Definition Of Leadership And Leadership

Leadership entails guiding others to realize particular goals using a variety of skills (Sullivan & Garland, 2011); Weihrich & Koontz, 2008). Likewise, Spector (2006) defined leadership as the art of influencing others to readily and actively endeavour towards achieving goals set by the team. Additionally, Spector (2006) emphasized that there is a shared theme that leadership comprises influencing individual belief systems, behaviours and feelings. As such, the smooth running of an organization requires effective leadership.

The Army’s definition of leadership is influencing people by providing purpose, direction, and motivation, while operating to accomplish the mission and improve the organization (Army, 2012). As a young Sergeant in the United States Army, I thought I was being a good leader by being an effective manager. I was determined to lead Soldiers and accomplish my organizations’ mission. As I gained more experience and attained the rank of Staff Sergeant, I realized that I was managing instead of leading. Leadership is not synonymous with management. Leadership goes beyond the allocation of personnel and resources to accomplish the organization’s goals. Leadership involves change, from being an individual performer to being an influencer. An effective leader has the ability to unite personnel behind the organization’s mission by examining individual motivations to promote success. Providing purpose and direction instills ownership in the success of the organization. A leader is also effective in building team culture. Yet, a leader cannot accomplish the above with establishing her/her own leadership philosophy grounded their individual values,

The role of leadership is an important position within an organization or group, since this position may influence an environment, both, the individual, and the climate. In the event of concentrating on how influential leadership may be, some leaders have transformed the views or perspectives of individuals within a society. Therefore, it’s possible for leadership traits to motivate, persuade, or stimulate visions, rather they are appropriate or unethical.

In today’s competitive world, leadership skills are crucial for both personal and professional development. Leadership is an important function of management which helps an individual or a business to maximize efficiency and to achieve goals. Leadership has different meanings to various authors.Most commonly, leadership is defined as influence, that is, the art of influencing people so that they will strive willingly and enthusiastically toward the achievement of group goals. (Koontz). Leadership is the process of influencing the activities of either formal or informal group in the task of goal setting and goal achievement. A leader is one whose magnetic personality innervates people for some cause. Not by words, but by their actions is

Leadership has been studied extensively and many varying definitions exist. Hughes, Ginnett and Curphy (2015, p.4) review many of these definitions and consequently describe leadership as ‘the process of influencing an organised group towards its goals’. Leadership involves the interplay of a range of different factors, not least the leader themselves, the followers and the situation. For

Murphy’s definition of leadership stems around the idea that leadership is situational, in which the leader, follower, and situation are all influenced by the other, and that through this interaction and relationships, a leader emerges and leads towards the achievement of a goal (Murphy, 1941).

The basic premise for leadership is the process of influencing other people to follow your lead in order to accomplish a goal. It is about the relationship between the leader and the followers. A good leader tries to motivate people to bring about positive changes revealing a common objective without using coercion or manipulation. Leadership is not about control, but permitting interaction and communication between the leader and the individual followers. With empowering others, leaders build a foundation of collaborative thinking and encourage an atmosphere of personal involvement; a leader can strengthen the respect and loyalty of his or her followers. Leaders can affect this process by applying their own personal characteristics, such

The study of leadership and the actions it entails can be dated back as far as 2300 B.C (Bass and Stodill, 1990), however in the modern day the study has evolved greatly, with theories and writers inputting their views and constantly updating and changing the definitions of what they believe leadership to be.

Leadership is a state of being a leader/head of a group of people, organization, and/or country. Ken Blanchard state that "As leader, we hold the lives of others in our hands, and these need to be gentle, caring and always available to provide support" (pg.2). Every leader has different styles or different ways of leading his people to achieve their common goal. This paper will talk about leadership theory and will compare and contract each theory from the each other.

Every individual has his or her own definition of leadership. Leadership is the coordination of actions that motivate individuals to work together. This paper will discuss the skills and qualities associated with effective leadership and its significance.

Throughout this class, we learned that leadership can be defined in many ways by different sources. The definitions depend on many things and different variables. One way we can attempt to define leadership is through characteristics of the leader, the followers, and the situation (Yukl, 2013). Yukl, 2013 defines leadership as being “the process of influencing others to understand and agree about what needs to be done and how to do it, and the process of facilitating individual and collective efforts to accomplish shared objectives” (Yukl, 2013 p.7). The character of the leader influences situations and followers in different ways. The characteristics of the followers also call for a different type of leadership style to influence them to complete that shared objective. A stern leader might influence followers to react with fear just like a charismatic leader might create a sense of euphoria from their follower.

“Leadership is a process whereby an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal.” (Northouse) I use to believe that leadership shows the confidence that many people do not portray, because my thoughts were that leadership was a group of people who stand up for the things that they believe. After an extensive study on the meaning of leadership, I have come to find that there is no way to specifically define the meaning of leadership, but there are ways to grasp a better understanding of what the aggregate meanings entail. The big questions that we are faced with are these; how is leadership approached in life, when is it practiced and needed, and who are some leaders in history that portray great leadership skills.

Leadership is complex and has many meanings. Therefore, to craft one definitive definition of the word leadership is challenging as there are many facets to be considered. Over the years, many scholars have offered vary definitions of the word leadership for example, Gaiter (2013) pointed out that “leadership requires leaders to have the ability to understand workings of individuals’ interactions and relationship within the workplace.” Similarly, Marquis and Huston (2015) have suggested that leaders are those individuals who are out front, taking risks, attempting to achieve shared goals, and inspiring others to action. Additionally, Northouse (2012) has argued that leadership is a component of traits, abilities, skills, behaviors, relationship, and processes. In other words, leadership encompasses the capacity or the ability (of a leader) to create a vision, effectively deliver this vision to followers, and as a result inspiring and mobilizing followers to accomplish desired goals. Leaders are frequently being watched; followers are always looking in the direction of their leaders to see what they are doing. They are watching, examining, analyzing, and learning what the standard; the culture is within the group. Consequently, the actions and decisions made by leaders do, have profound effect on followers. As an illustration, think of a leader i.e. Martin Luther King Jr., he led with truth, empathy, compassion, and conviction that “great things” can be accomplished

According to Stogdill (1974, p7) “There are almost as many different definitions of leadership as there are persons who have attempted to define the concept.” Leadership has been defined in a variety of different ways; most definitions of leadership share processual, contextual and evaluative components. Taking a chronological view, Hollander (1978, p1) defined leadership as “A process of influence between a leader and those who are followers.” Leadership is an interaction between two or more members of a group that often involves a structuring or restricting of the situation and the perceptions and expectations

The concept of leadership has no exact or definite definition. This is due to the fact that leadership in itself is multifaceted (de Ver,2009,p.4). The concept of leadership can for instance be defined in terms of group processes (Bass,1990,p.11), as personality and its various effects (Bingham,1927),as the art of successfully inducing compliance (Munson,1921), as an exercise of one's influence (Nash,1929), as an act, as a behavior (Fiedler,1967), as a form of persuasion (Neustadt,1960),as a power relation (Bass,1990,p.15), as an instrument for achieving goals (Borgadus,1929),as a differentiated role