Leadership

What is leadership? Most of us can recognize a leader or leadership qualities when we see them. Yet we would be hard pressed to define leadership conclusively. Perhaps this is because different people have different ideas of what constitutes leadership. Leadership can occur in almost any situation. We tend to think of it in grand terms. Someone who leads a nation through a difficult time or gives a grand vision - a destiny you could say - to fulfill. However, leadership occurs in more modest environs as well. Corporate leadership is a well documented phenomenon. Most of the large corporations in the world today were built up through corporate leadership. Many of the improvements in the quality of life were built up through someone taking up an issue and working for improvement in that area.

If defining leadership is hard to pin down, then perhaps we can look at some of the characteristics of leadership. In my view, leaders have a vision for the future towards which they work for. It is a vision that they can inspire in other people as well. Someone who has vision but is unable to inspire it in others fails to become a leader. Leaders need not be charismatic in the strict definition of the word. They do need to bring others round to their vision and that has to be more than strictly utilitarian. Some of the best corporate leaders like Jack Welch and Bill Gates have had very clear ideas of where they want their organizations to be.

More later.