As a matter of fact, the majority of people involved in business and management consider leadership skills to be the most essential for any company’s growth and development. At the same time, a few of them genuinely understand the nature of leadership, its practical application, and its challenges. From the beginning, I did not reflect on this concept as well and perceived it according to the commonly accepted definition and features. In other words, leadership was simply regarded as an ability to control people and force them to follow instructions presupposed by inherited strong nature and sometimes declamatory skills. However, through the course that has provided me an in-depth insight into leadership, I started to realize that this concept is more multifaceted than I have expected.
First of all, I found it highly surprising and controversial that despite its paramount value for management, leadership skills are frequently underrated. It goes without saying that competent leaders may formulate problem statements more clearly and efficiently without asking themselves constantly what problems they need to solve. As a result, they achieve corporate goals and develop more rapidly in comparison with their less-focused counterparts.
However, the ability to pass through various challenges in the most appropriate ways does not come to leaders naturally as a considerable number of subordinates, partners, and colleagues may think – these people put conscious efforts to sharpen their skills elaborating on structured approaches.
Subsequently, I realized that a leader’s duties do not imply control over employees’ working processes. Competent leaders are partially responsible for the emotional state of their colleagues and subordinates. Thus, regardless of the source of emotional stress, a leader should provide support. In addition, a tactic of ignorance of employees’ negative emotions is highly unproductive as an adequate and wise response to people’s frustration, anger, and dissatisfaction may provide very important feedback that will positively influence the company’s performance in the future.
Moreover, leaders are responsible for a huge in-depth examination of strategies, working processes, management approaches, organizational culture, and workers’ individual characteristics to make their work meaningful by empathizing its important features. In turn, this meaningfulness will not only impact employees’ productivity but attract, motivate, and retain talented specialists.
To conclude, it is necessary to say that leadership is not an inherent quality that cannot be changed over the course of time, even if a substantial number of successful leaders achieve their goals slightly more easily due to their personal characteristics. Leadership skills may be obtained and develop through hard work and a constant process of self-improvement. Thus, it is essential for a leader to be surrounded by people who may propose something new for learning.
At the same time, individuality, honesty, and transparency may be regarded as the main values of almost any successful leader. In addition, I realized that a leader is not a person whose responsibilities are limited by control over subordinates. First of all, successful leadership presupposes deep respect for people regardless of their position in the organizational structure. Competent leaders should inspire employees in challenging situations, listen to them attentively, support their initiatives, consider their needs, share their positive emotions, and react to negative ones.