Solving leadership challenges in Africa in philip kotler’s leadership phenomenon

1. SOLVING LEADERSHIP CHALLENGES IN AFRICA: A REFLECTION FROM
PHILIP KOTLER’S LEADERSHIP PHENOMENON.
1
UchennaNwankwo, 2Udochukwu Ogbaji and 3Dr. (Mrs) Rose Nwankwo
1
National Salaries and Wages Commission,
Abuja, Nigeria.
Email:uche77ng@yahoo.com
2&3
Department of Public Administration,
Federal Polytechnic, Oko
Anambra State Nigeria
Email: udojoel77@yahoo.ca
Abstract
African leadership and development challenges are as complex as they are multi- faceted. Their
resolution ultimately depends on the capacity of people to understand what is happening
around them, both internally and externally. They must possess enhanced ability to be able to
take appropriate steps and cope with a variety of problems surrounding them. The millennium
began with an optimistic mood, which even extended to the adoption of ambitious goals for
Africa’s development. Fuelling the optimism was heady economic growth and development,
driven forward by democracy and democratization and the endorsed Millennium Declaration
that marked the culmination of decades of efforts by the United Nations. Ten years later, this
optimism to address root causes of poverty, ignorance, diseases, environmental degradation
and other chronic ‘socio-political and economic problems’ suffers stagnation and despair. The
failure of the leadership class has continually become a stormy threat to this perceived
optimism in Africa. At a time of this lowering expectation, it is important not to succumb to
fatalism. It seems so obvious that it is worth reconsidering solving the leadership challenges in
Africa, drawing from Philip Kotler’s leadership phenomenon. This paper argue that leaders do
not need charisma to be effective; rather they are friendly, approachable, and caring; pursuing
people oriented goods as well as run open- door policies. This paper adopts content analysis,
personal opinions and observations, commentaries and editorials on the concept of leadership.
This paper derives reflection from Philip Kotler’s views on leadership and situates it with the
leadership question in Africa. Also, this paper carries out an unsentimental analysis to reveal
the nature and challenges of leadership in Africa as well as proffering practical approaches to
solving leadership challenges in Africa, in order to elevate the optimism and enhance the path
to development by Africans for Africans.
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2. Introduction
In the dawn of the 21st century, the emerging African paradigm reflects a need for democratic
capacity building – one that invites diverse communities into a participatory process with
leadership. The millennium began with an optimistic mood, which even extended to the
adoption of ambitious goals for Africa’s development. Fuelling the optimism was heady
economic growth and development, driven forward by democracy and democratization and the
endorsed Millennium Declaration that marked the culmination of decades of efforts by the
United Nations. Ten years later, this optimism to address root causes of poverty, ignorance,
diseases, environmental degradation and other chronic ‘socio-political and economic problems’
suffers stagnation and despair. The failure of the leadership class has continually become a
stormy threat to this perceived optimism in Africa.
Going by Philip Kotler’s understanding of leadership, if management is defined as getting
things done through others, then leadership should be defined as the social and informal sources
of influence that you use to inspire action taken by others. It means mobilizing others to want to
struggle toward a common goal. Great leaders help build an organization’s human capital, and
then motivate individuals to take concerted action. Leadership also includes an understanding of
when, where, and how to use more formal sources of authority and power, such as position or
ownership. Increasingly, we live in a world where good management requires good leaders and
leadership. While these views about the importance of leadership are not new, competition
among employers and countries for the best and brightest, increased labour mobility, and hyper-
competition puts pressure on organization to invest in present and future leadership capabilities.
This paper adopts content analysis, personal opinions and observations, commentaries and
editorials on the concept of leadership. This paper derives reflection from Philip Kotler’s views
on leadership and situates it with the leadership question in Africa. Also, this paper carries out
analysis to reveal the nature and challenges of leadership in Africa as well as approaches to
solving leadership challenges in Africa, in order to elevate the optimism.
