When I am asked, "What is the leadership lesson from the Wikileaks mess?" I reply with advice that I got from my dad.

Don't say anything in private you don't want known in public. Or in other words, don't do or say anything that you would not like to read about in the headlines of the newspaper.

And in this case, it sure seems like there are a lot a two-faced leaders who have made polemic comments in private that the world is now reading about in the headlines.

Wikileaks has raised a mired of controversial issues for nation versus nation.

For example, we learned in the headlines that US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton privately questioned the mental health of Argentina's President Cristina Fernandez, and enquired about the "interpersonal dynamics" between Fernandez and her late husband, Nestor Kirchner.

She went on to ask, "Is she taking any medication?" I am sure she never intended or desired for this private conversation to be known publicly — let alone for it to appear in the headlines of most newspapers around the world. What an embarrassing moment for Secretary Clinton.

Or for sure Rahul Gandhi, the heir apparent to India's ruling congress party, never intended his concerns about Hindu terror to be made public. The result of these private comments coming public is a lack of trust in leadership.

Many will respond saying that Wikileaks was wrong to leak these sensitive and secret cables.

This article is not about their rights; it is about the actions of leaders. As a leadership scholar, Wikileaks raises a precarious business issue: "Are leaders being two-faced — showing one face in public and another in private?" Being two-faced is marked by deliberate deceptiveness pretending to have one view or belief and acting under the influence of another.

Should leaders have private views that are juxtaposed to their public actions? Or should they be transparent and trustworthy?

Transparency

Let's explore the practical yet controversial issue of transparency in business leadership. Do leaders have the right to speak one opinion in private and another in the boardroom?

There are two sides to this controversial practice of leadership transparency: 1) leaders having the freedom and right to say what they want in private and 2) leaders being fully transparent.

Which do you vote for? Recall the point: "Don't say anything in private that you would not like to read about in headlines of the newspaper".

The answer is not about a leader's right, rather it is a about a leader's responsibility. For sure, leaders need to be able to handle sensitive information and have confidential conversations. But the nature of this should not be two-faced, one issue in private and another in public, leading to a lack of transparency or questionable trust. Nor should "leadership confidentiality" be used as an excuse to make derogatory conversations.

Leaders need to be authentic — what they say behind closed doors must be aligned with what they say in public. Having worked with thousands of leaders over the past 20 years, I attest, this clearly is not the case.

Unfortunately, the private and public messages are incongruent.

 

The writer is Vice President of Leadership Solutions, Kenexa.