader I want to be.