LEADERSHIP What do following people have in common? XIUHTEZCATL ROSKE-MARTINEZ Youth director of Earth Guardians, a worldwide conservation organization (that he founded!) that brings together activists and artists with an environmental streak MARI COPENY Mari Copeny wrote a letter to President Obama, asking him to meet with Flint activists in Washington, D.C. President Obama instead visited Flint directly, and in the years since, Copeny has continued to raise awareness for the Flint Water Crisis and bring joy, resources, and community to the kids of Flint. In 2017, she partnered with Pack Your Back and raised $10,000, contributing school supplies and 1,000 backpacks to Flint students. MELATI AND ISABEL WIJSEN These two sisters have transformed a dream into reality. Melati and Isabel started their own company, Bye Bye Plastic Bags in 2013, at the ages of 10 and 12, respectively. They live in Bali, and were inspired after sitting through a lesson about Nelson Mandela, Lady Diana, and Mahatma Gandhi in school and decided to literally be the change they wanted to see in the world the most inspiring part of their work is that it’s achieved real results: they successfully lobbied Bali airport to ban plastic bags in August 2016, and by January of this year, the entire island of Bali was declared plastic bag free. The country of Indonesia, one of the most populous in the world, is planning to ban all plastic bags by 2021, BILL AND MELINDA GATES The Gates Foundation spent more than $36 billion to fund work in global health, emergency relief, education, poverty, and more Eliminate eliminate malaria " within a generation," tackling a disease that has recently been on a fatal rise after decades of decline and working to end Ebola and polio Improve access to vaccines in the poorest countries in the world The Gates Millennium Scholars Program was established in 1999 to provide financial support to students of color pursuing undergraduate degrees. “The key to becoming an effective leader is not to focus on making other people follow, but on making yourself the kind of person they want to follow. You must become someone others can trust to take them where they want to go.” John Maxwell – Everything she did, she did for her people. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news /article-2126586/LiliuokalaniHawaiian-Queen--guilty-treasonimprisoned-palace.html Queen Liliʻuokalani Kuhio was often called Ke Ali’i Makaainana (Prince of People), and is well known for his efforts to preserve and strengthen the Hawaiian people. While a delegate of Congress, he spearheaded the effort in the passage of the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act that provides lands for native Hawaiians to homestead. Prince Kuhio was also known for restoring the Royal Prince Order of Kamehameha I and establishing the Hawaiian Civic Club. Kūhiō Kalanianaʻole Pope Francis, the 266th vicar of Jesus Christ on Earth, a man whose obvious humility, empathy and, above all, devotion to the economically disenfranchised has come to feel perfectly suited to our times, Pope Francis' leadership principles like this: "Commit to yourself deeply, including your frailties, and come to some peaceful acceptance of yourself and your calling to lead. Then, commit to 'get over yourself' to serve a purpose greater than self.” Work among and with the people you want to lead http://www.inc.com/minda-zetlin/whypope-francis-is-so-effective-8-lessons-forevery-leader.html Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/pope-francis-thetimes-they-are-a-changin-20140128#ixzz3C1bNmPoI Pope Francis Mahatma Ghandi Steve Jobs Malala Yousafzai Winston Chruchill Cpt. James Kirk Eleanor Roosevelt Margaret Thatcher Nelson Mandela Martin Luther King, Jr Talk to your group Discuss what do these people have in common? What traits do they share? • • • Defined: Individual’s ability to get others to willingly follow. What are Leadership Qualities? Characteristics? Traits? Is there a difference? YES. • • Qualities are things that are naturally who you are; self-confident, visionary Characteristics or Traits are descriptions of a feature (color, size) or actions taken; describes a quality VISION & COMMUNICATION • A leader with vision • • a clear, vivid picture of where to go, what success looks like and be able to act A leader that can communicate the vision • Ability to connect and communicate clearly and passionately to get people to buy in and follow. • Integrity is the integration of outward actions and inner values. A person of integrity is the same on the outside and on the inside. Such an individual can be trusted because he or she never veers from inner values, even when it might be expeditious to do so. A leader must have the trust of followers and therefore must display integrity. •Dedication means spending whatever time or energy is necessary to accomplish the task at hand. A leader inspires dedication by example, doing whatever it takes to complete the next step toward the vision. By setting an excellent example, leaders can show followers that there are no nine-to-five jobs on the team, only opportunities to achieve something great • Honest dealings, predictable reactions, well-controlled emotions, and an absence of tantrums and harsh outbursts are all signs of integrity. A leader who is centered in integrity will be more approachable by followers. •Magnanimity means giving credit where it is due. A magnanimous leader ensures that credit for successes is spread as widely as possible throughout the company. Conversely, a good leader takes personal responsibility for failures. This sort of reverse magnanimity helps other people feel good about themselves and draws the team closer together. To spread the fame and take the blame is a hallmark of effective leadership • Leaders with humility recognize that they are no better or worse than other members of the team. A humble leader is not self-effacing but rather tries to elevate everyone. Leaders with humility also understand that their status does not make them a god. Mahatma Gandhi is a role model for Indian leaders, and he pursued a “follower-centric” leadership role. •Openness means being able to listen to new ideas, even if they do not conform to the usual way of thinking. Good leaders are able to suspend judgment while listening to others’ ideas, as well as accept new ways of doing things that someone else thought of. Openness builds mutual respect and trust between leaders and followers, and it also keeps the team well supplied with new ideas that can further its vision. •Creativity is the ability to think differently, to get outside of the box that constrains solutions. Creativity gives leaders the ability to see things that others have not seen and thus lead followers in new directions. The most important question that a leader can ask is, “What if … ?” Possibly the worst thing a leader can say is, “I know this is a dumb question • Fairness means