What Makes a Good Leader
What makes a good leader? A great leader is someone who uses his role and leadership skills to influence others in some ways to reach a company or organization vision and goals. At the same time, he inspires his personnel to set their visions, help them grow, develop their self esteem and guide them to achieve their objectives. A good leader encourages his staff to unleash their potentials so that they can become outstanding employees, responsible managers and a leader themselves.
A leader has many responsibilities such as achieving business and organizational goals, team building, customer service, decision making, problem solving, negotiating, conflict management, financial management, human resource management and self management. Besides the necessary education, it takes a lot of hard work, courage and many hours and commitment to learn various skills.
Leadership Traits and Characteristics of a Good Leader
What Makes a Good Leader No. 1 - Problem Solver
What makes a good leader is ingenuity. Because he is intelligent, creative and resourceful he is able to see a potential problem in advance. He uses his creative, systematic and strategic thinking skills to recognize whether a problem is a new one or a recurrence before he troubleshoots to find the underlying cause. Using his effective problem solving strategies, he usually succeeds in avoiding, overcoming or transforming a problem.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 2 - Manage Conflict in the Workplace
A good leader has a high level of emotional intelligence and people skills. These skills help him resolve conflict in the workplace. He understand that workplace conflict is usually linked to differences in personal values, opinions, perceptions, beliefs or principles.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 3 - Ability to Build Instant Rapport
A good leader knows that building rapport is important to develop relationships, build trust and influence.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 4 - An Effective Communicator and Listener
A good leader is also an effective communicator and an active listener. He has the skills to communicate orally or verbally and gets his message across in writing effectively. He also understands and uses body language or nonverbal communication to deliver his message.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 5 - Ability to Influence
Having influence and persuasion skills gives a leader the power to become an effective mentor and a role model. The ability to influence helps him motivate his team to take action and reach the organization's goal.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 6 - Charismatic
A charismatic leader has an added power to influence. A charming personality attracts, fascinates and inspires people. He usually shows a compelling vision to succeed and is able to communicate it to others. He shows high level of confidence, dominance and strong conviction.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 7 - Has Integrity
A good leader uses his power wisely. People place confidence and trust on a character that shows integrity, honesty, competency, consistency and openness. He exercises fairness, is honest about his feelings, maintains confidence and demonstrates confidence and competence.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 8 - Trustworthy
Trust is essential in any relationship. When a follower trusts a leader he believes that the actions taken are for his best interest. A trustworthy leader is able to develop a "trust culture" and effective teamwork. He is able to get his people to work together and perform effectively.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 9 - Flexible
A good leader is flexible. When an activity or action does not produce the desired result, he is able to troubleshoot and establishes a new solution or direction.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 10 - Decisive
Decisiveness is what makes a good leader. He uses his decision making skills to define problems, establish goals, look for alternatives, evaluate, validate and achieve the desired outcome.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 11 - Self Motivated
He feels motivated and has a strong desire to increase his own potential and develop an effective management style. He has the initiative to learn, develop new skills and try new things.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 12 - Has an Open Mind
People have different views about something. A great leader has an open mind. He is able to accept feedback and opinions and do not pass judgments.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 13 - Knows the Importance of Delegation
A great leader knows that by delegating he can focus on more important tasks. Through delegating he is able to develop his team and improve their efficiency.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 14 - Organized
A leader is organized and methodical. It saves him time and he gets to complete his tasks on time.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 15 - Supportive
A good leader is supportive, empathic and compassionate. This is a necessary quality of a leader because he will have to face his staffs' personal problems that usually affect their productivity.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 16 - Has Initiative and is Fearless
A good leader is courageous, proactive and has the initiative to act against experts' advice. He welcomes new challenges, is not afraid to try and is willing to be accountable for his decisions and actions.
What Makes a Good Leader No. 17 - Develops People
What makes a good leader is his ability and willingness to develop his staff's personal growth. He listens, inspires them, recognize their potentials, guide and counsel them. In return he gains respect and cooperation.