The Top 10 Leadership Qualities

The Top 10 Leadership Qualities

Leadership can be defined as one's ability to get others to willingly follow. Every organization needs leaders at every level. Leaders can be found and nurtured if you look for the following character traits.

A leader with vision has a clear, vivid picture of where to go, as well as a firm grasp on what success looks like and how to achieve it. But it’s not enough to have a vision; leaders must also share it and act upon it. Jack Welch, former chairman and CEO of General Electric Co., said, "Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision and relentlessly drive it to completion."

A leader must be able to communicate his or her vision in terms that cause followers to buy into it. He or she must communicate clearly and passionately, as passion is contagious.

A good leader must have the discipline to work toward his or her vision single-mindedly, as well as to direct his or her actions and those of the team toward the goal. Action is the mark of a leader. A leader does not suffer “analysis paralysis” but is always doing something in pursuit of the vision, inspiring others to do the same.

Analysis

Integrity is the integration of outward actions and inner values. A person of integrity is the same on the outside and on the inside. Such an individual can be trusted because he or she never veers from inner values, even when it might be expeditious to do so. A leader must have the trust of followers and therefore must display integrity.

Honest dealings, predictable reactions, well-controlled emotions, and an absence of tantrums and harsh outbursts are all signs of integrity. A leader who is centered in integrity will be more approachable by followers.

Dedication means spending whatever time or energy is necessary to accomplish the task at hand. A leader inspires dedication by example, doing whatever it takes to complete the next step toward the vision. By setting an excellent example, leaders can show followers that there are no nine-to-five jobs on the team, only opportunities to achieve something great.

Magnanimity means giving credit where it is due. A magnanimous leader ensures that credit for successes is spread as widely as possible throughout the company. Conversely, a good leader takes personal responsibility for failures. This sort of reverse magnanimity helps other people feel good about themselves and draws the team closer together. To spread the fame and take the blame is a hallmark of effective leadership.

Leaders with humility recognize that they are no better or worse than other members of the team. A humble leader is not self-effacing but rather tries to elevate everyone. Leaders with humility also understand that their status does not make them a god. Mahatma Gandhi is a role model for Indian leaders, and he pursued a “follower-centric” leadership role.

Openness means being able to listen to new ideas, even if they do not conform to the usual way of thinking. Good leaders are able to suspend judgment while listening to others’ ideas, as well as accept new ways of doing things that someone else thought of. Openness builds mutual respect and trust between leaders and followers, and it also keeps the team well supplied with new ideas that can further its vision.

Creativity is the ability to think differently, to get outside of the box that constrains solutions. Creativity gives leaders the ability to see things that others have not seen and thus lead followers in new directions. The most important question that a leader can ask is, “What if … ?” Possibly the worst thing a leader can say is, “I know this is a dumb question ... ”

Fairness means dealing with others consistently and justly. A leader must check all the facts and hear everyone out before passing judgment. He or she must avoid leaping to conclusions based on incomplete evidence. When people feel they that are being treated fairly, they reward a leader with loyalty and dedication.

Assertiveness is not the same as aggressiveness. Rather, it is the ability to clearly state what one expects so that there will be no misunderstandings. A leader must be assertive to get the desired results. Along with assertiveness comes the responsibility to clearly understand what followers expect from their leader.

Many leaders have difficulty striking the right amount of assertiveness, according to a study in the February 2007 issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, published by the APA (American Psychological Association). It seems that being underassertive or overassertive may be the most common weakness among aspiring leaders.

A sense of humor is vital to relieve tension and boredom, as well as to defuse hostility. Effective leaders know how to use humor to energize followers. Humor is a form of power that provides some control over the work environment. And simply put, humor fosters good camaraderie.

Intrinsic traits such as intelligence, good looks, height and so on are not necessary to become a leader. Anyone can cultivate the proper leadership traits.

.Who Are Leaders?

Who Are Leaders?