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3. Philip Kotler’s Leadership Phenomenon
Phillip Kotler, known as “the father of Modern Marketing and a leading personality in modern
management, in his book “Marketing Insights from A TO Z, 80 Concepts Every Manager Needs
to know”, reiterated the importance of quality leadership. According to Kotler (2003):
“all managers should be leaders, but most are
administrators. If you are spending most of your time
on budget, organisation’s charts, costs, compliance,
and detail, you are an administrator. To become a
leader, you need to spend more time with people,
scanning opportunities, developing a vision, and
setting goals. A leader is the architect of the
organisation’s goals and vision. Leaders need to be
teachers and teach others to be leaders”.
Bad managers, in contrast, rely on command and control to get their ideas carried out. A
business leader’s job is “to make meaning”. The leader needs vision. Vision is “the art of
seeing things invisible”. Vision is the ability to conjure up a picture of great opportunities to
inspire the employees and the organisation’s stakeholders. The vision must be burn in the
leader’s breast if it is to ignite a passion in others. The leader must be able to gain respect
for his vision and as a person. The followers must believe that the leader is serving them,
that he or she is a servant-leader (Kotler, 2003). In Reinventing Leadership: Strategies to
Empower the Organization (2005), Bennis and Townsend discuss their concise leadership
plan for the 21st century that reinvented leadership strategies and aims to empower both
employees and organization. They focus on: moving away from conventional standards of
business practice, building trust, finding a mentor to encourage reflective backtalk and
rewarding accomplishment. No wonder, Napoleon said that “A leader is a dealer in hope”.
Robert Townsend observed that “true leadership must be for the benefit of the followers,
not the enrichment of the leaders” and that “A leader is not an administrator who loves to
run others, but someone who carries water for his people so that they can get on with their
jobs”. Leadership works best and extra-ordinarily when there are committed followers, who
stir up the vision of their leader.
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4. Kotler stressed that, some think that great leaders need charisma, and point to people or
personalities such as Franklin Roosevelt or Winston Churchill. They are forgetting Harry
Truman; the thirty-third President of the United States, whose one of his important decisions
was the use of the atomic bombs in Japan (Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945). In the
light of the above instance, leaders do not need charisma to be effective. Charismatic leaders are
often suspects. Some of the greatest business and organizational leaders went about their work
in a quiet way touching the minds and hearts of their staff. They are friendly, approachable, and
caring; pursuing people oriented goods as well as run an open- door policies (Kotler, ibid).
They act as role models. Remember Charles R. Walgreen III, who transformed Walgreen
Company into a company whose cumulative stock returns since 1975 have beaten the general
stock market by over 15 times. Yet, he never takes credit, pointing instead to his great team, and
he pins his success on being “lucky”. Katherine Graham of the Washington Post was another
quiet leader who built a great newspaper into a greater one. This is in line with what Chinese
Philosopher Lao-tzu said “a leader is best when people barely know that he exists”. In the words
of Harry Truman,
“a man cannot have character unless he lives with
a fundamental system of morals that creates character”
Leadership is character –oriented and character-motivated. The best leaders want to surround
themselves with talented characters. They revel in finding these categories of professionals who
are smart than they are. The main task of a leader is to build a team of experts who are aligned
with each other the primary goals of the company or organization.
It is important to note that good leaders do not want yes-men. A good leader should be able to
fire those who agree with him, especially at all times. Good leaders want the honest of their
colleagues. They encourage constructive debates and out-of-the-box thinking. They invite big-
picture ideas. They tolerate honest mistakes. And when they make the final decision, they
inspire and mobilize their people to do their best. And the best leaders do not spend too much
time poring over numbers. They get out and meet the troops. They devote a lot of time to major
players.
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5. At the same time, the job of a leader is daunting. It is not all about playing golf with other
business/organizational leaders. One CEO said “I am only comfortable when I am
uncomfortable”. When Dick Ferris, former CEO of United Air Lines, was asked how he sleeps
in tumultuous time, he said, “Just like a baby—I wake up every two hours and cry.”
