Jason Osborn on Leadership: Building Others vs. Managing Perception

In a recent LinkedIn post, Jason Osborn delves into the fundamental differences between superficial leadership focused on personal image and authentic leadership centered on developing others. Osborn contrasts the behaviors and motivations of “bad leaders” who prioritize self-preservation and perception management with those of “great leaders” who actively foster growth and elevate their teams.

Osborn begins by drawing a stark distinction:

“Bad Leaders Spend Their Entire Career Trying to Look Like Great Leaders. Great Leaders Spend Theirs Making Everyone Around Them Greater Than Themselves.”

This core difference, Osborn argues, manifests across all aspects of a leader’s professional life, influencing how they handle successes and failures, and their actions when unobserved. According to Osborn, leaders focused on perception engage in careful self-positioning, seeking credit and avoiding situations that might reveal weaknesses. Their decision-making process is consistently filtered through the lens of personal image.

The Exhaustion of Perception Management

Osborn highlights the toll this self-focused approach takes, not just on the leader but on the entire team. When a leader’s primary concern is their own image, the team members often become secondary, their development and successes viewed only through the extent to which they reflect positively on the leader. This can lead to team members’ wins being absorbed by the leader and their struggles being downplayed.

As Osborn puts it:

“When a leader is focused on their own image, the team becomes a supporting cast. Their growth matters only as far as it reflects well on the leader.”

The Impact of Developing Others

In contrast, Osborn describes great leaders as those whose reputation is built not on projected image, but on the tangible development of the people around them. These leaders actively celebrate when team members surpass their roles and intentionally push individuals into opportunities, even before they feel fully ready. Osborn emphasizes that their motivation isn’t to be the smartest person in the room, but to elevate the collective intelligence and capability of the group.

He elaborates on this philosophy:

“They share what they know freely because their goal was never to be the smartest person in the room. It was to make the room smarter.”

Measuring True Leadership Success

The ultimate metric of great leadership, according to Osborn, isn’t individual performance or accolades, but the enhanced performance of those led. He posits that a leader’s true legacy is not in the deals closed or titles held, but in the individuals who became more capable and effective because of their guidance. This contrasts sharply with the legacy of bad leaders, who may leave behind a reputation, while great leaders leave behind a succession of other leaders.

Osborn concludes with a reflective question for his audience, prompting them to consider which path they are building towards. The enduring impact of leadership, in his view, is measured by the quality of leaders it produces.