Hacker News Reader

Pick a good leader who doesn't brown nose his way into leadership positions

The keyword here is want.

People who want to lead are not good leaders.

I think that the qualifier "At the start" is important, here. I've known many good leaders who, at some point, got frustrated and took charge. I've also known a lot of jerks who wanted to be in charge of things as soon as they heard that there was going to be something to be in charge of.

Where does it say "good" in that rule?

In my experience, people who want to lead for the sake of leading, that is to get status or rewards that often come with that role or because they simply enjoy power, are often by far the worst leaders.

However, those who reluctantly come to leadership because they want to achieve something often make the best leaders but that is quite different to people who regard leadership (power) as an end in itself.