Who is a leader? Many of us call to mind historic figures like Dr. Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Jane Addams, Robert Kennedy or President Reagan. In reality, we find leaders everywhere - linking together networks through which we work to achieve common purposes.  In every community, church, classroom, and organization hundreds of people are doing the work of leadership without which these efforts would not survive. 
Although we associate leaders with certain kinds of attributes (like power), a more useful way to look at leadership is as a kind of relationship. James McGregor Burns argues leadership can be under­stood as a relationship that emerges from repeated "exchanges" or "transactions" between leaders and followers or constituents. Leaders can provide resources constituents need to address their inter­ests and constituents can provide resources leaders need to address theirs. 
What do we exchange in this kind of relationship? Constituents may get help solving a problem, a sense of empowerment, access to resources, etc.  Leaders may get the same things - and something else too, something that makes us willing to accept the responsibilities that go with leadership. Dr. King describes this as the "drum major instinct" - a desire to be first, to be recognized, even to be praised. As much as we may not want to admit it, this might sound familiar. Rather than condemn it - it is, after all, part of us - Dr. King argues it can be a good thing, depending on what we do to earn the recognition we seek. 
Based on this view of leadership, then, who makes leaders? Can they be self-anointed? Can I decide one day that I am a leader? Or do I earn leadership by entering into relationship with those who can make me a leader by entering into relationship with me - my con­stituents?  This makes it easy to recognize leaders. There is one simple test. Do they have fol­lowers? Fine speeches, a wonderful appearance, lovely awards and excellent work aside - no constituency, no leaders.  You may not agree with this, but consider it. 
How Does Leadership Work?
Many of us may not want to think of ourselves as followers or as leaders, for that matter. Leadership is highly praised, but no one says anything about being a good constituent...or citizen. I argue voluntary associations only work when people are willing to accept roles of leadership and followership. Leading and following are not expressions of who we "are" but of what we "do" - in a spe­cific meeting, committee, project, organization, or institution. We may play a lead­ership role with respect to one project and a followership role with respect to another.        
Another important distinction is that between leadership and domination. Effective leaders facilitate the interde­pendence or collaboration that can create more "power to" -- based on the interests of all parties. Domination is the exercise of "power over" --a rela­tionship that meets interests of the "power wielder" at the expense of everyone else. Leadership can turn into domination if we fail to hold it accountable. 
We are also wise to distinguish "authority" from "leadership." Authority is a "legitimacy" of command usually attached to specific social positions, offices, or roles - legit­imacy supported by cultural beliefs as well as coercive resources. An organization is a way to formalize authority relations among the participants - people's rights and their obligations. Bureaucracies structure authority as a set of rules according to which managers direct subordinates. Markets structure authority as a set of rules according to which entrepreneurs can design incentives for persons to make enforceable choices based on their individual economic resources.  Civic associations usually structure authority democratically in that leaders are accountable to the constituents whom they serve.  Exercising leadership in a civic context can require more skill than the other settings because it depends more on persuasion than on command. 
Most of us have been in situations in which those with authority have not earned their leadership, but try to compel co­operation based solely on their legitimacy or "power over". In these circumstances, to what extent do we think our interests are acknowledged and addressed? How does this affect our motivation and performance?
Finally, leaders can be distinguished from "activists." Hard working activists show up every day to staff the phone bank, pass out leaflets, and put up posters, and make critical contribu­tions to the work of any volunteer organization. This is not the same, however, as engaging others in doing the work of the organization. Leadership is exercised through relational work. 
What Do Leaders Do?
We've said a great deal about what leadership is and isn't, but what is it exactly that leaders do to earn their leadership? What is the organizational work they do? And why is it so important? 
Most of us have had lots of experience in "disorganizations."  What are they like?

• They are divided.  Factions and divisions fragment the organization and sap it of its resources.  
• They are confused. Each person has a different story about what's going on. There is a lot of gossip, but not very much good information.
• They are passive.  Most "members" do very little so one or two people do most of the work.  
• They are reactive. They are always trying to respond to some unanticipated new develop­ment. 
• They are inactive. No one comes to meetings. No one shows up for activities.
• And they drift. There is little purposefulness to meetings, actions, or decisions as things "drift" from one meeting to the next.

Being part of a disorganization can be pretty discouraging, demotivating, and makes us ask ourselves why we're involved at all. 
On the other hand, some of us may have had experience with organizations that really work.

• They are united. They have learned to manage their differences well enough that they can unite to accomplish the purposes for which they were formed. Differences are openly de­bated, discussed, and resolved. 
• They share understanding. There is a widely shared understanding of what's going on, what the challenges are, what the program is and why what is being done had to be done. 
• People participate. Lots of people in the organization are active - not just going to meetings, but getting the work of the organization done. 
• They take initiative.  Rather than reacting to whatever happens in their environment, they are proactive, and act upon their environment. 
• They act. People do the work they must to make things happen.  
• They share a sense of purpose. There is purposefulness about meetings, actions, and decisions and sense of forward momentum as work gets done.             

So what makes the difference? Why are some groups disorganizations and other groups organizations? It is the quality of the work leaders do within them that makes groups work. 
• Leaders turn division into solidarity by building, maintaining, and developing rela­tionships among those who form the organization. 
• Leaders turns confusion into understanding by facilitating interpretation of what is going on with the work of the organization. 
• Leaders turn passivity into participation by motivation - inspiring people to commit to the action required if the group's goals are to be accomplished. 
• Leaders turn reaction into initiative by strategizing - thinking through how the organization can use its resources to achieve its goals.                                                           
• Leaders turns inaction into action by mobilizing people to turn their resources into specific actions by means which they can achieve their goals.                       
• Leaders transforms drift into purpose by accepting responsi­bility for doing the leadership work which must be done if the group is to succeed and challenging others to accept their responsibility as well.
 
Leadership Development
Developing a leadership rich organization not only requires learning to delegate.  It requires a conscious strategy for identifying leader­s (opportunities for leaders to emerge), recruiting leaders (opportunities for lead­ership to be earned), and developing leaders (opportunities for leaders to grow).                
Identifying leaders requires looking for them.  Who are people with followers?  Who brings others to the meetings? Who encourages others to participate? Who attracts others to working with them? Whom do other people tell you to "look for?" [Saul] Alinsky writes about community networks knit together by "native" leaders - people who take the responsibility for helping a com­munity do its work out of their homes, small businesses, neighborhood hangouts, etc. They can be found coaching athletic teams, organizing little leagues, serving in their churches, and surfacing in other informal "schools" of leadership.  Where would you look for these kinds of leaders around here?
Although leading is a matter of "doing" and not "being," there are some ways of being that can help you lead. It is hard for a person who has not learned to be a good listener to become an effective leader - you have to understand the interests of your con­stituency if you are to help them act on those interests.  Listening means learning to attend to feelings - empathy - as well as to ideas because the way we feel about things affects our actions more than what we think about them. Curiosity helps us see the novel as interesting rather than threatening, enabling us to learn how to face new challenges that are always a part of organizational life. A good imagination helps because strategizing is a matter of imagining different futures and possible ways to get to them.  A sense of humor helps you from taking yourself and your troubles too seriously and helps keep things in perspective. A healthy ego is very important - arrogance and a wish to dominate others are usually the sign of a weak ego constantly in need of reassurance. Leadership also requires courage - the willingness to take risks, make choices, and accept the consequences.
Recruiting leaders requires giving people an opportunity to earn leadership. Since followers create leaders, they can't appoint themselves and you can't appoint them. What you can do is create opportunities for people to accept the responsibilities of leadership and support them in learning how to fulfill these responsibilities.  If you have to get the word out for a meeting, you can get three of your friends to help you pass out leaflets in the Yard one day or you can find one or two people in each House who will take responsibility for recruiting 5 people from their House to attend. They earn their leadership by bringing the people to the meeting.  What other ways can you think of that you can give people the op­portunity to earn leadership?          
Developing leaders requires structuring the work of the organization so it affords as many people as possible the opportunity to learn to lead - delegation. Dis­tributing the leaflets through House Committees, for example, shares the responsibility for engaging others with many people. It is true organizing the work in this way can be risky. You may delegate to the wrong people; they may let you down, etc. But as Moses learned from Jethro, if you fear delegating, the strength of the community is stifled and can never grow. But you can do things to increase the chances of success. Leadership training sessions help clarify what is expected of leaders in your organization, give people the confidence to accept leadership responsibilities, and express the value your organization places on leadership development. 
Leadership Team or "Lone Ranger"
The most successful organizers are those who form a leadership team with whom to work early on in their campaign. Although it can be a mistake to recruit people to act as an "organizing committee" too early - especially if you are not careful to recruit people drawn from the constituency whom that community views as leaders or, at least, potential leaders - organizers more often err in delaying too long. The sooner you have a team of people with whom to work, the sooner the "I" of the organizer becomes the "we" of the new organization. One you have formed a leadership team you can more easily establish a rhythm of regular meetings, clear decisions, and visible accountability that will help make things actually happen. You don't build an organization of 500 people by recruiting them all yourself. You build it by finding people willing and able to commit to help building it with you. If you don't have a leadership team working with you by midterm, it's time to look very closely at why.
Conclusion
Although identifying, recruiting and developing leaders is critical to the capacity - or power - of most organizations, it is the particular focus of organizers whose work is to be leaders of leaders. The primary responsibility of an organizer is to develop the leadership ca­pacities of others and, in this way, of the organizations through which their constituents act on their common interests.

Ways to Identify a Promising Person - Leadership

Ways to Identify a Promising Person

The most gifted athletes rarely make good coaches. The best violinist will not necessarily make the best conductor. Nor will the best teacher necessarily make the best head of the department.
So it's critical to distinguish between the skill of performance and the skill of leading the performance, two entirely different skills.
It's also important to determine whether a person is capable of learning leadership. The natural leader will stand out. The trick is identifying those who are capable of learning leadership over time.
Here are several traits to help identify whether someone is capable of learning to lead.

• Leadership in the past. The best predictor of the future is the past. When I was in business, I took note of any worker who told me he was superintendent of a school or a deacon in his church or a Boy Scout leader. If he showed leadership outside of the job, I wanted to find out if he had some leadership potential on the job.
• The capacity to create or catch vision. When I talk to people about the future, I want their eyes to light up. I want them to ask the right questions about what I'm talking about.
• The founder of Jefferson Standard built a successful insurance company from scratch. He assembled some of the greatest insurance people by simply asking, "Why don't you come and help me build something great?"
• A person who doesn't feel the thrill of challenge is not a potential leader.
• A constructive spirit of discontent. Some people would call this criticism, but there's a big difference in being constructively discontent and being critical. If somebody says, "There's got to be a better way to do this," I see if there's leadership potential by asking, "Have you ever thought about what that better way might be?" If he says no, he is being critical, not constructive. But if he says yes, he's challenged by a constructive spirit of discontent. That's the unscratchable itch. It is always in the leader.
• People locked in the status quo are not leaders. I ask of a potential leader, Does this person believe there is always a better way to do something?
• Practical ideas. Highly original people are often not good leaders because they are unable to judge their output; they need somebody else to say, "This will work" or "This won't."
• Brainstorming is not a particularly helpful practice in leadership, because ideas need to stay practical. Not everybody with practical ideas is a leader, of course, but leaders seem to be able to identify which ideas are practical and which aren't.
• A willingness to take responsibility. One night at the end of the second shift, I walked out of the plant and passed the porter. As head of operations, I had started my day at the beginning of the first shift. The porter said, "Mr. Smith, I sure wish I had your pay, but I don't want your worry." He equated responsibility and worry. He wanted to be able to drop his responsibility when he walked out the door and not carry it home. That's understandable, but it's not a trait in potential leaders. I thought about the porter's comment driving home. If the vice-president and the porter were paid the same money, I'd still want to be vice-president. Carrying responsibility doesn't intimidate me, because the joy of accomplishment-the vicarious feeling of contributing to other people-is what leadership is all about.
• A completion factor. I might test somebody's commitment by putting him or her on a task force. I'd find a problem that needs solving and assemble a group of people whose normal responsibilities don't include tackling that problem. The person who grabs hold of the problem and won't let go, like a dog with a bone, has leadership potential. This quality is critical in leaders, for there will be times when nothing but one's iron will says, "Keep going." Dale Carnegie used to say, "I know men in the ranks who will not stay in the ranks. Why? Because they have the ability to get things done." In the military, it is called "completed staff work." With potential leaders, when the work comes in, it's complete. The half-cooked meal isn't good enough.
