Leadership The Real Meaning

Have you ever wondered what is the meaning of leadership? You don’t have to look it up in a
dictionary. The meaning is in the word itself. If we look closely leadership consist of three words.
Leader, lead, ship. A leader is a person who leads a ship. A ship can be a certain company, a house,
or a country. People argue that some people are born leaders, but it has been proven many times
that leadership is not a trait that we inherit, it is a skill that can be learned.

A handyman has tools to help him do his work, a doctor has medical instruments to help him
perform surgery. So, does a leader have certain tools or skills that can help him do a better job?
You will love the following analogy if you are a marvel fan. Every superhero in avengers has some
sort of tool to help him do their task. Thor has a hammer; Cap has a shield and hulk gets angry
(we all have this ability). So, you and I are not less than any superhero. The difference is that they
fight aliens trying to invade earth, we try to fight the daily challenges that life throws at us. So, in
order to fight these challenges, we need to have some sort of tools that can help us.

Leadership Skills

These skills or tools are listening, empathy, emotional intelligence, creativity, and service
mindedness. Now if you are in a leadership position you must have these skills or as it is called
soft skills. People generally overlook these things and don’t learn them because they think they
don’t matter. But let me tell you these are equally as important as creating those balance sheets
and marketing campaigns.

The smartest leaders are the ones that go around and ask for everyone’s advice; they don’t
underestimate anyone. This points towards the first soft skill listening. Yes, you are right, listening
is the first skill that you need to master if you desire to lead. All of us have the ability to solve our
problems if anyone just listens to us. Listening can help you get what you want, without you even
asking for it. Even if you don’t want to become a leader, having a habit of listening will take you
a long way.

Another soft skill that a leader needs to have in his arsenal is empathy. Empathy means being
able to understand the needs of others. It means you’re aware of their feelings and their thinking.
A leader cannot build a team without empathy. So, a leader needs to see things from another
person’s perspective. This will help a leader make the right decisions.

Emotional intelligence is the ability to understand, use, and manage your own emotions in
positive ways to relieve stress, communicate effectively, empathize with others, overcome
challenges, and defuse conflict. Emotional intelligence can help a leader in dealing with difficult
people and situations. If a leader gets discouraged or tensed in a difficult situation then his team
will also lose hope. So, a leader has to have control over his emotions in order to lead.

How Can I Help You Win?

Now we come to the last soft skill that a leader needs to possess it is called service
mindedness. The job of the leader is not to be in charge of the people, the real job of a leader is
to take care of those in their charge. The leader should not say to his team how can you help me
win, but instead the leader should say “How can I help you win?”

So, if this inspired you, the next time you are in a position to lead. Do it with full courage and
confidence in yourself. Leadership is rewarding but it is twice as challenging as it looks. People
will not have faith in you unless you first have faith in yourself. Instead of telling your team how
it’s done, show them how it’s done.