A leader may be adept in casting powerful visions and be innovative, resourceful, courageous, passionate, self-motivated, diligent and full of grit but if he/she is married to a person with a wrong personality, such leader may end up on the wrong side of history. The personality of a spouse has far-reaching effects on the success of a leader. Many leaders who would have made indelible marks in their career ended up being less than sterling as a result of the personality of their spouses.
According to a study conducted by Joshua Jackson and Brittany Solomon, both of Washington University in St. Louis, which was published in the journal, Psychological Science, the personality of a leader’s spouse counts as much as that of the leader in influencing the experiences that lead to great success. After a five-year study involving almost 5,000 married people ranging in age from 19 to 89, with both spouses working in about 75 per cent of the sample, the researchers found out that a spouse’s conscientiousness is critical to the leader’s success.
They explain that a conscientious spouse helps the partner’s career in three basic ways. First, conscientious people are dependable and organized, they provide reliable support, and are skilled at planning and managing their lives. By taking care of other responsibilities that would have bogged down their spouses, they make it easy for the spouses to concentrate on their core responsibility as leaders. Another benefit is that leaders may emulate some of the good habits of their conscientious spouses, bringing traits such as diligence and reliability to bear on their own workplace situations all of which results in a better performance. Finally, having a spouse that keeps the leader’s personal life running smoothly may simply reduce stress and make it easier for such leader to maintain a productive work-life balance.
Between Pastor Enoch Adeboye and Apostle Ayo Babalola
Pastor Enoch Adeboye, the General Overseer (Worldwide) of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), caused a little stir recently when he said he was ready to kill anyone who ventured into touching his wife, Pastor Folu, with the intention of harming her. The clergyman explained that he would call on God to deal with such a person whose lot would be to slip into death from sleep. Adeboye said this to underscore the extent of his love for his wife. According to him, his wife believed in him right from the beginning of their relationship which was evident in her preference for him over some well-heeled suitors. So, he is willing to sacrifice his wellbeing for her comfort.
Adeboye, who heads one of the fastest growing churches in the world, attributes his success as a gospel minister to the power of God and the peace of mind which his wife makes available on the home front. According to the revered cleric, aside the Holy Spirit, his wife is the greatest gift of God to him.
But Apostle Ayo Babalola would hardly say that.
Apostle Babalola was a great revivalist and an outstanding evangelist, who alongside two others founded the Christ Apostolic Church (CAC) in Nigeria. Babalola was said to be a heavily anointed man of God through whom many miracles were wrought. He was said to have healed many of diverse illnesses and even raised some dead people. But the man of God was not always a happy man because, according to some church historians, his wife was a thorn in his flesh. She did not really support his pastoral work and made the home a hell for the man of God. Although this did not adversely impact on the anointing of God on Apostle Babalola, it affected him psychologically and emotionally. After several days of ministering in various locations, the man would not have a moment’s peace on his return home. Some writers suggest that Apostle Babalola was more of a travelling evangelist and revivalist principally to avoid having a faceoff with his wife. The highly anointed man of God was said to have died of exhaustion at the age of 55 years as a result of his constant travels because his home was anything but a haven. Not a few believe that the C.A.C’s first General Evangelist could have lived longer had he had a peaceful home or a conscientious wife like Pastor Adeboye. Many are also of the opinion that had Apostle Babalola lived a little longer, he would have been able to bequeath to the church he led a proper leadership and succession structure which would have ensured the church’s cohesion after his transition.
Effect of stable home on leaders
Aside the findings of the researcher, having a conscientious spouse who believes in a leader boosts the leader’s self-esteem.
Self-esteem is critical to leadership success because a leader has to believe in himself before others can believe in him. Self-esteem is a person’s evaluation of his significance. It is a positive or negative assessment of oneself that determines how one feels about oneself and what one does with one’s life. So, if an individual has a healthy assessment of his worth, he treats himself with respect and expects others to treat him likewise. But an individual with an unhealthy self-esteem disparages himself, underrates his accomplishments and does not expect to be treated any better by others.
