They are the men and women who inspire you. Who transform
potential into reality. Who manage, motivate, energize and influence people.
Who create an iconic vision of the future. Who bring success and prosperity.
The leaders. The visionaries who make a corner of the world a little better
with their passion and innovation.
As with various other endeavours, leadership is important at every
level in every organization. It is the leaders in an organization that provide
the direction, encouragement and impetus to the employees towards conquering
goals. Great leaders create great employees and together they create success
for a business or an organization.
So, are good
leaders born or made? Is leadership a natural talent or is it a characteristic
that can be nurtured? The question is sure to throw up many contrasting views, but
behavioural theories point out that leadership is definitely more than just
genetics.
Inborn traits can be associated more with leadership emergence
than with leadership effectiveness. Within a group, an extrovert, a more
intelligent or a confident person might assume leadership of the lot. However,
this charisma does not necessarily mean that the same person will perform well
if placed in a formal position of leadership.
People can become leaders through the process of training,
learning, experience and observation. Inherent characteristics like being bold,
assertive, smart, or risk-taking can be advantageous for leaders. If you don’t
possess these characteristics, fret not. You can still be a phenomenal leader
if you learn and develop the tactics, the strategies and the implementation.
Some of the most common attributes of a leader are -
· Decision making skills
· Flexibility
· Fairness
· Empathy
· Confidence
· Conviction
· Communication skills
· Conflict resolution
· Critical thinking
· Discipline
· Business acumen
While individuals are born with varying degrees of these traits,
only through practicing from the adolesent stage, these characteristics daily
and across varying situations, can they become deep-rooted and an integral part
of your character. Observe, listen, ask questions and pay attention to people
around you. Take it upon yourself to evaluate your leadership abilities and
acquire new skills. Do not wait to start learning something new, rather seek it
out.
Leaders who have these qualities should not be complacent either
but work hard to gain valuable expertise, perspective and insight to augment
their skills. That is how effective leaders maximize their success. They make
use of leadership training programs, knowledge from books, management courses,
mentoring and learn from their experience to boost their skills and cement
their position as a great leader.
Thus, if you are an owner of a business or part of the top
management, you need to recognize that strong leadership development training
at all levels in your organisation is crucial. Leadership is not about merely
communicating guidelines to your employees and expecting them to achieve them.
What an organization should do is prioritize leadership development and invest
the required resources to make it happen and more importantly, make it
effective.
For this you need to -
· Communicate with your employees and get them to understand what
leadership role is expected of them. Once you give them an overview of
leadership requirements, you can provide them an opportunity to analyze where
they stand and what skills gap they need to address to reach their goal.
· Once you analyze your employees’ leadership strengths and
weaknesses, you can decide on the kind of training they need. Training should
be given in the core leadership skills that is lacking. Provide them with
online resources, conduct workshops and bring in industry leaders to share
expert views on leadership and leadership practices.
· Networking is essential to individual growth of any leader as well
as for business development. Networking will teach them how to form connections, enter into discussions/conversations
and act with the confidence of a leader.
· Set up an objective mechanism to evaluate the performance of
employees in leadership roles. You should reward employees who have shown
outstanding leadership skills.
· Train your managers on new leadership styles, approaches, and
methodologies with a view to expose them to various ideas and situations.
· Mentoring is a great first stepping for developing leadership
attributes. By using an effective
mentoring program, you can help develop today’s talent into tomorrow’s leaders.
· Believe in your employees and give them the authority to make
certain decisions. When you give your employees responsibilities, they
will rise to the occasion and emerge as
leaders.
· People learn to be leaders by being around leaders. Leaders at the
top should be role models for employees. They should aim to continuously remain
a successful and a positive model in the workplace.