Yet the leader must be more optimist than a pessimist. He must see the cup as half full rather
than half empty. He is mostly tested when the times are tough. It is a rough sea that can make a
great captain. And Harry S. Truman, 33rd President of the United States, defined a leader
as…a man who can persuade people to do what
they do not want to do, or do what they are too lazy
to do and like it (Truman, H.,1884 -1972).
Warren Bennis, widely known as a modern leadership guru, identified six personal qualities of a
good leader- integrity, dedication, magnanimity, humility, openness and creativity. Bennis
summarized by defining leadership as, the capacity to translate vision into reality. In line with
Warren Bennis’ categorization, David Hakala, adds fairness, assertiveness and display of a
sense of humour as other personal qualities of a good leader (Hakala, 2008).
To this end, what insight can we generate from the above reflection? What are the leadership
challenges in Africa? It therefore, behooves on the writers to attempt a review of the questions
stated above so as to make good conclusion on the subject matter.
The Leadership Challenges in Africa
Gardner (1990) defines leadership as ‘the process of persuasion or example by which an
individual induces a group to pursue objectives held by the leader or shared by the leader and
his or her followers’. In the African context, it was often the case that post-independence
national leadership was of the so-called ‘big man’ style. In this form of leadership, decision
making over the distribution of resources, power, and authority was (and still is to a limited
extent) exclusively controlled by the president. To the extent that objectives were participatory,
state leaders mainly involved a tightly controlled group of political elites (Warfield and
Sentongo, 2011).
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6. Twelve years into the millennium, the optimism to address root causes of poverty, ignorance,
diseases, environmental degradation and other chronic ‘socio-political and economic problems’
suffers stagnation and despair. A lot have been elucidated above on what leadership is meant to
represent. However, in the context of the theme of this work, the reality is far from the
principles and thoughts enumerated above. Leadership and socio-political and economic
empowerment is the key to Africa's future. Those are the words of Ecologist Wangari Maathai.
Expressing her view in her book ‘Challenges for Africa and the problems facing the African
Continent’, Maathai (2009) says that the real challenge for Africa is working with the leadership
of the countries.
"We live on a continent that is extremely rich, highly
fertile and with a lot of resources and minerals. There
is absolutely no reason why we are poor except we
have been having very poor leadership for so many
decades".
Commenting from the above assertion, African leaders should really help Africa to get out of
this cycle of violence and poverty and refuse to be exploited by the rest of the world. Kagame
(2010) observed that:
poor political leadership was to blame for Africa’s
share of conflicts and regional instability, which could
only end if the region embraced good leadership and
proper electoral laws that encourage political
inclusiveness. Just as a failed state is a result of failed
leadership, it takes a different type of leadership to
build a nation.
It is a truism that, the principle and practice of good leadership is not yet developed in most
African states, Nigeria inclusive. What ineffective leadership has caused Africa is
immeasurable. Franz Fanon in his book 'The Wretched of the Earth' published in 1961
eloquently described the character of the class that inherited power from the colonialists.
According to Fanon (1961):
It is "a sort of little greedy caste, avid and voracious,
with the mind of a huckster, only too glad to accept the
dividends that the former colonial powers hands out.
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7. This get-rich-quick middle class shows itself incapable
of great ideas or of inventiveness. It remembers what it
has read in European textbooks and imperceptibly it
becomes not even the replica of Europe, but its
caricature." This class, said Fanon prophetically, is not
capable of building industries "it is completely canalized
into activities of the intermediary type. Its innermost
vocation seems to be to keep in the running and to be
part of the racket. The psychology of the national
bourgeoisie is that of a businessman, not that of a
captain of industry."
The description remains accurate for today's elite who have grown through civilian politics,
military governments, business and the civil service.
