Max Depree once said: The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality.
So what is the reality of being able to lead? Although being a leader might seem an incredible move in one’s career, being in leadership, according to university research, may not be as good for your mind or body.
A research team led by CUHK Business School, together with the National University of Singapore, found that there may be a unique genetic link between leadership and physical and mental health. It was discovered that genes related to leadership roles might also endanger a person’s physical and mental health. People who lead or manage would have a shorter lifespan and suffer from higher body mass index (BMI), additional risks of cardiovascular disease, and may even trigger bipolar disorder and schizophrenia if under long-term stress.
The team collected and conducted research from genetic and medical data of over 240,000 people of European ancestry through UK Biobank, the world’s largest public genetic and occupational database.
The research also obtained data from websites of the Official Standard Occupational Classification of the United Kingdom and the Career Information in the United States.
Unlike previous studies, the study discovered positive correlations between leadership and overall well-being indicators. It shows that genes associated with leadership may also harm people’s physical and mental health. Excluding the impact of income and education levels, leadership roles are genetically linked to higher BMI, additional risks of cardiovascular disease, and shortened lifespan.
Lee explained, “One of the causes can be due to the huge psychological load required to sustain a leadership position. When one is under various sources of stress for a prolonged period, it will trigger psychological and physical stress responses.
These responses include fat metabolism and cardiovascular function changes, which are detrimental to one’s long-term wellbeing. In other words, leaders may be prone to diseases and conditions caused by those stresses through genetic inheritance. The pressures that leaders bear may also trigger or exacerbate those effects.
One of the most shocking findings was that the genes closely related to leadership skills are also the genetic variants contributing to an increased risk of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Professor Lee pointed out, “Bipolar or schizophrenic sufferers may have advantages in becoming leaders. But this study also revealed a first-ever discovery; there is a connection between a genetic mutation in one’s leadership ability and bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
The study also found that leadership and alcoholism are linked genetically.
Besides genetic factors, the research team also tested leadership roles and their connection with traditional genes related to leadership abilities. The test was based on criteria including Intelligence Quotient (IQ), risk tolerance, height, and others. The results suggest that genes thought to trigger leadership may be related to these traits.
