Discover what decades of scientific research reveal about the nature versus nurture debate in leadership development and what it means for your organisation.
Written by Laura Bouttell • Fri 7th November 2025
The question has persisted since ancient Athens debated whether virtue could be taught. Are the leaders who shape organisations, nations, and movements products of fortunate genetics—blessed with innate qualities the rest of us lack? Or can leadership be systematically developed, democratising access to one of humanity's most consequential capabilities?
Leadership is approximately 30% genetic and 70% developed through experience, education, and deliberate practice. Whilst certain inherited traits influence leadership emergence, research conclusively demonstrates that the majority of leadership capability develops through environmental factors, making effective leadership accessible to far more people than the "born leader" myth suggests.
For business leaders responsible for succession planning, talent development, and organisational capability, this isn't merely theoretical—it fundamentally shapes investment decisions, hiring practices, and development strategies. The science offers both encouraging news and important nuance that challenges simplistic assumptions on both sides of the debate.
The most rigorous evidence comes from twin studies—comparing identical twins who share 100% of their DNA with fraternal twins who share only 50%. By examining which twin in each pair occupies leadership roles, researchers can isolate genetic from environmental influences.
The findings are striking. Research by Dr Richard Arvey and colleagues found that genetic factors account for approximately 30% of the variance in leadership role occupancy. Subsequent studies examining leadership styles found even higher heritability estimates: 48% for transactional leadership dimensions and 59% for transformational leadership qualities.
University College London researchers identified a specific genotype (rs4950) associated with leadership ability passing through generations. Individuals with this genetic variant showed significantly higher likelihood of occupying supervisory positions across their careers.
Genes don't create "leadership" directly—they influence underlying traits that make leadership more likely. Research suggests heritability operates through several mechanisms:
Temperamental predispositions: Extraversion, emotional stability, and openness to experience—all partially heritable—correlate with leadership emergence
Cognitive capabilities: General intelligence and specific cognitive abilities like pattern recognition and strategic thinking show substantial heritability
Physical characteristics: Height (80% heritable) influences leadership perceptions, with taller individuals disproportionately occupying leadership roles
Neurobiological factors: Dopamine receptor genetics influence risk-taking and reward sensitivity, affecting leadership behaviour
The inherited component isn't destiny—it's probability. Genetic predispositions increase the likelihood of seeking, attaining, and succeeding in leadership roles, but they represent starting points rather than endpoints.
If genetics explain 30% of leadership variance, what explains the remaining 70%? The answer reshapes how we should think about leadership development.
Deliberate practice and experience: Research consistently shows that leadership capability improves with practice. A meta-analysis of leadership development programmes found meaningful improvements across cognitive, affective, and behavioural outcomes—improvements that cannot be attributed to genetics.
Observational learning: Leaders develop by observing other leaders—both effective and ineffective. The quality and diversity of leadership models available throughout development significantly impacts capability.
Education and training: Formal leadership education shows measurable effects. Studies of military officer training, executive education programmes, and corporate leadership development all demonstrate significant capability improvements.
Environmental shaping: Organisational culture, role requirements, feedback systems, and accountability structures all shape leadership behaviour. The same individual will demonstrate different leadership capability in different contexts.
Critical experiences: Specific experiences—particularly challenging assignments, significant failures, and exposure to diverse contexts—accelerate leadership development in ways that genetic predisposition alone cannot.
If evidence overwhelmingly supports development, why does the "natural leader" concept endure? Several psychological and social factors maintain this misperception:
Attribution errors: We underestimate the thousands of hours of deliberate practice behind apparently "natural" leadership, similar to how we perceive athletic or artistic excellence
Confirmation bias: Leaders who succeed early receive more opportunities, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy that appears to validate innate ability
Visibility of extremes: The most prominent leaders—those with both genetic advantages and extensive development—become disproportionately visible, skewing perception
Motivation for exclusivity: Believing leadership is innate allows organisations to justify limited investment in development and perpetuates existing hierarchies
The myth isn't merely incorrect—it's actively harmful, preventing organisations from systematically developing leadership capability across their talent base.
The most sophisticated understanding recognises that genes and environment don't operate independently—they interact dynamically throughout development.
Gene-environment correlation: Individuals with genetic predispositions toward leadership (extraversion, confidence) actively seek environments that develop those capabilities further. An outgoing child joins more teams, gaining more leadership experience, amplifying the genetic predisposition through environmental exposure.