Certainly, African nations suffer from poor administrative, inadequate judicial infrastructure
and insufficient numbers of expertise. But these short-comings cannot explain the abuse and
misuse of state power in the continent. The fact remains that most African rulers have ignored
the provisions of the constitution and laid-down administrative procedures. Leaders act selfishly
with total disregard to existing rules and laid-down procedures.
The failure of democracy and economic development in Africa are due to a large part to the
scramble for wealth by predator elites, who have dominated African politics since
independence. They see the state as a source of personal wealth accumulation, using state fund
to finance ungodly political interests which are anti-civil society. Many of the apparently
senseless civil conflicts and wars in Africa, including in Liberia, Somalia, Rwanda and Darfur
region of Sudan, are due to the battle for the spoils of power. The competition for national
resources leads to conflict and repression, hence, the ruling classes, including people in and
outside government (cartel/cronies), are motivated by objectives that have little to do with the
common good.
African’s tragedy is not that its nations are poor. No, the continent is not poor. The tragedy is
that it lacks ruling classes that are committed to overcoming the state of poverty. Mostly it is all
about politicking, rarely about human-oriented policies and programmes. Political actors are
those who compete among themselves for power, not actors who use power to confront their
country’s problems. In the Nigerian national assembly, those who address themselves as
honourable members engage in both verbal and physical assault; all in the name of politics,
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8. appropriation of interest and above all consolidation of interest for second/third term of office.
This has jeopardized so many developing democracies in Africa. It’s a pity. No wonder, In
President Obama maiden speech in sub-Saharan Africa he stressed that “good governance is the
change that can unlock Africa's potential and emphasized that it is the ingredient which has
been missing in many places for far too long”. Obviously, it is quality leadership that can
perpetuate good governance in Africa.
In Africa where only 6 countries are in the upper middle-income category, at least 38 countries
are classified as low-income (ADB, 2003). In World Bank terms, Africa is today caught in a
low-equilibrium development trap, just as Asia was in the 1960s. With the exception of
Botswana which has emerged ‘from rags to riches’, the lot of countries and peoples in Africa
remains a precarious existence.
Other paradoxes of Africa’s development experience are declining savings and investment per
capita since 1970. In the light of the above, the GDP is lowered and investment rates are
comparatively lower to other regions of the World and productivity on investments is
diametrically disappointing. Africa’s share of world trade has also plummeted to less than 3 per
cent, resulting in high and persistent balance of payment and inflation problems crippling and
effectively worsening prospects of a quick economic recovery. Apparently, this dramatically
affects the so-called ‘Foreign Reserve’.
Moreover, another effect of bad leadership in Africa is that economic and social policies
pursued by most African countries are counter-productive and inimical to rapid economic
growth. As a result, the state and its technocrats substitute and prevent the emergence of an
entrepreneurial class. This has reduced the state to an avenue for capital accumulation for those
with access to state resources through ‘blind forces’ which culminated in a ‘deliberate policy of
spoils and plundering of public coffers by the ruling elite’. For two or more decades, African
governments of both leftist and rightist ideological orientations assumed greater control over
economic affairs, often advancing policies that facilitated governmental corruption. In effect,
this aside crippling African societies; it is bleeding their potential. It tends to freeze technical
initiatives, which Kindleberger terms technological ‘fossilization’ (Kindleberger, 1958:301).
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9. It is informative to realize that there are certain domestic elements, which through non-
economic, have influenced Africa’s harsh economic realities. Such factors as incessant political
instability, authoritarian regimes and unprogressive attitudes have impacted negatively on
economic growth (Ayittey, 1992). Fragile political institutions created by poor leadership create
insurmountable barriers to economic prosperity, especially in welfare states. Myriad military
coups and dictatorships partly account for Nigeria’s, Ghana’s and Niger’s economic crisis;
while civil war in Mozambique, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Sierra Leone, Angola,
Somalia, Liberia and Darfur have paralyzed growth of their economies. In countries with
authoritarian regimes like Malawi under Banda, Nigeria, in the days of Abacha Junta, and
Zimbabwe still under President Mobutu and many other examples, long term economic
objectives and strategies were replaced by myopic, short-term policies like large public sector
deficits to support politically determined projects. This scenario reflects conflicts between
economic and political rationality, which according to Schatz (1988), enshrines government
schemes providing opportunities for graft, and political patronage.
