Are leaders really born as one or made as one? Leaders are people who help themselves and help others to do things right. While planning for success, leadership development is an important process.
What is leadership?
Leadership is setting a direction and motivating a group of people to act towards achieving a common goal.
Leadership is both a practical skill and a research area, embodying the ability of an individual, group, or organization to “lead”, guide, or influence other teams, individuals, or entire organizations.
Leadership is an “art”, which explains itself that there is no right way to do it. It is one’s intuition and attitude, which are built over time.
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Leaders tend to communicate vision and guide fellow humans; focus on leading huge client projects, and invest in developing their teams to grow. Improving leadership skills helps for greater innovation.
Innovative leaders focus on being more empathetic towards the team in the continued development and education of the individuals in their team and themselves. The innovative skills which are developed with the help of good leadership help to stay competitive in today’s business environment.
What makes a great leader?
A leader must be a great communicator. They must be good at communicating top-down and also bottom-up. This helps to create alignment and develop trust between people. He/she must have a strong opinion but also continue to learn.
Leadership development starts with listening and then being able to act accordingly with a very strong sense of self. A good leader must be courageous enough to take risks. They just shouldn’t talk about risk-taking but should also be bold enough to do it.
A great leader must possess the ability to influence others, they must be role models and lead by example. A leader must understand a multi-generational workplace. Outstanding leaders not only visualize the future, but they must know how to share their vision with their subordinates and get their alignment and attention.
Components of leadership development:
- Motivation
- Communication
- Creativity
- Positivity
- Feedback
Motivation
There arises the importance of managing people and relationships, which is generally much more important than tasks, to inspire their workers to go the extra mile. Leaders must learn what motivates their employees or their team members to increase productivity and encourage passion, and this can be achieved only by getting to know them.
There are a number of ways to encourage employees. It can be done through recognition and rewards or by giving the team members new responsibilities to increase their investment in the company.
Communication
Words have an incredible power to motivate and inspire the team members, not only when they are spoken but also when written or listened to. A huge part of successful communication involves good listening. A good way to build successful communication is to interact with team members or employees.
Creativity
In the challenging world, leaders must be able to “think outside the box”. He/She must be creative as well as innovative. Creative thinking and constant innovations help the leader and the team members to stand out from the crowd.
A leader who doesn’t always choose the safe option in order to discover what does really works for their team and organization will be impressed and inspired by most of the employees.
Positivity
A positive attitude can reach great miles. An effective leader should create space for the employees to feel respected and cared about.
He must develop a positive atmosphere and develop morale among the employees. If the employees feel that they are working in a positive atmosphere, they will be willing to put in more effort which increases the labor hours which in turn increases productivity.
Feedback
A person, being open to receiving feedback yourself helps the team members to respect you more as a leader and this will also ensure that you feel more confident delegating tasks to your staff. The team members will also feel respected for taking their feedback and listening to what they say.
Cognitive style:
Cognitive style is the manner in which individuals process, interpret, perceive and use information. It plays a significant role in leadership behavior as well as in leaders’ efforts to relate to followers, collaborators, superiors, peers, and constituents.
After many discussions, the cognitive style is mostly distinguished between left brain and right brain thinking patterns.
A linear approach to thinking, emphasizes analytical and logical tendencies which are said to be based on the left side of the brain. On the other hand, creative and intuitive thinking is said to be based on the right side.
In reality, all leaders use both the left and the right-brain thinking patterns, but most of them have a dominant style.
Are leaders born or made?
The most common question asked of all time is, are leaders really born rather than made?
Research shows that about 30 percent of the leadership skills are ingrained in their genes whereas 70 percent of it depends on external factors.
Many economists believe that some leaders are born while some are made. After all, today’s best leaders must be good at effective communication, adept problem-solvers, and be the builders of mutually-beneficial relationships.