Gene-environment interaction: The same genetic predisposition produces different outcomes in different environments. Natural assertiveness might develop into effective leadership in supportive environments or counterproductive aggression in toxic ones.
Epigenetic effects: Environmental factors influence which genes are expressed. Stress, relationships, and experiences don't just develop skills—they literally change how our genetic code operates.
This complexity means asking "born or made?" poses the wrong question. The meaningful question is: how do we create environments that maximise leadership development for people with diverse genetic starting points?
Understanding the genetic component should refine, not restrict, how organisations identify leadership potential:
Look beyond early emergence: Some individuals display leadership qualities early (often those with genetic advantages), but late bloomers frequently develop equally or more effective leadership capability with proper development.
Assess developmental trajectory, not just current state: How quickly does someone develop new capabilities when given opportunity and support? This growth rate predicts long-term potential better than current performance alone.
Create multiple pathways: Different genetic starting points benefit from different development approaches. Introverts may require different support than extraverts to develop equally effective leadership capability.
Reduce false negatives: The "born leader" bias causes organisations to overlook high-potential individuals who don't fit the stereotypical leader mould. Research on gender and leadership demonstrates how damaging these biases become.
The 70% development component isn't automatic—it requires deliberate, evidence-based approaches:
1. Provide genuine challenge: Leadership capability develops through tackling genuinely difficult problems with appropriate support. Safe, easy assignments don't develop leadership any more than lifting light weights builds strength.
2. Ensure quality feedback: Development requires accurate, timely, specific feedback on leadership behaviour. Without feedback, practice doesn't improve performance—it merely reinforces existing patterns.
3. Create learning-friendly failure: Leadership develops through mistakes, but only when organisational culture allows learning from failure rather than punishing it.
4. Offer diverse experiences: Different contexts develop different leadership capabilities. Rotation through functions, geographies, and challenges builds versatile leadership.
5. Combine experience with reflection: Experience alone doesn't develop leadership—reflection on experience does. Structured reflection processes accelerate learning from leadership challenges.
6. Invest in formal development: Whilst experience provides the foundation, formal development programmes accelerate capability growth by providing frameworks, models, and opportunities for deliberate practice.
What appears as "natural" typically reflects either genetic advantages (extraversion, confidence, cognitive ability) combined with extensive early development opportunities that aren't visible to observers. Research on expert performance consistently shows that apparent natural ability in any domain results from thousands of hours of deliberate practice.
The "naturalness" often reflects comfort and confidence from extensive practice, not innate capability. The executive who "naturally" commands a room has likely participated in hundreds of presentations, meetings, and negotiations—practice that's become invisible.
This binary thinking contradicts all evidence. Leadership capability exists on a continuum, and virtually everyone can develop significantly beyond their starting point. Studies of leadership development programmes consistently show meaningful improvements across diverse populations.
The relevant question isn't whether someone "has" leadership capability but where they currently are on the developmental continuum and how effectively they're progressing.
When organisations conclude that leadership development fails, the problem typically lies not with the concept but with the implementation:
Properly designed leadership development—combining assessment, challenge, support, and feedback—consistently produces measurable capability improvements.
Consider Winston Churchill, often cited as evidence for the "born leader" position. He certainly possessed genetic advantages: cognitive ability, physical vitality (in his youth), and psychological resilience. His family connections provided unparalleled early leadership opportunities.
Yet Churchill's leadership capability demonstrably developed through experience. His disastrous Gallipoli campaign in the First World War represented a catastrophic leadership failure. The Churchill of 1940 had learned from decades of mistakes, setbacks, and continuous development. His greatest leadership emerged not from genetic destiny but from systematic learning across a lifetime.
Even the most "naturally" gifted leaders we can identify show clear developmental trajectories shaped by experience, learning, and deliberate improvement. Genetics provided Churchill starting advantages, but development produced his consequential leadership.
Understanding that leadership is primarily developed rather than innate transforms talent strategy:
Wider talent pools: Stop screening for "natural" leadership; start screening for developmental trajectory and learning capability
Deeper development investment: Leadership development isn't polishing existing gems; it's creating them through systematic development
More inclusive practices: Recognise that diverse backgrounds may produce different starting points but similar developmental potential
Better succession planning: Focus on creating development experiences that prepare successors rather than merely identifying those who already appear leadership-ready
Cultural transformation: Shift from cultures that identify and elevate "natural" leaders to cultures that systematically develop leadership throughout the organisation
For individuals uncertain about their leadership potential, the research offers profound encouragement: leadership capability can be developed. Whilst genetic starting points vary, the majority of leadership capability comes from deliberate development.
