Custom «Leadership Portrait» Essay Paper Sample

Introduction

According to the old adage, “Everybody can be a leader, but not all can be good leaders.” Leadership is a vast and important subject although it is confusing in the eyes of many because of the different interpretations. The main task of a leader is social influence by giving support to others in order to accomplish a common task (McDougle, 2006). It has been an important area for study by many scholars because in everyday activities people have to bring in leadership in order for them to run their business smoothly. Current essay is aimed at analyzing different issues about leadership.

Personal Leadership

Various leadership theories have been developed by different scholars with majority of them being aimed at explaining what good leadership is. The situational and contingency theories clearly explain good leadership. These are theories that appeared as a reaction to the trait theory of leadership. The theories hold that different situations call for different characteristics. Therefore, there is no single optimal psychographic profile leader (Durowoju & Yusuf, 2013). The task that is being performed determined the type of leadership characteristics that will be employed. The theory is very effective in explaining a good leader because a leader who cannot change with the task is not an effective leader. In the current global economy there are many changes that occur on a daily basis. Therefore, leaders need to be adaptive to the task so that to take advantage of it (Durowoju & Yusuf, 2013). The leader has to take part in a decision-making process which is very important for maintain a high relationship behavior with his/her subordinates. A good leader must be flexible which helps him/her adapt easily and take a proper decision depending on the situation. It is based on the idea that good leaders need to be adaptive to both favorable and unfavorable situations. Participating in a decision-making process is also a key to becoming a strong and effective leader. A weakness which can be observed in this is the ability to delegate duties. A good leader has to know how to delegate duties so that responsibility is passed to individuals. At times, it becomes challenging as the leader thinks that it shows irresponsibility to delegate tasks rather than work with the subjects to complete the tasks.

Good leaders have to be honest so that others can emulate them. If all people could speak the truth then some issues, such as transparency and accountability, would be addressed with ease. A good leader also possesses good professional communication skills (Salaman, 2004). Through these characteristic leaders are able to relate the organization’s vision to the team and by the word of mouth lead them to achieve the goals. Confidence is also a key leadership. It is seen in the ability to put out fire and maintain team morale. When things go astray good leaders do not panic rather they build confidence in them and in their subjects that will be good. Moreover, a good leader has to possess the following traits: high commitment, institution, creativity, and the ability to inspire.

One leadership characteristic a good leader has to develop is the ability to delegate duties. It is a leadership trait that is highly supported by the situational theory of leadership. The ability to delegate duties gives one a chance to give tasks to employees so that they would feel responsible for them. Through this it becomes easy to manage the task and those implementing it. A good leader must strive to develop a positive attitude (Durowoju & Yusuf, 2013). It is an important trait that keeps balance between productivity and playfulness by creating the right mood in the work environment.

Academic experiences are very important when it comes to good leadership. It acts like an avenue for preparing people to be good leaders in the future because they are equipped with much theory relating to good leadership. For instance, they are told about strategies of developing the right traits as a leader. Therefore, when they get to the field they put this into an empirical form and in the end they become good leaders. Education is a lifelong process through which people acquire academic skills they use to evaluate academic writing (Jones, 2008). These skills are important as they help people to obtain what is best for them and how they can improve their current position as leaders. In future a good leader will be able to improve his/her leadership ability as he/she will be getting technical know-how from different scholarly writings.

A good leader influences others in the community. It means that good leadership goes beyond the walls of the organization. In order to build and maintain strong relationships with people in the community a good leader needs to be a role model (McDougle, 2006). It is enhanced by the differentcharacteristics portrayed. For instance, if a leader practices honesty when relating with others in the community they will eventually emulate this. As the old adage goes, “Once a teacher always a teacher”; this is the same situation when it comes to good leaders. A leader will need to motivate others in the community and show them direction. Beyond the academic experiences there are personal experiences which play a critical role in good leadership (Durowoju & Yusuf, 2013). It helps people to continue improving their leadership skills because they are able to learn from their mistakes. Therefore, a mistake today will act as a strength tomorrow because better leaders develop their skills every day.

A public service leader needs to show an ethical behavior. For public leaders it is important to use impartial judgment when it comes to service. There are some people who will tend to favor one side because they lack the ethics in public service. A public service leader will also need to avoid conflicts of interest that in most cases undermine their objective judgment. They also need to avoid favoritism and refuse bribes.

When it comes to public service a good leader needs to embrace diversity and inclusiveness. It is based on the fact that there are different types of people in public organizations and they all need to be lined to achieve the set organizational goals (Salaman, 2004). A good leader will need to embrace diversity by employing skills that will be considered by all. The leader will also need to be flexible to adapt to different individuals in the organization. Every employee needs to be involved in decision making so that they would feel themselves a part of implementation process.