Dishearteningly, African states are victims of their own specialization in primary production,
which is subject to ever declining terms of trade. This is why countries like Nigeria bases its
annual budget estimate on the wavering crude oil price in the international market. Is it not
because of ineptitude on the part our leaders? Yes, it is. Poor leadership has brought about gross
inefficiencies and ineffectiveness of the domestic production capacity, thus, the local refineries
are in comatose situation, which would have promoted increased production if it were in the
developed economies. This supports why African producers of primary products can not have
control over production.
With the failures highlighted above, African leaders to a large extent are not good students of
Phillip Kotler’s view about leadership. According to Professor Kotler (ibid):
“all managers should be leaders, but most are administrators.
If you are spending most of your time on budget,
organisation’s charts, costs, compliance, and detail, you are
an administrator. To become a leader, you need to spend more
time with people, scanning opportunities, developing a vision,
and setting goals”.
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10. A leader is the architect of the organisation’s goals and vision. In situating this conception with
the leadership style of most African leaders, one could easily note a wide gap. There exist
organizational gap, leaders are not accessible, and thus they spend much of their tenure pursuing
selfish business trips abroad. Because of non-performance, African leaders surround themselves
with aids, in form of security men in order to ward-off the people from them.
Solving the Leadership Challenges in Africa
If the 21st century African leader (and here we flatten the definition to include a range of
leadership at different levels in society) is to stimulate democratic capacity building in
communities, this individual must first learn the process of managing or mitigating conflict to
build a community’s capacity for sustainable peace and development (Warfield and Sentongo,
2011). Burns (1978) recognized that leadership emerges in response to conflict. Indeed, one
could argue that conflict gives depth and perspective to leadership. In the African context, this
refers not only to the typically understood intra-state conflict, but to the proliferation of conflict
taking place at the local level as well. Conflict is a catalytic agent for transformation, and
conflict mitigation is the tool that negotiates this transformation.
Lederach (1997 as cited in Warfield and Sentongo, 2011) provides a model of how one can
examine leadership at various levels, ranging from top level to leadership at the grassroots.
Lederach envisions three levels of leadership. At the top (Level 1) are the regime elites,
politicians, religious leaders, and the military who engage in highly visible negotiations at the
state level. At Level 2, Lederach locates intellectuals, ethnic leadership, regional or local
religious leaders, and heads of recognized non- governmental organizations (NGOs). These are
individuals who are most likely to be engaged in negotiations with Level 1 over the
implementation of national policy. Such was the case in Rwanda where individuals who headed
up humanitarian organizations were involved with Level 1 in the implementation of gacaca and
ingando programmes, as part of the national reconciliation programme. Level 3 is where the
grassroots leadership resides. Here we find indigenous community leaders of one sort or another
who tend to be engaged in the struggle for bringing more resources to their local population. Of
course, these are not rigid divisions. In some post-conflict developing countries there is mobility
as some Level 2 actors will be pulled into Level 1 and Level 3 actors can move to Level 2.
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11. In practical terms therefore, one can understand that, the enormity and complexity of, the
challenges confronting the continent demands a multifaceted approach in dealing with them but
the question is where exactly do we start from? Faced with all these daunting challenges;
illiteracy, poverty, instability, where do we take off? The foundation of all the economic
policies, poverty reduction strategies and development goals, including the implementation of
the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), rest on effective leadership which engenders good
governance. Ensuring environmental sustainability requires effective and efficient leadership.
