Leadership Qualities: How to become a good leader?

Know the Top Leadership Qualities to become a great leader.

Leadership quality is defined as the ability or the power to guide and lead individuals and teams, although it is a general definition, it is not the only definition.

According to the U.S. academy, Leadership Qualities are defined as:

A process of social influence in which a person can enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task.

Leadership qualities are the qualities required to be an effective, inspiring leader and demand sacrifice and patience and as a result are not part of everyone.

Only those who can stand like a rock even in the scariest and difficult times have the ability and eligibility of these qualities.

In this age of revolutionary changes, you may also aspire to be a good leader.

So if you want to be a good leader, you may have to bring a drastic change in yourself such as

• Broadening your vision
• Seeing the outside world from a new perspective

You cannot become a good leader without any effort and is not possible. Either you can choose a life full of loopholes or either a life with new and demanding ambitions.

Here in this article, I will discuss a good leader and effective leadership qualities.

Where are the Leadership Qualities Needed?

Leadership qualities are needed not only for a monstrous aim but even for a short-lived aim.

Whether you are working as a manager in a firm or running a school as a dean, you need these qualities to guide your subordinates.

These leadership qualities will unite others and they will be side by side with your aim.

Learn business management courses to learn managing skills and leadership skills essential to starting a business.

Who and How to be a Good Leader?

Leadership is not just a ten-lettered word and everyone can’t become a good or a great leader.

It is a combination of characteristics and abilities which demand great sacrifices to achieve greater aims in life.

You may ask now how to be a good leader. Good leaders are not born every day.

After a century of mismanagement, cruelty, and suffering, humanity is bestowed with great leaders.

A company or a business may have a leader or a boss. The main or key difference is that “a boss drives while a leader leads”.

A good and effective leader is to undergo many difficulties for the accomplishment of his ambition.

A good leader will think about others, ready to work with others to complete a task or aim.

Quality Leadership Skills

Leadership skills are the ones required to direct a group of individuals successfully. While the leadership qualities are the same but they are strongly related to moral ethics more.

Leadership skills are the empowerment of a great leader as our history is crowded with those great and aspiring leaders.

These skills are not a matter of choice; they are more of a necessity to lead the Homo sapiens around you.

Leadership is not just about one thing but it is a combo of many great qualities needed to shape your character.

It is a group of trustworthiness, intelligence, humanness, and discipline.

Here I will discuss some leadership skills randomly:

• So to be a good leader, you have to have a clear aim and ambition.
• You have to be clear about what you want and how you want to fulfill your aim.
• It must not be that your ambitions change at the starting of every month.
• Although you need flexibility according to the circumstances, this flexibility is for the sole ambition.

Who is a Good Leader?

Even if you are assigned a minute task to be accomplished with your team, you should be clear about the main structure or main idea of that task.

A good leader leads a simple and decent life. He tries to stay away from materialism.

His attire, dressing, and gait show the simplicity of his thoughts.

So if you want to be a good leader, try to be genuine, simple and original.

Try not to be the one influenced by the attractions and appeal of this world.

Gandhi, who is a role model for the Indians, toured India in his simple attire and with a cane. He provided his message to the masses in a simple way.

Next is smartness, one of the most desired qualities of a leader. Here in this world, everyone is working and living without any strong thoughts.

A leader is smart and knows how to deal with the most sensitive and critical issues and changes his mindset according to the situations and needs.

To be a good leader, well-disciplined life is necessary. A personality with discipline is a great thriving power to achieve success.

Top 10 Leadership Qualities to be a Good Leader

Now here is the main section of this article, leadership qualities.

Suppose you want to be a leading person and wanted to know the basics of traits required to be a leader, then read further.

Leadership qualities have been the characteristics of many inspirational leaders who have changed history.

These have been the traits of those who also created a new history with their earth-shaking guidance.

So if you want to be a great leader, then you have to incorporate those traits or qualities in yourself.

Here is a list of top 10 leadership qualities that when inculcated can produce magnanimous leaders:

1. Honesty, Integrity, Loyalty, and Credibility

These four traits are the leadership strengths of any great leader.

Integrity and credibility are the basis of any strength of the long-lasting relationship.

In the relationship between a leader and his team, these qualities are strongly required.

E.g. if you are running a company and the people around you do not acknowledge your leadership, they don’t trust you.

Then it will create an atmosphere of conflicts and fights due to any single mistake or any other reason. But remember that “Trust lost is difficult to get back”.

A great leader is highly honest and loyal to his work and he knows the secret of achieving great success with satisfaction.

The Leader knows that honesty may not be the best policy but it surely is the quality of great leaders.

If he is leading a company, he tries to be honest with himself and his subordinates or team.

2. Passion and Enthusiasm

Passion and enthusiasm are the topmost essentials of good leadership.

This is the most important leadership quality as every good leader is always passionate as well as enthused.

They know that running a company or a state demands a great deal of work and effort.

A great leader puts all of his efforts into his work to achieve his specific goal.

So to be a good leader, first be passionate about what you want to do. Be excited to work for your goal and to achieve better and good results.

