What “Gurus” Won’t Tell You about leadership…
The “Grim Reality 
” of Trying
to become a leader online…
“Many educators are finding that developing great leaders isn’t about teaching skill sets. It’s about helping students adopt the essential behaviors that all great leaders share.” – Tricia Bisoux
Who do think are the Great Leaders? What characteristics that a great leader must have?
Mahatma Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, Nelson Mandela and Margaret Thatcher to name a few. Those are the very famous great leaders that have make a difference in people’s lives.
Without qualms, we need great leaders to help our nation through times of peril. Companies need great leaders to make a business organization successful. The mission of a not-for-profit organization will only be fulfilled with a great leadership! At home, parents have to be great leaders to enable children to grow strong and healthy and become productive adults.
It’s very important for you to aware the needs of great leadership in this home-based business industry.
Yes, we all know that great leadership is very essential to an individual, society, businesses or even nationwide.
But, here are the difficult questions:
Can leadership be taught?
Can it be learned?
Yes, you might think that you can learn great leadership from leadership-based centers and programs cropping up at schools worldwide. Howevert,do you know that even as business educators design leadership courses, many seem uncomfortable with the idea of “teaching leadership.” ? Teaching implies the delivery of knowledge from one person to another; where leadership is concerned, you must often discover that knowledge for yourselves.
Paula Hill Strasser, director of the Business Leadership Center at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, points out that the job of a business school isn’t necessarily to teach leadership. “We don’t believe leaders are born, but that people are born with different potentials to lead,” she says. “Leadership can’t be taught, but it can be learned through facilitation, simulation, and one-on-one coaching. It’s a process of self-discovery.”
LEADERSHIP’S “TOP 10”
Leaders often follow such incredibly different paths and take such drastically different approaches that it’s difficult to pinpoint the common traits that make them effective.
Terry Pearce, author of Leading Out Loud and instructor at the Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley and the London School of Business, once said, “If you’re in the forest and see footprints, you’re on the wrong path.”
However, great leaders share a set of distinct behaviors and characteristics, which you must possess if you, too, wish to lead.
1. SELF AWARENESS
Firstly, in order to be a great leader you must know who you are. You have to ask yourselves two important questions: Who am I at this moment? What do I want?
By engaging in a great deal of self-reflection, you will be able to identify what your strengths and weaknesses are, and what your characters are like. With this understanding on yourself, then you can really deploy your full talents.
2. PERSONAL CONVICTION
Self-awareness is the key; but leadership stems not just from who people are, but from what they believe, says Kembrel Jones, who is associate dean of full-time MBA programs at Emory University’s Goizueta Business School in Atlanta.
3. COURAGE
Do you have the courage to lead this charge despite resistance?
Do you have the courage to have your beliefs questioned?
Great leaders will always face resistance to change, they must have the courage to act on their beliefs no matter what the circumstance.
4&5 CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION
Creativity and innovation are the lifeblood to an organization. You need to know not just how to lead, but how to drive change in an organization and convince an entire organization to do things differently.
It has been said that the difference between management and leadership is the difference between keeping the status quo and innovating to drive change.
6. CURIOSITY
Great leaders have an inherent curiosity that drives them to ask questions and try new things, just to see what happens. “Leadership requires regularly thinking of the questions that affect the world we live in,” says Alduino. “Only by asking those questions can we have the opportunity to make a difference in the world and create something that is fundamentally better than what is already there”
7. ABILITY TO INSPIRE
When were you last inspired?
Why was it inspirational for you?
By working on these two fundamental questions either on yourselves or with a group of friends, can help you to find, explore, and activate your own abilities to inspire and earn the trust of others.
“When you look at leaders who have changed the world, they have some kind of internal spirit that has led them to do it. That capability resides in every one of us.” said Pearce
8. ABILITY TO LISTEN
When people think of leaders, they may think of individuals who can talk a good game. But…
Do you know that great leaders often do their best when they stop communicating and start listening?
By learning to listen, you will become a better problem solver, a better leader .
9&10 EAGERNESS TO EXPERIENCE AND WILLINGNESS TO REFLECT
You must understand how important it is to take time to reflect on an experience. People have their ‘aha’ moments
during times of reflection, not when they’re going 90 miles an hour.
You have to reflect on your own experiences, develop generalizations from that experience, and move that forward into new experiences to truly develop as leaders.”
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