they seem sort of quaint—and frankly, out of touch. Back then, we agreed that leaders could be born or made. We were also familiar with the American ideal of the “self-made”—our society still loves stories about determined boot-strappers who came from nothing and accumulated a ton of dough, a lofty title, or both. But let’s be clear. We were never really talking about something we need more than ever today: self-made leaders. Instead we were talking about self-made billionaires, self-made entrepreneurs, self-made CEOs, self-made NBA and NFL all-stars.
People still go from nothing to something out of nowhere, even overnight. Take Mark Zuckerberg, whose Wikipedia blurb identified him as the “world’s 2nd youngest self-made (my italics) billionaire” in 2012. Zuckerberg is also a self-made innovator. As a college kid, he invented one of the most compelling capabilities of our new century, not to mention the world’s most valuable social network. Still, writing about the 2010 movie The Social Network, The New York Times columnist David Brooks took “the character loosely based on Mark Zuckerberg” to task for being “without social and moral skills” largely because he was a product of a “culture reticent to talk about social and moral conduct.”
More recently, the real Zuckerberg is making headlines for what by all accounts appears to be an authentic journey toward becoming the type of leader our companies and world so desperately need. As some detractors called for Zuckerberg to step aside when Facebook’s new stock faltered in 2012, he gave a public interview re-committing to running a “mission-based company”; asserted that his number one priority is Facebook’s “great team”, one inspired by “building something that’s worthwhile.” Early in 2013, the Employees’ Choice Awards named Facebook the #1 Best Company to Work for in 2013. The latest headlines about Zuckerberg’s