Encouraging the Heart

In the reading, Encouraging the Heart by James Kouzes and Barry Posner, they seek to explore one of the most indescribable leadership skills of all caring. Caring is said to be an essential skill to be a successful leader, yet one of the most difficult to master. Kouzes & Posner propose that caring leadership is composed of seven essentials: setting clear standards, expecting the best, paying attention, personalizing recognition, telling the story, celebrating together, and setting the example. The book seeks to describe how and why caring leadership works, and goes beyond outlining practices and principles associated with this type of leadership. This book is an inspirational and uplifting blend of theory and principle, true-life stories of caring leadership, and self-reflecting questions.

As a leader, we can show people that we believe in them despite our personal feelings by providing positive feedback and encouragement. By providing positive feedback and encouragement, we can inspire people to feel confident and show that we trust their abilities to do the best job possible. Showing people that we dislike them and do not believe in them can create stressful relationships which will affect the quality of work be done, however through positive feedback and encouragement we can develop healthy relationships to obtain the best results. Sometimes if we try to build a good rapport and believe each other, we can eventually overcome our differences and find common ground despite not liking everything about each other.

To inspire and influence others, a leader must possess many skills and abilities. As motivational speaker Peter Northouse, states, “a leader should be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant” (Northouse, 2013) Moving an entire group of individuals toward a singular goal is a considerable undertaking. Without effective communication skills and a clear vision of what needs to be accomplished, one will feel like they are trying to herd cats rather than leading.

A wise woman once said “A good leader inspires people to have confidence in the leader, a great leader inspires people to have confidence in themselves.” These wise words were stated by the 32nd U.S. First Lady and civil rights activist, Eleanor Roosevelt. This quote has shaped the leader I am today and inspired my leadership philosophy. I believe a leader should always lead in a way that inspires others to be greater. As an older sister, I aspire for my sister to have confidence in me but also in themselves. This also applies to any leadership opportunity. I also believe that a great leader must also be a great follower. This has proven essential in my life and strengthened my leadership skills. My time as a follower has made me the leader

The heart of leadership has to do with what a person believes, values, dreams about, and is committed to. - Sergiovanni

Queens of Bringing Heart Together is an organization, which was established in spring of 2017. This organization is dedicated to serving patients with the best option when it comes to heart related issues. This particular organization has more than one method of helping heart related issues such as transplants, bringing knowledge to prevent future heart issues, guiding patients with payment plans, and most importantly nursing the patients.

With that in mind, health care leaders are asking questions like how can we deliver the best care possible to our patients, involving everyone on their team. Also leading by example with humility and not power would nurture a strong leader-employee relationship. “Executives and all the other managers in the organization must become students of the work, relinquishing their need to (seem to) have all the answers. Most importantly, they must mentor, coach, and teach’ (Toussaint,

Encourage the Heart is another Exemplary Leadership practice discussed by Kouzes and Posner. Encouraging the heart is close to caring. The genuine recognition of others and a celebration of the team's contributions will encourage others and is essential for leadership. The two commitments that fall under this practice are:

Leadership is an important aspect of life as it pushes us to create leaders out of followers or become leaders for a change. Leadership serves distinct purposes for everyone, but the quote “leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality” by American scholar Warren Bennis directly relates to my views regarding leadership. Bennis shows how a leader guides others to victory by successfully helping them fulfil their plans. As a leader in multiple situations, I believe that a leader always has to prevent others from falling and motivate them to create their aspirations into reality. If a leader fails to do so, he or she decreases the confidence and morale of its followers and averts the followers from becoming leaders in the future.

Having these emotions provides the abilities for leaders to be able to lead by humanity. More importantly, the age-old Biblical doctrine of "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” and other leadership Biblical principles can then serve as a model that supports Goldman (1998) and other individuals’ arguments that a "True Leader" must possess emotional maturity and emotional stamina to be truly effective. "True leaders" must know and understand who they are as individuals and know why they behave the way they do. Consequently, being able to understand themselves provides the connection to other people ... for allowing them to understand

Marian Anderson, once said, “As long as you keep a person down, some part of you has to be down there to hold him down, so it means you cannot soar as you otherwise might.” This quote shows the values and ideals Anderson held. It inspires us to lift each other up. This is a crucial part of leadership. Leaders do what they believe is ethical to help others while achieving results they will be proud of. As a young woman entering the real world, I hope to become a moral leader. I hope to elevate the spirits of others by lending my hand and helping those who need it the most.

As a leader, you need to interact with your followers, peers, seniors and others, whose support you need in order to accomplish your

Incomprehensibly, the vitality that gets individuals going can likewise make them surrender. Transformational Leaders frequently have a lot of energy which, if tirelessly connected, can destroy their

Leadership is a grey territory. The delicate balance between being inspiring and intruding the subordinates as well as co-workers is often hard to find. Every employee comes from a different backdrop with a different set of experiences that shaped his notions of fairness and professionalism. A leader is vested with the responsibility to bring this kaleidoscopic set of values under one umbrella, to sprinkle some of his eccentricities and designs into this mixture and redefine the work culture to include the best of everything. A leader need not necessarily be a superior. He may be a co-worker or a person stationed below the traditional leadership chairs. He just needs to have the vision to recognize a problem when he sees it, and a self-assigned mission to deal with it at the very roots. There are no roadmaps to great leadership. There are mistakes and there are shortfalls. But what sets a leader apart in the potpourri of personalities trying to assert themselves in a common arena is his belief that he can – self efficacy. A leader trusts his own abilities to excel and places faith that he may be able to draw out commitment and a hunger to

“A leader is best when people barely know they exist” this quote from The way of life according to Lao Tzu explains how a leader should be. It means a leader has to be able to get their point by. This means that they should be heard because people want to listen, not because they were forced. They must be able to connect with others and understand them. As a leader they must they must have all the right qualities and be able to inspire others.