Reflection on Leadership
Common sense suggests that a leader needs followers. Hence leadership is the ability to motivate people to voluntarily follow you. In order to accomplish that you need to possess a set of qualities that benefits your followers and commands respect. Both aspects are very important. The most respected person will fail as a leader if he or she fails to benefit his or her followers through his or her extraordinary talents. These benefits can be material (such as higher income, increased living standard) and immaterial (such as inspiration, pacification and appeasement). The most skilled leader that benefits his or her followers will equally fail as a leader if he or she is incapable of earning respect. Being respected ensures that a successful leader’s success will be accredited to him or her and no potential rival dares to belie it.
The demands on leaders have grown in recent years as globalization and international issues have made the world more complicated and the full scope of problems harder to oversee. Leaders today need to deal with a lot more stress as they are expected to make themselves available at all times. Considering this, a third component of successful leadership is about to become equally important as the previous two I have mentioned above: the ability to selectively ignore and delegate while focusing on the strategic long-term issues. It is crucial for a modern leader not to forget the importance of guiding the way in a world where everyday business seems to become infinitely time-consuming and important.
