What Makes a Good Leader?

The success and failure of a venture rely heavily on its leadership. It’s essential to build up leaders with a skillset that helps guide your venture towards future successes. So, what makes a good leader? Simply put, a good leader empowers people to give and be their very best.

Managers might busy with meetings, decision-making and bureaucracy but if they are not focused on their team’s ability to perform – they are failing as a manager.

Leaders shape nations, communities and business. Having good leaders to help guide us and make large-scale decisions keeps the world moving forward.

This article will also provide information on:

What Are the Qualities of a Good Leadership?

What Is the Definition of a Good Leader?

10 Tips To Become A Good Leader

What Are the Qualities of a Good Leadership?

The action of leaders is constantly scrutinized in good times and bad. That is why it is so important for every leader to do their best to gain the qualities of great leadership. Like when building any skillset, you are required to learn from mistakes and continually strengthening your weaknesses.

Successful leader exhibit certain qualities that make them successful. Based on research from the Center for Creative Leadership, here are the key qualities of a good leader.

• Ability to inspire
• Ability to delegate
• Clarity
• Commitment
• Communication
• Confidence
• Courage
• Creativity
• Decisiveness
• Honesty
• Humility
• Intuition
• Passion
• Positive attitude
• Sense of humor

What Is the Definition of a Good Leader?

Managers focus on the how to do things, while leaders focus on the why. Leaders engage people connecting everything to a larger mission and thinking beyond the now as to what the future could be. Leaders focus on the big picture. They inspire and motivate by creating and demonstrating a vision, mission and values that help guide other towards greatness. Good leaders know how to self-motivate themselves, how to motivate others and how to lead through change.

10 Tips To Become A Good Leader

As it has been discussed previously in this article, some qualities of good leadership include commitments, passion and creativity. Now that you know these qualities, what can you do embrace these value qualities and become a better leader?

1) Understand Your Leadership Style

Understanding your leadership style is so important in how you forge your path as a leader. What are your strengths? Where could you make some improvements?
To better understand your leadership style, take this quiz and read on the dominant characteristics of your leadership style. Are these characteristics helping or hindering your performance as a leader? Once you have identified the areas you need to work on, you look for ways to improve your leadership abilities.

2) Encourage Creativity

A good leader encourages the intellectual stimulation of their follows by empowering them to express their creativity. Effective leaders offer new challenges with ample support to achieve these goals.

A method for fostering creativity is offering challenges to your team that are within the grasp of their abilities. The purpose of setting up these challenges to encourage your team to stretch their limits and not limit and not be discourages by failure and barriers.

3) Be a Role Model

Good leaders walk the walk and talk the talk. As a result, follower tend to admire these leaders and try to emulate these behaviors. Transform your team by modeling qualities that you like to see your team members.

4) Show Your Passion

Would you go to someone for guidance if they did not truly care about the goals of the team? Probably not. Good leaders have genuine passion and enthusiasm for the projects they are working on, so they encourage a group to focus on finishing their tasks.

This skill can be developed by thinking of different ways to express your excitement and passion for your work. Show people that you care about their progress. Be sure to tell your team that you appreciate their contributions regularly.

5) Listen and Communicate Carefully

Another important task of a leader is to provide one-on-one communication with team members. Effective leaders express sincere care and concern for their team both verbally and nonverbally.
Keeping an open line of communication allows your team to feel comfortable to contribute openly and receive recognition for their achievements.

6) Be Positive

Good leaders are upbeat, optimistic and inspiring to their followers. If leaders seem apathetic or discourage, this can affect how their team feels under their charge.

Even when things look bleak, it is up to a leader to stay positive for their team. This does not mean thing should be viewed through rose-colored glasses but simply maintaining optimism in the face of challenges.

7) Encourage People to Contribute

It is important to let your team know that you welcome their ideas. When you encourage involvement from your team are thought of as democratic leaders. While they retain the final say over all decisions, they encourage active participation from their team in coming up with ideas and making plans.

Research has indicated that democratic leadership has the greatest commitment, more creative problem-solving and improved productivity.

8) Motivate Followers

Effective leaders provide inspirational motivation that encourages their followers into action. Being inspirational isn’t always easy. Fortunately, there are methods for inspiring your team other than just rousing motivational speeches.

A leader could inspire their team by being genuinely passionate about their ideas and company goals, helping team members feel included in the process and offering recognition of their people’s accomplishments.

9) Offer Rewards and Recognition

A good system of rewards and recognition is important for a good leader to have to keep their team happy and appreciated. And not surprisingly, the happier your team is the better they will perform at their jobs.

Leaders can help their teams be happier by removing barriers to success and rewarding strong efforts.

10) Always Try New Things

Leadership does not have to be a one-way relationship. As you work to develop your leadership qualities and strategies, look to your team for feedback and inspiration.

Keep track of things that have been effective in the past but always look for new ways to inspire, motivate and reward your team.

 

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