When you look around the corporate landscape today, you see plenty of highly paid CEOs and other top executives. These men and women are obviously all smart, hard working and powerful. But do they have the key leadership attributes of the greatest men and women in history?

Broadly educated. The greatest men and women in history were often self-educated. But they were also continuously self-educated. Those who were formally educated generally were not specialists in one area of field but were broadly and liberally educated in a number of areas from languages to sciences to history and literature. Today, more often than not, the women and men who lead the largest corporations in the world are engineers, accountants and MBAs as opposed to liberally educated people.

Singular focus. The greatest women and men in history often were singular in their focus whether it was political success, military victory, building a business empire or leading a great cause. These great people fought the odds and popular opinion over and over again to achieve success in their area of focus. Today