I’ve been meditating a lot on leadership lately.

On what it means, on how you come to be one, on the leaders I respect and admire. 

It’s not for nothing. I’ve been in a leadership training class at work for almost 6 months now. So it’s a theme that I’m engrossed in regularly. I remember one of the first questions posed to the class of middle and senior managers: Are leaders born or made?

It seemed an obvious answer to me. Leaders are made. It was therefore quite surprising to see an unexpected number of my classmates respond that leaders are born that way. It revealed more than I cared to explore at that time. 

In a different leadership session, with a different group of people, we were asked to bring 2 pictures of leaders who inspired us. I brought a picture of this man. Provocative, yes. But true.

Malcolm has been an inspirational example of leadership for me since I read his autobiography in high school. Primarily because he and his life is a testament that becoming a leader is a process, perhaps a neverending one, but definitely one that will require you to stretch beyond your current boundaries, master a new level of skills and discipline, use that to accomplish great things, and then repeat the cycle again.

In his early life, Malcolm was an orphan, a pimp, a numbers runner, a thief, a convict. When that life had taken him as far as it could, a new life possibility was presented to him. He accepted and became a scholar, an orator, a community organizer, a husband, a father, a hero to some, and a villainous nuisance to others. When he was effectively cast out of that life, Malcolm was forced yet again to create a new life for himself - the first one he would create of his own volition, not just as a reaction to his environment and circumstances. It’s this life that we know the least about, because it was cut short before he could bring his newly defined self into full existence. 

At each stage of his life, however, Malcolm was a leader. He distinguished himself among both lowlifes and high-born with a natural charisma and a willingness to ‘take the weight’. So, then... are leaders like Malcolm born? Or are they made?

We are all born with everything that we need to achieve greatness. But we must be made ready through the experiences life presents us and the ways we respond to them. This is the lesson that Malcolm Little, aka Detroit Red, aka Satan, aka, Malcolm X, aka, El Hajj Malik El Shabazz taught me.

It’s the reason why I brought a picture of him into a corporate classroom, and it’s one of the many reasons that I, and many others will take a few moments of time today to celebrate the anniversary of his birth.

Happy birthday, brother Malcolm.