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Thursday, January 13, 2011

7 Wonderful Qualities of a Leader | iluvislam.com + discover the beauty of islam

7 Wonderful Qualities of a Leader | iluvislam.com + discover the beauty of islam


7 Wonderful Qualities of a Leader Isn, 27 Dis 2010 11:54 
Kamaruddin Hassan, Editor: Team Bisnes

Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary, New 8th edition (2010), defines  leader as a person who leads a group of people, especially the head of a  country, an organization, etc.

To be a wonderful leader, one should possess combinations of some of the following qualities:

1) Leaders Have Good Communication Skills

Leaders are good communicators. They leave no doubt about the meaning of  their message. That's what Stan Toler (2002) wrote in his book "Minute  Motivators for Leaders". He added that communication process is not  complete until the audience has both listened and understood the  delivered message.

Bob Adams (2001) in his book "The Everything Leadership Book" said that  effective communication skills are integral to any working partnership /  team or personal relationship. Therefore, according to him, it is safe  to say that good communication skills are one of the building blocks of  being an effective leader.


2) Leaders Are People with Courage

Courage is largely habit and self-confidence. It is a valuable commodity  on the battlefield or in the board room. Alan Axelrod (1999) mentioned  this in his book "Patton on Leadership". According to him, General  George S. Patton, Jr., one of the most decorated American heroes during  World War II, believed that courage could be learned – acquired through  practice.

According to Marshall Loeb and Stephen Kindel (1999) in their book  "Leadership for Dummies", leaders learn how to suck up their courage,  trust their instincts, and move ahead into the unknown, even when  they're just as scared as their followers.


3) Leaders Pay Attention to Details

During World War II, in commanding the U.S. Third Army, General Patton  understood that wet socks lead to trenchfoot and other conditions that  keep a man from marching, wrote Axelrod (1999). Socks are a small and  lowly item, but Patton realized that on dry socks (and healthy feet),  the efficiency of his army depended.

On the other hand, lack of attention to details can result in tragedy.  According to Seth Godin (1995) in his book "Wisdom, Inc.", the space  shuttle Challenger exploded because a fifteen-cent rubber part did not  function in unusually cold weather. Several brilliant scientists (and  astronauts) were killed because this one tiny detail was overlooked.

Napoleon Hill (1937) in his book "Think and Grow Rich" mentioned about  the mastery of detail, which was one of the 11 important factors of  leadership. According to him, successful leadership calls for mastery of  the details of the leader's position.


4) Leaders are Problem Solvers

"You can measure a leader by the problems he tackles. He always looks  for ones his own size", wrote by John C. Maxwell (1999) in his book "The  21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader".

Every workplace will have some conflict, no matter how great the  leadership team may be. Leaders need to identify conflict as early as  possible and determine what kind of conflict is involved and its  underlying causes. These remarks were written by Bob Adams (2001) in his  book "The Everything Leadership Book".


5) Leaders Build Relationships

Building relationships based on trust was one of the topics covered by  Ian Lawson (2001) in his book "Leadership". According to him, there are  seven key behaviours / attributes in this area:
  • Not putting self-interest before the interests of your staff,
  • Keeping promises and doing what you say you will do,
  • Being in touch with and sensitive to other people's feelings,
  • Being calm in a crisis and when under pressure,
  • Being honest and truthful,
  • Not taking personal credit for other people's work, and
  • Always being fair.


6) The Leader as Team-Builder

Ismail Noor (2002) wrote his book "Prophet Muhammad's Leadership" that  the Prophet Muhammad s.a.w. is acknowledged as an exemplary team leader  who knew how to get the best out of his principal lieutenants by  understanding the true value of the human resource factor.

According to him, effective team-working stems from people  complementing, rather than, rivalling, each other or merely co-existing  alongside one another.

The leading members of the Majlis Syura or the Consultative Council  during the time of the Prophet's governance were Abu Bakar As-Siddiq,  Umar Al-Khattab, Uthman Al-Affan, Ali bin Abi Talib, Zaid bin Thabit  Al-Ansari, Abd. Rahman bin 'Auf, Salmaan Al-Farsi, and 'Ubayy bin Ka'b.


7) The Leader as Visionary

In her book "Leadership Skills for Managers", Marlene Caroselli (2001)  stated that for leaders to effect positive change, they must have a  picture of what the improvement will look like. That improvement, on a  small or grand scale, is called a vision.

According to Ros Jay (2004), vision is the ability to develop the future  strategy of the business. In her book "The Successful Candidate", she  wrote: "vision implies that not only can you see ahead and respond well  in advance, but that you can also be pro-active, setting the trend  yourself and setting how the business will look in several years' time.

"Wonderful leaders are comparable to eagles. They fly higher but not in flocks, like most birds".

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