Essay: Essential Characteristics Of A Good Leader And Leadership Skills Development.

Do Leadership Traits Matter?

What comes into your mind the term leadership is mentioned? Well, leadership is the process of by which leaders implement the leadership qualities at the work place. Do leadership traits matter (Kirkpatic & Locke 1991)? Yes they do matter in that it is a must for a person inspiring to become a leader to have the identified traits of a leader such as honesty, courage, discipline and humility. Without these qualities, a person can make to be a good leader. All leaders need to always identify their strengths and weaknesses so that they can be able to plan on how to develop those skills in the future. It is also good for leaders to accept their mistakes at a given time so that they learn from their mistakes and become great leaders they wish.

Since a leader is someone who is above say, other employees, he or she requires good characteristics that will identify him or her as a leader. There are some of the characteristics that are seen as the most essential characteristics that define a great and good leader. These characteristics include:

Most business employees are the reflection of their leaders. A leader who is ethical in that he or she is responsible in the assigned duties as a leader will always be able to raise the bars of the business even higher than expected. To be honest as a leader is being able to be true to both the employees under you and the business. An honest leader will not hide the mistakes occurring within the business but will try to handle them by being open to the employees or the management.

Being a leader is not an easy task as people think it is. Most leaders may at one point be scrutinized if mistakes are noted within the business and as a good leader he or she should be bold enough to face the challenges and come up with the solutions. Though most courage can be a blessed virtue within a leader, most great leaders tend to practice how to be courage enough and overcome the fear in them. Courage as observed helps leaders to fulfill their roles and responsibilities assigned to them by the management of the business and gain good values and clear vision (Synder 2010).

Though confidence is an attractive quality that people admire in a leader, humility should be part of the confidence exercised by the leader. A humble leader will always be able to communicate with his or her employees well and understand what the need as a team. A good leader will always be able to admit the mistakes detailed out of him or her and take advantage of that to improve his or her qualities as leader. Employees will always give a listening ear to a humble leader rather than a rude and ignorant leader.

A leader will never lack his points of strengths and weaknesses. There are those points where a leader is able to handle his responsibilities with great strength but it also comes a point where the leader will fail to handle the delegated responsibilities due to the weakness within him. As a leader in a business company, I realized the strengths and weaknesses that were within my leadership skills. These are referred to as the attributes of a good leader (Lutz 1986). The strengths that reflected in my leadership role included:

1. Ability to find a better way of doing things

Executive Summary

This is the most appropriate strength I noted once I started my leadership role in the business. As the leader I was able to come up with new methodologies of how to do things within the organization and that made me realize my strength as a leader. I implemented new ways that would bring changes to the business in a positive way for example; I had the ability to change the positions of the employees working generally in the organization. This was to prevent close relations between the employees which could incite them not to report any negative impacts an employee is creating in the organization.

1. Ability to spot what was not working more than other leaders

Being allocated the responsibility of being the kitchen staff leader, I was able to note some of the areas that were not working as per the expectations of the business. Most of the kitchen staffs were wasting time talking during working hours instead of handling the orders given to them. As a leader with qualities, I was able to note that the poor management of time in preparation of food by the kitchen staffs which lead to more lose in the business. Many customers would leave without taking their orders due to the poor time management by the kitchen workers. Other than me, no leader was able to spot why the business was losing customers day after day.

1. Ability to market the business products

My strength as a leader in the food production organization was that I was able to market the food products to different populations in different countries. I had the ability to come up with good ideas of marketing the business products to many countries and areas that were surrounding the organization. This was one of the strongest strengths that boosted and encouraged my leadership role since the more I marketed the products, the more the customers the business accommodated. This strength encouraged the management to raise my wages more than of other leaders.

Not all men are perfect thus there are the skills that break a leader hence becoming a challenge in their leadership role (Ames & Flynn 2007). Some of the skills (weaknesses) that I noted that were breaking me as a leader and I did not have included:

1. Ability to make peace with those who resist changes

Changes are the things that will never miss in any organization with many employees or individuals. Though accepting a change is hard, employees or individuals concerned should at least try and accept the changes so as to bring developments within the organization. As the leader in the food production company, I faced the challenge of conflicting with the employees who resisted changes that I came up with. It was so discouraging for me when I was in bad terms with those who did not want to change and do as required. This is one of the skills that I plan to develop in the future since I realized it caused me some of the hardworking employees who quit the job due to resistance to changes leading to leadership challenges a leader faces (Kouzes & Posner 2006).

1. Ability to report negative behaviors to the management

The Essential Characteristics of a Good Leader

Relationships are meant to be created between people who work together in good terms. As the leader of the kitchen employees, I had to make good relationship with the employees so that they could listen and do as I required them. These relationships developed up to a point where I found it difficult to report the employee’s negative impact on the business. It could have been sad for me to lose my workmates if I went ahead and reported them to the top management since the management could not have listened to their excuses but fire them at the spot. This weakness or skill is one if the leadership skills I am planning to work on in the next leadership role I will be enrolled in.

1. Ability to work with large teams and organizations

The skill of engaging in work with a large team or a well recognized organization is also among the skills that I am planning to develop in the future. I realized I had the courage and potential to work along with the small team of kitchen staffs I was given. If I had the courage to manage a small team, then I realize that I have to develop my courage to the extent of being able to work with larger teams and organizations as I am planning to become a great leader.