Our books are filled with dozens of great leaders who once choose any ambition glued them completely to it.

They worked for the completion and fulfillment of that ambition throughout their lives. Every great leader has to be accompanied by this driving quality.

If you have started a business and you are not passionate about it, then you will fail now or later. You will fail to strive for the challenges put in front of you.

3. Determination and Firmness

Determination and steadfastness are the chief requirements for the completion of any task. And leadership has a much greater meaning and aspects.

A great leader should have to be resolved and have to face the hurdles and hardships lying in the journey to success.

If you are a lightweight balloon who staggers by just a jerk, then leadership is not for you.

Just take a look at the history that has produced the greatest leaders ever. Take a qualitative examination of their firmness and steadfastness.

4. Diligence and Hard work

Hard work and practice are also some of the essentials of good leadership. If you just have an aim and no action, then how will you be able to gain it? To be a good leader, you have to work day and night.

You have to put all your energy into your leadership. Without diligence, you will not be able to achieve the aim because it is the only key to success.

Take examples of all the leaders involved in the freedom movement e.g. Nehru, Patel. Etc. They struggled throughout their lives to provide a better and more promising future for the upcoming generations.

They struggled, withered, and faced criticism and at last succeeded in freeing India from British Raj.

5. Meticulousness and Smartness

It is a common saying that even common sense is not so common. It’s true because many just don’t aspire and those who do try for illogical or unreasonable aims.

A great leader is a person who is smart, meticulous, and realistic who knows about his aims and aspirations clearly.

The leader knows how to handle situations and totally aware of his dealings with his rivals and opponents.

A great leader is not a perfect model, he does make mistakes but knows how to rectify them?

He makes wrong choices and learns his lessons from life.

“A great leader does not always make right decisions, however, has the superpower to make his wrong decisions right”.

A good leader is highly creative and innovative and makes his decisions according to the situation.

He knows that creativeness in his work can achieve a good result. The leader sits with his team and asks them for new and intriguing ideas.

He is not an Orthodox who strictly attaches himself to some illogical beliefs or concepts and is ready to bring alterations in himself or his work accordingly.

A quality leader looks for many possibilities while making a decision. According to John Maxwell, “A leader is the one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way”.

6. Ability to Connect with Others

A leader has to lead individuals with him along with different ideologies and thinking.

These varieties of ideas can lead to conflicts. So, a great leader can connect with others.

He has the power to accept others without imposing his beliefs and understands his team and has friendly relations with them.

His good communication skills and comprehension are a source of solace and satisfaction for his team and subordinates.

A great or inspiring leader does not impose his commands on others, but considers the viewpoint of others and then makes a decision.

He knows that friendly discussions can produce good and effective results. Thus, he comprehends the people and tries to have a good relationship with others.

7. An opponent of Favoritism

A great leader enjoys no bliss for him alone or not self-centered.

He looks after the interests of his team or nation and knows that God has sent us into this world for a purpose to look after the needs of others.

Whenever he is offered something illegal or in clear words bribe, he immediately rejects it.

He knows much better than this small incentive will divert him and his team from their path.

8. Fearlessness and Bravery

A great leader is courageous, brave and valor is in the blood of his vessels.

He is not the one who surrenders to the situations but the one who changes the circumstances according to his own will.

Even if he is in prison, he raises the morale of his people through his speeches, addresses, and writings.

He does not care about the oppression endowed on him by his opponents.

History is full of those leaders who set a commendable and ever-lasting example of fearlessness.

Those people who fought with swords and crossbows in their hands. Napoleon Bonaparte, Socrates set a new example of bravery for us.

9. Compassion and Sympathy

Compassion is one of the leading qualities of good leadership. A person who is oppressive and cruel can be a dictator but not a leader.

Leadership is not to be forced or imposed but it is to be absorbed into others’ minds with patience and good dealings.

A great leader is aware of the needs of his people and is interested in taking his problems as his own and finding those solutions.

For being a good leader, you have to be beneficial to the people. To have this trait, you don’t need to sell your property or something else.

Even micro-tasks can show your concern and compassion. Doing some small things for the welfare of people can get them to acknowledge you as a leader.

E.g. it may include taking care of their necessities, viewpoints, etc.

10. Far-sighted

A great leader is far-sighted and hawk-eyed. He does not examine things from a surface only.

He is shrewd and can predict the happenings of the future from current situations.

A leader is not the person who makes vague judgments about others and smartly observes the things and phenomena around him and then makes sharp predictions.

Now to be a good leader, try to deepen your thought and thinking, try to examine things more deeply and carefully.
Before making any important decision, try to visualize the consequences of that step.

But once you have taken a decision, be firm about it. If you are a good leader, then even your wrong decisions will be right for the people.

Conclusion

So now you see that leadership is not easy and demands a great deal of patience and calmness.

Leadership qualities can shape the future of a leader.

It requires our best efforts for the retrieval of the best results and is not just about a single quality.

It is about a single aim, a single devotion, a single team, and a single leader.