Summary
Leadership is the capability to revolutionize an individual’s action so as to accomplish the objectives set by the leader. To commence this, character is believed to be the firm base of which the leader should poses to accomplish his goals.
Character is the set of traits that mould a person’s thoughts, actions, feelings and reaction. It comprises of empathy, making good judgment, portraying strength of will, achieving goals, displaying a strong sense of conscientiousness and maintaining self respect (Western, 83). A leader’s behavior reveals his personality when it comes to leadership and also depicts the leader’s temperament.
Physical traits like being smart, witty, and handsome, genius or even a great organizer does not qualify one to be leader. A leader possesses the definite exercise of leadership, that is, he or she may give direction or guidance to some other human being in a way that the other person will be willing and able to implement the directions. In every business setting, quality leadership must be portrayed for the business of the premise to strive.
Background
People who have been put in the leadership position in many cases have not portrayed the personality of a quality leader. From the decisions, policies and actions implemented by the current leaders, moral belief and behavior is missing.
A lot of leaders have been seen to give in to pressures from the outside world even though he or she is pressured towards doing what is morally wrong and unacceptable. The majority in the society seem to follow the majority even though they are on the wrong and this should not be the case with a leader. A leader should be able to stand when everyone else is against him or her as long as what he or she stands for is morally right (Ciulla, 5).
Body
Supervisors and managers have the authority to attain certain tasks. This means that they are bosses but not leaders since leadership makes the associates strive towards accomplishing certain goals and not bossing.
To be able to lead well, a leader requires wisdom in his mind and he or she must believe in his heart that neither his actions, money nor recruiting skills can earn him character. Since many leaders work towards being successful and earning money, they must understand that money is not the root to gaining other people’s favor nor is it a way to make others do what is supposed to be done. Though money can buy all the material things, it cannot buy moral character, honesty, sincere belief and behavior.
A successful leader should have in mind that he or she cannot purchase trust, honesty, kindness, respect, courage to make the right decision and also the aptitude to choose the right thing to be done. He or she must be aimed at ‘doing the right thing’ and not ‘doing things right’. A good leader should also be trustworthy. He or she must be able to trust himself in the decisions he takes on as well as gain other people’s trust and maintain it. Thus leadership should be trustworthy (Flynn, 86).
Good leadership does not entail blaming others for a wrong decision implemented or a choice made. Instead, it focuses on undertaking corrective actions and thinking of other challenges to embark on. This does not mean that the leader is at liberty to make wrong decision and excuse himself. Rather, he or she should make correct and timely decision making by consulting both his had and his heart and base his or her decisions on the leadership characters.
A good leader should also take time to know his or her associates and appreciate them where good has been done as well as correct them where they need corrections. He or she must develop team spirit and ensure that associates understand their respective tasks and have the spirit to accomplish them.
Conclusion
Good leadership does not mean bossing others around but rather creating a spirit that will provide conducive environment for others to live and work in. this is only possible when one possesses the characters necessary for a leader.
Work Cited
Ciulla, Joanne. Ethics, the heart of leadership. New York: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2004.
Flynn, Gabriel. Leadership and Business Ethics. Volume 25 of Issues in Business Ethics. New yolk. SAGE publishers, 2008.
Western, Simon. Leadership: a critical text. Massachusetts: SAGE, 2007