We say experience is the best teacher. Due to the experiences I had while working in the food production company, I had the chance to realize the leadership skills that I have to develop in the future leadership role I will engage myself in. Though I was a good leader, there were skills that did not meet the qualities of a good leader and according to Conger and Falmer (2003) a leader requires to develop his or her leadership pipelines. After sometime I came up with some strategies that I plan to implement while developing leadership skill. The plan strategy included the following items that I needed to find out on how to handle them come later when I become a great leader;

A plan is the first step to achieving what is expected by a leader. A good plan will always outline the objectives and the goals of the planned activities and I had to find out the objectives of this plan. My plan of developing my leadership included the objectives that I intended to achieve along the way. Some of the objectives detailed in my plan were such as; to ensure I meet the people I would wish to work with in a decade from now, the ensure I note the various positions at work place that I wish to undertake before I achieve the goal of becoming the CEO of the World Bank, to ensure more practice is done on the qualities of a good leader and lastly to ensure I note the legacy that I wish to leave the world with.   

My plan is not only become a leader but a great leader who will be recognized for having the best and reliable leadership qualities. A decade from now, I see myself as being the CEO of the World Bank which is located in. when I work on the leadership skill of how to work with large organizations and teams, then I can see myself working as the CEO of the World Bank in a decade to come. The plan here is to improve my courage in that I will be able to stand and give a speech to more than a thousand people as the leader of the World Bank. To achieve this, I need to start talking to large number of people from different countries. This will help me modify my skill of being able to work with the largest bank in the world.

Honesty

Along the way, I see myself working with the presidents of different countries, CEOs of the other banks and also with the great managers of the World Bank.  I can see myself as a great leader due to the qualities that details me as a good leader for the last few years I have been working with different organizations. To achieve the goal of working with presidents, managers and also other CEOs, I have come up with a plan to visit different countries and have successful conversations with the presidents and the CEOs of the banks in the countries. This plan would help me gain more courage. My weakness of having conflict with those who resist change will be handled since I myself will have to accept the changes that the presidents of visited countries will implement.

To become a good and reliable leader, I needed to practice more on the qualities that describes a great leader. I had to plan on how and what practices that I will adopt so that I end up being a great leader I desire. First, I planned to carry out the practices that will help me boost my courage and to achieve I planned to engage myself with large numbers of people in different levels at work place. I also planned on how to handle my attitude with those who would resist my changes in the place of work. Along the way I plan to be a leader of a small organization and implement changes so that I can be able to relate well with those resisting changes.

A good leader will always ensure that he or she leaves back a legacy to the world so that he or she will be remembered as a great leader of the organization worked for. In my plan to develop my leadership, I noted the legacy that I wish to leave to the world once I achieve the greatest job of being the World Bank’s CEO. I plan that when I achieve my greatest job, the legacy I will leave to the world will be my ability to enroll the best leadership skills than other leaders. I plan to modify all the qualities needed for one to be the best and great leader so that once I enroll in the World Bank; I will implement them to ensure great leadership is observed within the work place.

Conclusion

Are there people who are aspiring to become leaders but do not know the qualities of a leader? Well, to sum it all, it is therefore correct to conclude that for a person to become a great leader in any work place, all the qualities that satisfies a leader should be seen in him or her. The qualities that a good leader should have are such as; courage, honesty and humility. It can also be concluded that not all leaders are always right since there are those weaknesses that tend to discourage the leadership skill of any leader. Different leaders have different weaknesses such as mine of being unable to report negativities of employees to the management and also the ability of not relating well with the employees that resist changes by conflicting with them.

For a leader to improve his or her leadership skills, he or she needs to come up with a plan that will enable him or her to carry out the activities that will help them in developing their leadership skills as they enroll in larger organizations. A person needs to ensure that he or she meets the objectives that are set in the outlined plan of developing the leadership skills.

Not only are the people who are aspiring to become leaders but also leaders are recommended to carry put a plan that will enable them to develop their leadership skills. Leaders are highly recommended to have positive attitude when they are dealing with their various weaknesses noted in their leadership roles at the work place. Also, various organizations are recommended to encourage the various leaders so that they can improve their leadership roles in different departments. Motivating the leaders will also lead to motivation of the employees by the leaders into providing work that is of high standards without negative impacts.

References

Hoff, K. S. (1999). Leaders and managers: Essential skills required within higher education. Higher Education, 38(3), 311-331.

Kirkpatick, S. A., & Locke, E. A. (1991). Leadership: do traits matter?. The executive, 5(2), 48-60.

Kouzes, J. M., & Posner, B. Z. (2006). The leadership challenge (Vol. 3). John Wiley & Sons.

Exline, J. J., & Geyer, A. L. (2004). Perceptions of humility: A preliminary study. Self and Identity, 3(2), 95-114.

Snyder, N. (2010). Vision, values, and courage: Leadership for quality management. Simon and Schuster.

Lutz, C. M. (1986). Attributes of a Good Leader. Vocational Education Journal, 61(3), 28-30.

Ames, D. R., & Flynn, F. J. (2007). What breaks a leader: the curvilinear relation between assertiveness and leadership. Journal of personality and social psychology, 92(2), 307.

Conger, J. A., & Fulmer, R. M. (2003). Developing your leadership pipeline. Harvard business review, 81(12), 76-85.