Is Leadership for You? There's No Shame in Saying "No"

A common critique of the scholarly humanities is that it's a system under which a very small number of tenured and tenure-track faculty turn out a large number of new PhDs every year, thus creating a constantly growing number of aspiring humanistic academics for whom there are no academic jobs available – or, at least, no tenure-track professorial jobs.

But this isn't just a problem in academia – I think it's a problem with American culture generally when it comes to leadership. I have long been uncomfortable with the assumption, which seems pervasive to me, that everyone should aspire to higher and higher positions of leadership – that this represents "growth," and in fact the only meaningful manifestation of growth. That assumption is baked into statements of educational mission that proclaim the organization's goal to turn all of its students into leaders, and into cultural rhetoric that treats leadership as the assumed goal of all self- and professional development.

Obviously, if everyone becomes a "leader" then they'll run out of people to lead. Of course, people can lead in different ways and not everyone who has the qualities of a leader is going to use those qualities in a formal professional role as a manager or administrator. But if everyone who graduates from a university does so with the expectation that he or she is going to be a professional leader, there will be a lot of disappointed people in the workforce.

One possible response to this reality might be to say "Well, we need to create more leadership opportunities." And maybe we do – but we'll never create enough formal, professional leadership opportunities to accommodate everyone who wants them (or even everyone who is qualified to hold them).

What if, instead, we were to take a step back and say "Not everyone needs to aspire to leadership; it's okay to be happy as a follower, if that's where you're most comfortable"?

Let's step back from the macro question, though, and focus more on the issue of library leadership. What I want to suggest today is that just because you work in a library, that doesn't necessarily mean that you need to aspire to being a library administrator or director. If that role sounds interesting and exciting to you, then great – by all means, pursue it. But if it doesn't, don't feel guilty. Most people who work in libraries won't ever direct a library. And there's no reason for them to feel like they should.

If you've been thinking about pursuing library leadership, but you're not positive it's the right thing for you, I would suggest asking yourself some questions that might help you get a better sense of whether library leadership really would be a good fit. These include: