"Leadership
is not magnetic personality, that can just as well be a glib tongue. It is not
"making friends and influencing people", that is flattery. Leadership
is lifting a person's vision to higher sights, the raising of a person's
performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its
normal limitations."— Peter F. Drucker
Everyone
wants to be a leader but a few excel as leaders. Why it is so?
Is leadership the privilege of a few individuals? Not exactly! Here goes
the story:
Leadership
is a skill that can be acquired by various means including training, teaching,
reading, observation, practice, and experience. But only a few people become
leaders as they care for the people, and put in extra efforts. Especially the
people who like to be in their effective zones rather than in their comfort
zones excel as leaders. The people who are ready to take the blame in case of
failures and spread the fame in case of successes become the leaders.
Leadership is again taking responsibility. If you accept responsibility you can
excel as a leader. If you set an example
to others you become a leader. If you have the service orientation you can excel
as a leader. Therefore, leadership is easier said than done. Everyone cannot excel but only a few excel
who walk their talk; willing to take responsibility; ability to influence
people; and being smart in emotional intelligence.
There
are a number of definitions on leadership. For instance, Peter Drucker says,
"Leadership is not popularity. It is getting results." Ken Blanchard
says, “The key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority.” However, I would like to define leadership as
the process of setting the goals, influencing the people, building the teams,
making the decisions, motivating the people, and aligning them constantly
towards achieving the organizational goals and objectives.
There
are various leadership styles. But basically
there are three styles namely: democratic style, autocratic style, and
delegative style. In democratic style the leaders involve the people in making
the decisions and go by the majority decision. Since people participate it is
also known as participative leadership style. If anything goes wrong in
decision-making the entire team will accept the blame. In contrast, if
everything goes well the entire team takes the credit as they are actively involved
in participation. This style is good when the leaders are not in a position to
take a call, and the team demands participation, and there is availability of adequate
time.
In
autocratic leadership style, the leaders make the decisions due to paucity of
time and when they want to maintain confidentiality. Usually this style
prevails in armed forces, and it is also known as dictatorship leadership
style. Currently people don’t appreciate this style of leadership. However, there are still leaders who adopt
this style of leadership. In this style, if something goes wrong in
decision-making the leaders take the sole responsibility as they did not
consult anybody while making decisions.
In
delegative leadership style, the leaders pass on their routine leadership roles
and responsibilities to their subordinates to save their time, and groom
subordinates into leadership positions. If anything goes wrong the leaders take
responsibility. It is also known as free-reign
leadership style. From all these
leadership styles there is nothing like good or bad leadership styles, and
leaders must act as per the situation, and it is known as situational
leadership style.
Remember
leadership is not a cakewalk. It is full
of trials and tribulations. When everything goes well your people will take the
credit and if something goes wrong you are accountable. Only when you are prepared to accept
responsibility and ready to take both bouquets and brickbats you must endeavor
to excel as a leader. Are you ready to excel as a leader now? If you are ready to take up the responsibilities
then you are a leader.
I
wish you good luck in your endeavors!
“It
is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you
celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is
danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership.” - Nelson Mandela
Email:
profmsr12@gmail.com
Born
for the Students
Dear
readers,
I
would appreciate your comments about this article.
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