{"id":3821,"date":"2025-07-08T15:53:35","date_gmt":"2025-07-08T15:53:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aomtodayprod.wpenginepowered.com\/?p=3821"},"modified":"2025-07-08T15:53:35","modified_gmt":"2025-07-08T15:53:35","slug":"leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked\/","title":{"rendered":"Leaders Don\u2019t Need to Be Liked"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Daniel Butcher<\/a><\/p>\n

Becoming a respected, powerful leader often requires a fundamental mindset shift of letting go of a need to be seen as likeable and authentic. In fact, effective leaders don\u2019t dwell on how their management style and decisions will affect their popularity but rather focus on what\u2019s best for the organization and what will inspire employees to perform well, according to Academy of Management Scholar Jeffrey Pfeffer of Stanford University<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Pfeffer, one of today\u2019s most influential management professors and researchers, offers some takeaways on that subject from his book 7 Rules of Power<\/em>. Leadership isn\u2019t a popularity contest; rather, it\u2019s about levering influence to achieve strategic objectives for the good of the organization\u2019s shareholders.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to learn how to interact with other people across your organization in ways that build your influence and permit you to get the things done that you want to get done,\u201d Pfeffer says.<\/p>\n

One of Pfeffer\u2019s tips for current and aspiring leaders is to \u201close the self-descriptions and inhibitions that hold you back, for example, the idea that you have to be liked, because, as an executive, you\u2019re hired to get things done, not necessarily to win a popularity contest. Lose this currently popular idea that you need to be quote-unquote authentic, which is, of course, incorrect.\u201d<\/p>\n

The best leaders know the optimal course of action may involve breaking the rules, including policies and procedures that fall into the \u201cbut we\u2019ve always done things this way\u201d category. Effective leaders embrace innovation and encourage everyone at the organization to do so.<\/p>\n

Another key insight is that once professionals have acquired power, what they did to get it will be forgiven, forgotten, or both. Most personnel will fall in line and get on board or eventually leave the organization.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce you have power and status and success, no one will care how you got it, and people will people will accommodate themselves, because people like to be close to power,\u201d Pfeffer says.<\/p>\n

Once they\u2019re in a leadership position, high-ranking executives shouldn\u2019t be shy about using their power, he stresses, even if they step on a few toes or ruffle some feathers. Leaders who let go of the idea that they need to be liked or loved and instead act decisively may face resistance or even spark anger but will likely earn employees\u2019 respect.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Daniel Butcher Becoming a respected, powerful leader often requires a fundamental mindset shift of letting go of a need to be seen as likeable and authentic. In fact, effective leaders don\u2019t dwell on how their management style and decisions will affect their popularity but rather focus on what\u2019s best for the organization and what […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":4131,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,71,29,19],"tags":[],"sp_smart_badges":[],"ppma_author":[70],"class_list":["post-3821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-c-suite","category-communicating","category-emotions","category-leadership"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nLeaders Don\u2019t Need to Be Liked - Academy of Management Today<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Daniel Butcher\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Daniel Butcher\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/d1297a59039d9ca7bac9d9f0952e508c\"},\"headline\":\"Leaders Don\u2019t Need to Be Liked\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-07-08T15:53:35+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":406,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2025\\\/04\\\/boss-yells-at-employee.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"C-SUITE\",\"COMMUNICATING\",\"EMOTIONS\",\"LEADERSHIP\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/leaders-dont-need-to-be-liked\\\/\",\"name\":\"Leaders Don\u2019t Need to Be Liked - 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In fact, effective leaders don\u2019t dwell on how their management style and decisions will affect their popularity but rather focus on what\u2019s best for the organization and what…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3821\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4131"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3821"},{"taxonomy":"sp_smart_badges","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sp_smart_badges?post=3821"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=3821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}