dealing with others consistently and justly. A leader must check all the facts and hear everyone out before passing judgment. He or she must avoid leaping to conclusions based on incomplete evidence. When people feel they that are being treated fairly, they reward a leader with loyalty and dedication. •Assertiveness is not the same as aggressiveness. Rather, it is the ability to clearly state what one expects so that there will be no misunderstandings. A leader must be assertive to get the desired results. Along with assertiveness comes the responsibility to clearly understand what followers expect from their leader. •A sense of humor is vital to relieve tension and boredom, as well as to defuse hostility. Effective leaders know how to use humor to energize followers. Humor is a form of power that provides some control over the work environment. And simply put, humor fosters good camaraderie. FIVE LEADERSHIP TRAITS The five leadership traits/leadership qualities are: Honest. Forward-Looking . Competent . Inspiring . Intelligent . Your skill at exhibiting these five leadership qualities is strongly correlated with people’s desire to follow your lead. Exhibiting these traits will inspire confidence in your leadership. Not exhibiting these traits or exhibiting the opposite of these traits will decrease your leadership influence with those around you. HONESTY AS A LEADERSHIP QUALITY People want to follow an honest leader. Years ago, many employees started out by assuming that their leadership was honest simply because the authority of their position. With modern scandals, this is no longer true. When you start a leadership position, you need to assume that people will think you are a little dishonest. In order to be seen as an honest individual, you will have to go out of your way to display honesty. People will not assume you are honest simply because you have never been caught lying. One of the most frequent places where leaders miss an opportunity to display honesty is in handling mistakes. Much of a leader’s job is to try new things and refine the ideas that don’t work. However, many leaders want to avoid failure to the extent that they don’t admit when something did not work. There was a medium size organization that was attempting to move to a less centralized structure. Instead of one location serving an entire city, they wanted to put smaller offices throughout the entire metro area. At the same time, they were planning an expansion for headquarters to accommodate more customers at the main site. The smaller remote offices was heralded as a way to reach more customers at a lower cost and cover more demographic areas. FORWARD-LOOKING AS A LEADERSHIP TRAIT The whole point of leadership is figuring out where to go from where you are now. While you may know where you want to go, people won’t see that unless you actively communicate it with them. Remember, these traits aren’t just things you need to have, they are things you need to actively display to those around you. When people do not consider their leader forward-looking, that leader is usually suffering from one of two possible problems: The leader doesn’t have a forward-looking vision. The leader is unwilling or scared to share the vision with others. When a leader doesn’t have a vision for the future, it usually because they are spending so much time on today, that they haven’t really thought about tomorrow. On a very simplistic level this can be solved simply by setting aside some time for planning, strategizing and thinking about the future. Many times when a leader has no time to think and plan for the future, it is because they are doing a poor job of leading in the present. They have created an organization and systems that rely too much on the leader for input at every stage. COMPENTENCY AS A LEADERSHIP QUALITY People want to follow someone who is competent. This doesn’t mean a leader needs to be the foremost expert on every area of the entire organization, but they need to be able to demonstrate competency. For a leader to demonstrate that they are competent, it isn’t enough to just avoid displaying incompetency. Some people will assume you are competent because of your leadership position, but most will have to see demonstrations before deciding that you are competent. When people under your leadership look at some action you have taken and think, “that just goes to show why he is the one in charge”, you are demonstrating competency. If these moments are infrequent, it is likely that some demonstrations of competency will help boost your leadership influence. INSPIRATION AS A LEADESHIP QUALITY People want to be inspired. In fact, there is a whole class of people who will follow an inspiring leader–even when the leader has no other qualities. If you have developed the other traits in this article, being inspiring is usually just a matter of communicating clearly and with passion. Being inspiring means telling people how your organization is going to change the world. A great example of inspiration is when Steve Jobs stole the CEO from Pepsi by asking him, “Do you want to sell sugar water for the rest of your life, or do you want to change the world?” Being inspiring means showing people the big picture and helping them see beyond a narrow focus and understand how their part fits into the big picture. INTELLIGENCE AS A LEADERSHIP TRAIT Intelligence is something that can be difficult to develop. The road toward becoming more intelligent is difficult, long and can’t be completed without investing considerable time. Developing intelligence is a lifestyle choice. Your college graduation was the beginning of your education, not the end. In fact, much of what is taught in college functions merely as a foundational language for lifelong educational experiences. To develop intelligence you need to commit to continual learning–both formally and informally. With modern advances in distance, education it is easy to take a class or two each year from well respected professors in the evening at your computer. WHAT MAKES A GOOD LEADER? The leadership qualities that are required to make a good leader can vary in different companies, teams and situations – IT DEPENDS ON THE SITUATION! “The pessimist complains about the wind. The optimist expects it to change. The leader adjusts the sails.” John Maxwell • • • • • • • • • Empathy? Resilience? Openess? Communication? Impulse control? Humility? Respect? Responsibility? Care? LEADERSHIP STYLE Autocratic Leadership: Autocratic leadership is an extreme form of transactional leadership, where leaders have absolute power over their workers or team Bureaucratic Leadership: Bureaucratic leaders work “by the book”. They follow rules rigorously. Charismatic Leadership: Charismatic leaders inspire lots of enthusiasm in their teams. Democratic Leadership: Democratic leaders make final decisions. They invite other members of the team to contribute to decision making process.
