Discover the authentic leadership character

But not many discover their leadership characteristics and build the empowerment process to bring out the innate potential.

Many executives, being parents, like to take my advice on choosing the right path for their children. I always ask them, "[Your child] has many skills but which one is supported by an innate drive?" The right skill with the right innate drive is the key for strategic growth.

The same principle is also true in an organisation when you try to find the right path for your team. Many organisations just promote good managers but fail to nurture leaders. They forget to let them practice hearing the insight of the heart.

I organised "The Leader Of Tomorrow" camp for a leading global company that wanted to provide a quality leadership programme to its super-VIP customers. Twenty families joined the programme. We set up two camps. One for the parents and another for the children, who were about 15- to 18-years-old.

In the children's camp, we taught them how to draw a picture of who they want to be when they grow up. We let them share their deep-seated desires with their peer group. And encouraged the group to ask tough questions - "why, why, why?".

At the same time, we taught parents not about intelligence quotient but about emotional quotient, especially in the area of listening with their heart to discover the true leadership character of their child.

One family shared an enlightening experience about how it discovered its son's authentic leadership character. This family is one of engineers. But when the youngest son presented his dream of being a cartoonist, his father almost had a nervous breakdown.

He patiently listened to the "what, why and how" of his son's thoughts. After that, the man changed his parenting paradigm from "telling his son what to do" to "being the wind beneath his son's wings" to help his child craft his inspiration in developing his skills and turn his vision into reality.

Kris Ruyaporn is the chief executive of Asia Pacific Innovation Centre.