Personal Reflection \"On Leadership.\" Leadership

Personal Reflection "On Leadership."

Leadership is a concept that has many associations. For most, leadership might be seen as a position of power, where the manager functions as the decision-maker with subordinates who carry out decisions. In today's leadership paradigm, however, this type of autocratic leadership is no longer regarded as optimally effective. Instead, leadership can only be effective when it is surrounded by certain conditions. This is something that John Gardner refers to in his book On Leadership. For the author, leadership entails that leaders and followers should work as a team that fulfills specific roles to fulfill the purpose of the team and leader.

One specific thing that struck me about Gardner's writing is the fact that the purpose of leadership is not so much to solve problems that arise as it is creating a company or team that can solve problems that the future will bring. Problems will arise regardless of the excellence of a particular leader's problem solving skills. A truly good leader will ensure that the company or team will be able to survive after the leader has left.

To accomplish this, the author notes that motivation and confidence are primarily important qualities. While effective leaders heighten both these qualities, it is difficult to set up such effective leadership in environments where they are absent to begin with. However, even in such circumstances, I feel that an effective leader can build the confidence and motivation required to make a success of the venture. The most important component of successful leadership is the leader him- or herself should start with the necessary qualities to be effective. Leaders cannot be effective if they do not themselves have motivation and confidence.

Motivation and confidence should be focused upon more than one thing. The leader should, for example, have confidence in him- or herself, while also having confidence in the company and its employees. Employees, in turn, should have confidence in the leader and the company. This confidence can then be used to build motivation; the leader's motivation, I feel, should come first. In my experience, a leader without motivation will necessarily be unable to inspire motivation in his or her employees, which in turn will lead to a lack of success in the long-term. In this way, the leader's attitude and qualities lead directly to the success or failure of the company, as leaders infuse the corporate culture with his or her attitude.

Another very important component of successful leadership is shared value. Leaders bring with them a certain set of values when they enter the position. These can be both personal and business values. The author notes that human beings are creatures of belief. All areas of life have some belief system at their roots. Religion, relationships, education, and business, for example all thrive when there is a central value system that governs them. In the same way as the components of motivation and confidence, the leader should also embody the basic values upon which the company is built.

One thing that struck me in particular was the examples of effective leadership where the value system is either skewed or non-existent. The Ku Klux Klan, for example, is an example of leadership that cares for its followers, but endorses prejudice and murder. Hitler is another prime example of such leadership. These examples are then used as evidence to support the need for leadership that is built on a set of values.