Early leadership experience can be very valuable. Selective colleges screen for demonstrated leadership experience , and studies have found that people with high school leadership experience are paid up to 33% more than those without it. This wage premium is similar to the one associated with a college degree. However, we know little about what types of skills early leadership service may help to develop. Although adults who serve as leaders are observably different from nonleaders — leaders tend to have higher cognitive ability, more self-confidence, and more motivation or drive — we don’t know much about whether these differences arise because leadership service changes individuals or because these individuals are selected for their preexisting skills. To investigate this question, we studied 378 seventh-grade students in a Chinese secondary school. Among the top 92 students, we randomly assigned classroom leadership positions to 46 of them. We tracked the students f
BUSINESS RESEARCH | BRANDING | ANALYSIS