What Makes A Politically Savvy Leader?

Intelligence is one of the more important traits related to effective leadership. Theodore Roosevelt possessed intelligence from a young age and this helped to understand the world around him. His thirst for knowledge took him on journeys that exposed him to many experiences. These experiences provided a different perspective about what it means to be a strong leader and what it takes to get people to follow you. He was always well informed and his emotional intelligence helped him to understand and perceive his own emotions and the emotions of others.

In What Makes an Effective Executive, Drucker (2011) outlines eight simple practices or rules that all effective executives follow (p. 23-24). He reminds us that during his 65-year consulting career, some of the cream of the crop executives have not exactly fit the leader stereotype who exudes charisma and charm. Rather, they are diverse with regards to their personalities, attitudes, values, strengths, and weaknesses. Harry Truman is an excellent example of this – a president who lacked charisma yet became one the most effective presidents in our history.

The most important characteristic for effective governmental leaders today is being genuine. The typical voter in America receives most of its political information from the media. Many times, the portrayal of politicians is distorted in a way that exclusively highlights characteristics that puts them in high pedestals. Our system is conditioned to see government officials as perfect, however, those who are honest and strive to have a natural connection with their constituents make the most relatable and effective governmental leaders in our democratic system today.

Every person has a different definition of what makes a leader. Some feel a leader is inspirational, while others regard leadership as someone who can give criticism and make the tough decisions. Each definition is unique, and each is vague. This is why the definitions of leadership people use aren’t always accurate. Bolman and Deal, however, do an excellent job of presenting four frames of leadership people use to successfully—or unsuccessfully—support and lead a group of people. The four frames presented by the authors are: human resource, symbolic, structural, and political. The human resource frame is used by leaders to empathize with their followers, the symbolic frame is used to inspire and unite followers around a vision, the structural frame is used to emphasize the importance of a process, and the political frame establishes competition and focuses on creating allies.

What does it take to be an effective leader in today’s fast paced and ever changing world?

Political Savvy: Political savvy is a skill that leaders use to assess the needs of the various stakeholder groups within their organization. They are also good at recognizing who represents these groups as key subordinate leaders within their organization. Using their political skills, great leaders are able to build coalitions by common cause among the key stakeholders. If a leader is unable to build collation, they will find it very difficult to move ahead with their agenda.

Political Savvy is very much like playing sports, while some have what might be considered divine talent others can perform on an equivalent level or better by learning to hone foundational skills and put into practice strategies to increase their political intelligence. Functional politics resonate from individuals whose self-interest are inline or parallel to organizational interests, this is the foundation for being Politically Savvy. After establishing a firm foundation by understanding what the organizations interests are, and realizing a way to align personal interests the next step will be to get others with in the organization to cooperate with you by socializing ideas and building bridges to meet them half way. (Shambaugh, 2012) According to Rebecca Shambaugh, a leadership strategist and fonder of Women in Leadership and Learning, there are five key facets to building social awareness and becoming Politically savvy. Situational awareness, presence, authenticity, networking, and clarity are five of the areas one must focus on to be effective as a Politically Savvy

Also social intelligence in this day, and age gives a leader the capacity to manage complex social

What qualities make a good leader? You can ask a hundred different people, and you will get a hundred different answers. A good leader is someone who accomplishes the mission, has the respect of their subordinates, and makes the difficult decisions when needed. For me, I believe that a great leader needs to have a variety of qualities, but most importantly a sense of fairness, hard work/care, and common consideration for others. Different experiences throughout my life and time at West Point have lead me to believe that these three tenants are what are most needed for a great leader. In terms of a leader’s moral character, common consideration has the greatest influence on the success of a leader, because without common consideration, a

What does it mean to be a leader? What qualities does a leader have? How do you become a good leader? Leader have many qualities that represent a wise person. There are leaders in everyday life and most of the time we don’t realize, their leaders. If we didn’t have leaders in life, nothing would get done and people would be clueless. Leader tend to lead when the time gets tough and people look to them. What happens if your leader is not a good leader? Your leader can also lead you into trouble and not be a traditional good leader. There are three leaders that come all in different times, Plato, Machiavelli, and Marcus Aurelius. These leaders aren’t at all from the same era, Plato was about 400 BC, Marcus about 200 common era, and Machiavelli about 1450 AD. These leaders all have different leading methods and show them through their writings. Of these three leaders I believe Marcus Aurelius is the better leader of the three. Marcus just like Machiavelli was an actually leader. Their ideas are is it better to be feared or love? Marcus thinks love, well Machiavelli thinks feared. The Plato side, is Platonism which is basically go with the flow type of leading, if you can’t control don’t worry about it. Unlike the first two Plato was never an actual leader. There are clearly different ways in which these leaders lead, they all have made clear texts for each style.

Leadership can be very complicated since it is personal and most of us have a different vision or stance on how we lead or think we lead. There are many definitions on what leadership is and most are usually correct in one way or another. A person’s leadership philosophy can be greatly influenced in many ways spanning their entire life and career. I have been influenced in many ways, starting with my parents and continuing to the newest A-school student checking into the Air Station. I like to think that a good leader is influenced by anyone he comes in contact with shaping who you are as a leader and that it never ceases to end. Being a United States Marine has also greatly influenced my life in many ways, including building the

Someone who is considered a leader has to have many qualities and abilities. They must have

What makes a leader? Some may say good values, environment, and role models. Others may say they are just born. I would not say I was just born a leader and I cannot say that there is just one moment that lead to all of this. There were a string of moments; accidental lessons and trainings. Overall, I do not think I ever chose to be a leader, I chose to be active and that choice is what lead me to where I am today.

The challenges faced by strategic leaders in implementing complex and long-range consequential decisions demand that they be sophisticated with respect to issues of leadership, power and influence. The changes that are shaping the nature of work in today's complex organizations require that we develop the political will, expertise and personal skills to become more flexible, innovative and adaptive. Without political awareness and skill, we face the inevitable prospect of becoming immersed in bureaucratic infighting, parochial politics and destructive power struggles, which greatly retard organizational initiative, innovation, morale and performance

The researchers surmised the integration of position power and political skill would have a positive correlation for those with high political skill and negative correlation for those with low political skill in regards to follower job satisfaction.