This doesn't mean everyone will become a CEO, nor should they aspire to. But it does mean that virtually everyone can develop significantly greater leadership capability than they currently possess—if they commit to the developmental process.
The path requires:
Genetic advantages might accelerate this process, but they don't determine its outcome. The research is clear: effort, practice, and experience matter more than initial talent.
After decades of rigorous research—twin studies, genetic analyses, longitudinal development studies, and programme evaluations—the evidence decisively answers the question: leaders are primarily made, though genetics plays a supporting role.
The approximate 30/70 split between nature and nurture means that whilst genetic factors influence leadership emergence, the overwhelming majority of leadership capability develops through experience, education, and deliberate practice.
This conclusion should fundamentally reshape organisational approaches to leadership:
The "born leader" myth has served as a convenient fiction—justifying limited development investment, narrow talent pools, and maintenance of existing hierarchies. The science reveals it as exactly that: fiction.
The reality is simultaneously more democratic and more demanding. More democratic because leadership capability is accessible to far more people than traditional assumptions suggest. More demanding because developing leadership requires sustained commitment, challenging experiences, quality feedback, and deliberate practice.
For organisations willing to embrace this reality, the opportunity is substantial: systematically developing leadership capability across broader talent pools, creating deeper benches, and building more resilient organisations. The question is no longer whether leaders are born or made—it's whether we're willing to invest in making them.
Research suggests approximately 30% of leadership capability variance stems from genetic factors, whilst 70% develops through environmental influences, experience, and deliberate practice. Twin studies examining leadership role occupancy found heritability estimates ranging from 24% to 32%, whilst studies of leadership styles found somewhat higher genetic components (48-59%). However, even these higher estimates indicate that the majority of leadership capability develops through learning, experience, and environmental factors rather than genetic predisposition.
Absolutely. Whilst extraversion shows genetic heritability and correlates with leadership emergence, research demonstrates that introverts develop equally effective leadership capability through different pathways. Introverted leaders often excel at deep listening, thoughtful decision-making, and empowering team members—capabilities that prove highly effective in many contexts. Susan Cain's research on quiet leadership demonstrates that introverts lead some of the world's most successful organisations, though they may require different development approaches than extraverted leaders.
Leadership development follows the same patterns as expertise development in other domains: significant capability requires sustained deliberate practice over years, not months. Research on expert performance suggests approximately 10,000 hours of deliberate practice to achieve expertise, though meaningful improvement occurs progressively throughout development. For leadership specifically, meaningful capability improvements occur within 6-12 months of focused development, but developing senior leadership capability typically requires 10-20 years of progressively challenging experiences, continuous learning, and systematic reflection.
Rigorously designed leadership development programmes consistently demonstrate meaningful capability improvements across cognitive, affective, and behavioural dimensions. However, effectiveness depends critically on implementation quality: programmes must combine challenging assignments, quality feedback, structured reflection, and accountability for application. Programmes that offer only classroom learning without workplace application show limited effects. The highest ROI comes from blended approaches combining formal development, challenging assignments, coaching, and peer learning sustained over time rather than isolated training events.
Research consistently identifies several traits predicting leadership effectiveness: cognitive ability (for complex problem-solving), emotional intelligence (for relationship management), integrity (for trust-building), learning agility (for adapting to new situations), and resilience (for persisting through setbacks). Importantly, whilst some traits show genetic influence, all develop significantly through experience and deliberate practice. The specific importance of different traits varies by context: entrepreneurial leadership requires different trait profiles than operational leadership, and cultural contexts significantly influence which traits prove most effective.
Whilst genetic factors influence leadership emergence and create different starting points, research suggests that virtually anyone can develop significantly greater leadership capability than they currently possess. However, "great" leadership—the exceptional capability demonstrated by history's most consequential leaders—typically requires both genetic advantages and extensive, deliberate development over decades. More practically, most people can develop effective leadership capability sufficient for the roles they're likely to occupy, though the rate and ceiling of development will vary based on both genetic predisposition and environmental factors.
Research indicates that different leadership styles show varying degrees of heritability. Studies found 48% of variance in transactional leadership and 59% of variance in transformational leadership explained by genetic factors. However, these figures indicate substantial environmental influence even on style preferences. Moreover, effective leaders demonstrate flexibility in adapting their style to context rather than relying on a single genetically influenced preference. Development programmes can successfully help leaders expand their stylistic range, accessing approaches that may not come "naturally" but prove effective in particular situations.