Leadership : An Enhanced Personal View

Leadership is something that people are born with. It is an inherent charm and it doesn’t hide even if you want to hide it. There is a leader amongst us and he or she is the one that leads other people to great things by inspiring and motivating people to do good deeds. Leadership has been described as “a process of social influence in which one person can enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task”. This way a leader can decide what work goes in and goes out. Good leaders in history have left a mark in walks of life. But great leaders, they’re different. Great leaders have the ability to make each and every individual re-think their life decisions and choices by

Every generation has a leader that defines them. Martin Luther King Jr. was a leader for standing up to social rights and leading the civil rights movement. Abraham Lincoln began to lead the American people into unity after a long racial divide. What do I think a leader is? A leader is defined as “The person who leads or commands a group, organization, or country,’’ as said by Oxford. Because of this word’s old age, a leader is often interpreted very differently by different people and I think leaders are able to put others before themselves for the greater good. Along with being selfless leaders are people who are willing to sacrifice themselves for the good of the whole. For example, teachers have the responsibilities of a leader because they set the ground rules and represent their classroom. They are willing to sacrifice anything for your well-being. The leader, a kind and respectful individual, always wants those whom they lead

Leadership is the ability to inspire and focus members on a common goal, whether short term or long term and have the same vision. Leadership is more than telling or ordering, but having members believe and want to follow the same path as you. It’s a commitment to your people built on trust and respect. Many leaders shaped my personal leadership philosophy, to include several negative and positive experiences. Negative experiences from poor leaders and lessons learned on my part have uniquely shaped this vision. Difficult to be a good follower when your leader lacks competency, integrity, and your trust. If a leader takes credit for work other than their own, or forces and ideology onto others, but does not follow it themselves; these negative influences damage the trust and respect required of all leaders. However, positive experiences can also have a career lasting impact. A leader who inspires through personal actions and convictions can change how an entire unit operates without ever saying a word.

Leaders are those influential people who carry with themselves the responsibility to inspire others to attain a vision. A leader does not puts greatness into people, rather recognises the greatness that they already have. A leader can have endless attributes to be considered but what matters is the attributes that shine within him and makes him a good leader. History witnesses a dictionary of leaders and their own philosophies. Followers make the leader learn more about their own development of skills. Leader-follower fit just right is a challenge to be achieved. Though I truly believe that

Arguably, there are countless different definitions of leaders in the world, and my experience brought me in contact with countless worthy people who excel as examples of this. Consequently, by utilizing the abundant case studies over the last 28 years of my career, I formed the following definition of what a leader is: A morally grounded individual who meets all challenges with an infectious excitement which others wish to emulate. This drive inspires allegiance to this individual, mostly without a formal request to follow. The members just choose to assist this individual in meeting the desired results without a need for the accolades of a successful result.

A quick Google search for “Leadership” will yield over 490 billion entries with results ranging from Forbes Magazine to the Harvard Business Review, and on Amazon.com there are over 140,000 books written on the topic. If you limit your query to trying to find a definition of leadership the results be come only slightly clearer, with 298 billion results and thousands of websites trying to clearly articulate the definition of a leader. This focus on building great leaders stretches throughout history with philosophers like Plato extolling the virtues by which good leaders could be identified, and examples like Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, and George Washington litter the annals of history giving us living examples by which to model leadership.

My idea of leadership is being able to inspire others, motivate, set a vision, communicate, respect others, and of course, lead by example. A leader must have an honest understanding of who they are, what they know, and what they are capable of. To be a successful leader, you have to be able to convince your followers, not just yourself or your superiors, that you are worthy of being followed. In my opinion, this can build confidence in their followers to have faith in you, in order to be able to lead. I strongly believe that good leaders are made rather, and not born. If you have the desire and willpower, you can become an effective leader. Good leaders are developed through a never ending process of self-study, education, training, and

The world has its fair share of leaders, both good and bad, real and fictional. How did they lead? By example? Fear? Power? Which is the best way, the moral way, and the most effective way? Leadership, as previously stated has many different ways of showing itself, and in the period of human history there has always been someone on top. Great leaders and not so great leaders, it is this select few that characterizes the world we live in now. Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Dr. Jose Rizal, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. are some of the many positive great examples history could offer, however, Mao Zedong, Kim Jong Un, Karl Marx, and Adolf Hitler are some not so great figures in the world. Although these leaders may seem worlds apart the similarity

A leader is described as a person who guides others and has authority and influence over others. They work to influence others into meeting certain goals. There is no right or wrong definition of a leader and there is no recipe that ensures effective leadership. Successful leaders have a good balance of vision, influence, and power. “Leaders gain their authority from their ability to influence others to get the work done; because of this, anyone has the potential to be a leader.” (Finkelman. 2012 P15)

As the researcher of this observation, my definition of a leader would include a person who is in charge and convinces other people to follow them. This individual creates an inspiring vision of the future. Motivates and inspires people to engage with that vision. From this definition a person would conclude if an individual wasn’t able to motivate a person or group of people to achieve great things, then that person wouldn’t be considered a good leader.

The word leadership can mean different things to different individuals. It brings variety of images to our minds as well. It can be from a political leader like Hamid Karzai or Obama, an inspirational person like Ahmad Shah Massoud, Nelson Mandela, Gandhi, or Martin Luther King, an executive like Steve Jobs and for some people it can be someone like Osama Bin Laden, one determined “leader”, who was able to successfully encourage hundreds of his followers to sacrifice their lives. For me Leadership is open-ended as it is so broadly used, but I perceive a leader someone who is a role model in any field and can successfully take the followers to achieve the objectives they ultimately pursue.

Leadership is also a powerful word like President or King. It has the ability to change lives, improve communities and thrive in business. But for all the good it can do, it can also destroy. Leadership if left in the wrong hands can be terrifying. Take Hitler for example, He committed horrendous crimes against humanity and his treatment of the Jewish people was revolting. His charismatic qualities along with his intelligence and his ability to communicate effectively compelled people to follow him, even though he was a vicious dictator. Hitler’s leadership was the cause of an assortment of pain and horror throughout the world during his reign.

John C. Maxwell once said, “A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way,” (Brainyquote). In our society, we know about many good leaders in the past and today, because of the internet, and news stories. People risk their life for other people, they make smart choices for themselves and others, and they tolerate and control their feelings when something doesn’t go the way they wanted it to go. Leadership is not just being a great leader, it is being able to take risks, and having self confidence, and emotional stability.

What is leadership? According to Moore, (1927, p. 124) the term leadership is defined by ‘the ability to impress the will of the leader on those led and induce obedience, respect, loyalty, and cooperation’ (as cited by Northouse, 2017, p. 2). The word has a positive connotation to it when you think of certain leaders. When I hear it I immediately envision some of our great leaders of the past and present such as; Martin Luther King Jr. and Christiane Amanpour. Each of these leaders have demonstrated good leadership in their lives and we can all learn from them.

Leadership does not have one universally accepted definition; it is according me an ever-evolving concept. I firmly believe that even though individuals can be groomed and trained to be leaders, however some leaders could motivate and influence individuals around them more effectively/easily then others and direct an organization into a coherent and cohesive way in order to accomplish objectives and targets. This exact school of thought is actually a common thread or an existing element in various theories and