The key to eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, rest on quality leadership, the catalyst to
achieving universal primary education, promoting gender equality and empowering women is
good leadership. The vital weapon to promoting peace and security as well as post-war
reconstruction in Africa is quality leadership. The whole clamour for an electoral reform and
democratic consolidation in Africa takes its root in good leadership.
Our governments and leaders must recognize that, faced with the same economic constraints
and economic marginalization in the global economic system, countries like China, India,
Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea just to mention a few have spurred their economies to
appreciable height even though there is still some room for improvement. Today the progress of
these countries has shifted the development paradigm and the hegemony in the global economic
system has taken a twist. Little did the world know that these countries could emerge economic
giants, flex their economic muscles and rival the dominance of the West in the global economic
system. Africa's socio-economic fortunes have hope but this hope will only experience result
and witness development on the principles of good leadership.
Some African living legends, like Nelson Mandela and Kofi Annan have high hopes in a new
Africa. According to Nelson Mandela:
“I dream of the realization of the unity of Africa, whereby its
leaders combine in their efforts to solve the problems of this
continent. I dream of our vast deserts, of our forests, of all our
great wildernesses turning to become a glory to Africa”.
In the view of solving the disheartening Africa’s problems, Kofi Annan advocates that:
“we need to continue fighting corruption, we need to build
strong institutions and I think we need to eliminate red-tape
and bureaucracy; we must develop strong institutions that
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12. would engender good governance and democratic
consolidation”.
In a related development, African leaders do not need to acquire charisma before they could
transform the continent and harness the great potential. Rather they could make important
decisions and match it with actions. They are to be friendly, approachable, and caring; poised to
pursue people oriented goods. The kinds of leaders that will transform Africa are those that will
act as role models; those who will always go for success. They are to make both constructive
and progressive debate in the comity of nations. In the face of international community, they
should be fearless and doggedly maintaining unwavering position, especially as it concerns
economic and political affairs of the continent, when the ‘super-powers’ begin with their power
politics and diplomacy. Optimism should be their greatest value, as Kotler posits.
Regrettably, being the leading area for diamonds, cobalt, uranium, and many other rare
minerals, the continent is still wallowing in the dungeons of poverty and plague of
underdevelopment. For instance, Nigeria with all the oil deposits has not inched up significantly
in its developmental goals and objectives. Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is one of the
richest countries in diamonds, gold, timber, cobalt, yet it has little to show for them. Talk of the
gold mines of Ghana, Oil fields of Sudan, Angola but yet the continent has failed to make
significant impact in improving the living standards of its people. Despite the Continent's
seemingly abundant resources, ineffective leadership has raided the continent of its destiny.
In conclusion therefore, position captures that transformative leadership need to be equated with
what Greenstone and Peterson (1973 as cited in Warfield and Sentongo, 2011) call orthodox
liberalism: essentially, a broad redistribution of goods and services by the state. As we have
noted in one way or another, transformative leadership has to balance constitutional democracy
(often under pressure from international actors) with utilitarian democracy where needs and
interests of grassroots leadership are stimulated. In this sense, transformative (political)
leadership can be better described as pragmatic liberalism. Or putting it another way, pragmatic
realism where procedural democracy (in this instance, the distribution of power) is occasionally
sacrificed to produce the ‘greater good’. In Nigeria today, the President Goodluck Jonathan’s
transformational mandate and fresh-air phenomenon would only answer to good and quality
leadership which can only build Nigeria’s capacity for sustainable peace and development.
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13. References
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See Cozay Forum ‘Bad Leadership and Corruption in Developing Countries Social and
Cultural Issues’.
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14. Truman, H. (1884- 1972) ‘Harry Truman’s Quotes’ Accessed from Thinkexist.com June 2010
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www.ajol.info/index.php/ajcr/article/viewFile/69834/57914
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http://changingminds.org/disciplines/leadership/articles/benis_qualitieshtm July 2010
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