• Mental toughness. No one can lead without being criticized or without facing discouragement. A potential leader needs a mental toughness. I don't want a mean leader; I want a tough-minded leader who sees things as they are and will pay the price. Leadership creates a certain separation from one's peers. The separation comes from carrying responsibility that only you can carry. Years ago, I spoke to a group of presidents in Columbus, Ohio, about loneliness in leadership. One participant, president of an architectural firm, came up afterward and said, "You've solved my problem." "What's your problem?" I asked. "My organization's always confused," he said, "and I didn't know why. It's because I don't like to be lonely; I've got to talk about my ideas to the rest of the company. But they never know which ones will work, so everybody who likes my idea jumps to work on it. Those who don't, work against it. Employees are going backward and forward-when the idea may not even come about at all." Fearing loneliness, this president was not able to keep his ideas to himself until they were better formulated. A leader must be able to keep his or her own counsel until the proper time.
• Peer respect. Peer respect doesn't reveal ability, but it can show character and personality. Trammell Crow, one of the world's most successful real estate brokers, said that he looks for people whose associates want them to succeed. He said, "It's tough enough to succeed when everybody wants you to succeed. People who don't want you to succeed are like weights in your running shoes." Maxey Jarmen used to say, "It isn't important that people like you. It's important that they respect you. They may like you but not follow you. If they respect you, they'll follow you, even if perhaps they don't like you."
• Family respect. I also look at the family of a potential leader: Do they respect him or her? Fifteen years ago, my daughter said, "Dad, one thing I appreciate is that after you speak and I walk up, you are always attentive to me. You seem proud of me." That meant a lot to me. If respect isn't there, that's also visible. The family's feelings toward someone reveal much about his or her potential to lead.
• A quality that makes people listen to them. Potential leaders have a "holding court" quality about them. When they speak, people listen. Other people may talk a great deal, but nobody listens to them. They're making a speech; they're not giving leadership. I take notice of people to whom others listen.

It's not enough for people to have leadership potential; they must have character and the right setting in which to grow. Before I give someone significant leadership responsibilities, I find it helpful to ask myself several questions:

• What will this person do to be liked? It's nice to be liked, but as a leader it cannot be the controlling factor. The cause must be the prime motivator.
• Does this person have a destructive weakness? There are only two things I need to know about myself: my constructive strength and any destructive weakness. A destructive weakness may not show up on a test; it's a character flaw. A destructive weakness may, for example, be an obsession. An obsession controls us; we don't control it. It only grows worse over time.
• Can I provide this person the environment to succeed? It is so important, particularly in the early days of someone's leadership, that he or she be put into a congenial environment. I wouldn't want, for example, to put someone who requires mentoring with a leader who pays no attention to people. An environment that threatens our sense of security or well-being splits our concentration from the cause. Young leaders need an environment in which they can concentrate on leading.

What is the Role of Leadership?
You may have the following questions about your peer leaders.

• What do long-term school reform leaders view as their essential professional competencies?
• What do they see as their role in sustaining reform?
• How do they engage teachers, families, and communities in partnerships that build programs to help children meet challenging standards?
• How do such leaders know when they are doing a good job?

Dimensions of Sustaining Leadership

• Partnership and voice
• Vision and values
• Knowledge and daring
• Savvy and persistence
• Personal qualities (passion, humor, and empathy strength of character, general maturity, patience, wisdom, common sense, trustworthiness, reliability, creativity, sensitivity)