Srilanka, Nov. 23 -- In Sri Lankan culture, leaders are believed to be people who have solutions to problems.

You look up to leaders for advice, guidance, coaching, direction and various means of support - basically providing answers. Often managers and leaders are created because they are experts at a thing.

And that thing is something they understand really well, can manage well, and make decisions about. Stepping into leadership then needs a whole lot of other skills. Where knowing all the answers has gotten people into a new role, they now need to rely on not-knowing to get by. And this is one of the paradoxes of leadership.

Leadership is not about knowing all the answers - it's not always practical or real. You know that multiple ...