Having a healthy self-esteem boosts an individual’s confidence. The person with a good self-esteem is confident about what he can contribute to the advancement of the society where he finds himself. He knows that he is in a symbiotic relationship with the society; the society needs him as much as he needs the society. This gives him the impetus to give his best, knowing that the society will not fail to appropriately recompense him.
While it is possible for an individual with unhealthy or low self-esteem to demonstrate self-confidence, such demonstration does not always last the distance because the confidence is not hinged on who they really are. Many of the people in this category usually depend on external stimuli to put up such shows. After the event, they go back to their normal plane and are overwhelmed by a sense of inadequacy. That is why celebrities, musicians, sportsmen and even businessmen, who seem to enjoy global acclaim and are regarded as successful by those outside their immediate worlds, are often engaged in substance abuse and sometimes commit suicide. This happens when the bottom is knocked out of their confidence because there is no correlation between how the world perceives them and how they see themselves. The world thinks they are successful but to themselves, they are failures. The world thinks they are profound but they know that they are shallow. The misalignment is too much for them to handle and that leads to their destruction.
An individual’s perception of him or herself is often a reflection of the spouse’s assessment of him or her. While a conscientious spouse will always have a good perception of the partner, a spouse without this quality will definitely injure a leader’s self-worth. To be trapped with a spouse who pounds a person’s self-worth is one of the worst tragedies that can befall a leader.
How leaders can help their spouses develop conscientiousness
Since a spouse’s conscientiousness plays a vital role in the determination of a leader’s success, leaders who are stuck with spouses that are low on conscientiousness have a duty to help such partners raise their level of conscientiousness so as to increase their own chances of making a success of their leadership. This is important because leaders are change agents; they have the responsibility of moulding those they work with to make them better individuals. If leaders are able to achieve such feat in the workplace, they should be able to reenact the exploits at home to enhance their chances of recording great success.
According to experts, conscientiousness is made up of six components, which are self-efficacy, the ability to accomplish tasks; orderliness, the ability to organize; dutifulness, having a sense of obligation; achievement-striving, the commitment to achieving excellence; self-discipline, a high level of willpower to trade away comfort for result; and cautiousness, the ability to think through possibilities before acting.
Helping a spouse to develop conscientiousness involves doing the following.
Encouraging commitment to self development
Leaders who develop themselves without developing their spouses do so at their own peril. A leader’s immediate scope of influence is the family. Therefore, a leader who is worth the name must ensure that as he is making progress in knowledge acquisition, the spouse is not left behind. As the leader increases his own capacity to accomplish tasks, by sharing knowledge with the spouse or creating opportunities for the spouse to also acquire knowledge, the competence level of the spouse will increase and he/she will be able to develop self-efficacy.
Set priorities
Leaders should also encourage their spouses to set priorities. Many people fail to accomplish their purpose because of their inability to put first things first. This can be accomplished by listing out everything that has to be done and rank them in order of importance. Taking this route will ensure that precious time is not wasted on trivial issues while vital matters suffer neglect. Setting priorities is the first step to being organized.
Encourage positive trade-offs
Leaders should also encourage their spouses to adopt trade-offs as a way of life. They should inculcate in them the fact that everything in life comes at a cost. The greatest cost is to steer clear of what one would ordinarily want to do to get what one needs to get. This is self-discipline. Leaders must encourage their spouses to imbibe self-discipline so as to be able to accomplish their cherished dreams.
Reflections
Leaders must also encourage their spouses to be reflective rather than reflexive. Instead of taking an action that just occurs to them, they should take time to reflect on such actions and the consequences before embarking on it. Those who pause and ponder before taking a step usually make better decisions than those who are impulsive in their actions.
Last line
Since a spouse’s conscientiousness plays a vital role in the success of a leader, any investment in raising a spouse’s conscientiousness is a wise one that is bound to yield a pleasing harvest.
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