Leadership is a crucial managerial function that influences the direction taken by an organization, society, or a group of people. It determines approaches taken to enhance efficiency and accomplish particular goals and objectives. Leadership involves various aspects such as having a clear vision and capability to communicate the latter to the followers, inspiring others towards achieving set goals, and managing conflict and differences among different parties. Excellent and successful leaders possess a wide range of skills that enable them to deal with all people regardless of cultural or gender differences. The two books Better Together Chapters 1 and 2 and Cultural Intelligence: Improving Your CQ to Engage a Multicultural World explain important aspects of leadership in the contemporary world.
I think Chapters one and two of the book Better Together emphasize the significance of eliminating gender differences and uniting men and women to ensure an excellent future for everyone. The book shows how women have been discriminated against in making important decisions. For decades, women, especially in Africa have been denied an opportunity to participate in leadership in their societies, perpetuating the issue of inequalities (Strickland 2020). However, Strickland (2020) indicates that women can bring positive social, economic, health, and political changes. Therefore, the book can teach leaders to focus on empowering both men and women in society to guarantee a better future for everyone.
I think the book Cultural Intelligence: Improving Your CQ to Engage a Multicultural Word tries to explain the importance of having a skill that facilitates working in culturally diverse environments. Livermore (2009) expounds on the relevance of cultural intelligence in modern sociological realities, its theoretical perspective, and its framework. The author clearly shows that cultural intelligence is a critical leadership skill that ensures a cohesive and loving society. The skill allows leaders to understand cross-cultural differences and issues and address them, be mindful, reshape their interests and motivation, and change behaviors during cross-cultural interactions. The way the author explains the knowledge, interpretive, perseverance, and behavioral aspects of cultural intelligence makes it easier to understand how leaders possessing these skills can be instrumental tools for positively changing society.
The two chapters of the book Better Together help me better understand myself as a leader by explaining the different roles and strategies that I can utilize to promote the well-being of everyone in society. Indeed, leaders always focus on addressing issues that negatively impact their followers. The book gives enhances my knowledge about the role I have to play in building a healthier society by empowering both men and women. Conversely, the book Cultural Intelligence: Improving Your CQ to Engage a Multicultural Word helps me better understand myself as a leader by explaining an invaluable leadership skill vital in performing excellently in a culturally-diverse world. Technological advancements have accelerated the way people from different cultures come and work together, increasing the risks of cultural conflicts. Therefore, the book gives a reason as to why I should focus on enhancing cultural intelligence skills to guarantee excellent leadership.
The two books have equipped me with a better understanding of the world and the topic of leadership. Technological changes and the need to work and transact business in different parts of the world have accelerated intercultural interaction. This poses challenges to both individuals and leaders due to conflicts associated with cultural differences. Therefore, the world should focus on establishing a society in which people understand and embrace one another’s differences for a better future. Equally, gender inequality continues to be a significant issue with adverse economic, social, political, and health impacts. However, the world is changing towards empowering both men and women to address various social issues such as poverty. I have also gained an insight that leaders should be culturally intelligent and non-discriminatively empower men and women to guarantee excellent outcomes.
I will apply what I have learned from the two books to facilitate effective interaction with culturally diverse individuals and address issues that hinder gender equality from unlocking new opportunities for men and women. I always encounter people from different cultural backgrounds during the execution of day-to-day activities. Sometimes it becomes challenging to establish and maintain better relationships due to differences in the way we think and do things. However, knowing the importance of cultural intelligence and enhancing the latter will help me relate well with all people. As a leader, I will be training my followers to ensure that they have excellent cultural intelligence skills. Poverty reduced productivity, and conflicts in families are some of the issues associated with gender inequality. I will be empowering both men and women in society through training and other incentives to help address these social problems.
References
Livermore, D. A. (2009). Cultural intelligence: Improving your CQ to engage our multicultural world. Baker Academic.
Strickland, D. (2020). Better together: How women and men can heal the divide and work together to transform the future. Thomas Nelson.