Warren Bennis’ novel, On Becoming a Leader, is the book I was able to read. Bennis worked years on this novel constructing it off of one of his former creations. Finally, in Cambridge, Ma Bennis published his story by Perseus publishing. Throughout this book he centers around the search to understand exactly how leaders are made. Bennis uses a unique approach to portraying his opinion. This is not an ordinary “how to” book on becoming a leader. Nor is it an autobiography of one’s personal experience. Bennis was a teacher and student all his life, he has never run a country or even a company. Bennis is not directly reciting his own experiences as a leader. This paper outlines Bennis’ basic thoughts, theories, and his contributions to the field …show more content…
A leader needs to rely on their gut feeling or as Bennis refers to this as “inner voices.” The leader needs to be confident in themselves. Bennis’ previous points suggest knowing oneself and their world to give them that confidence to make decisions. A true leader relies on everything they have learned to set their vision.
Lastly, the key to successful leadership is getting all of one’s followers on their side. In order to achieve this, leaders must gain all their followers trust. Bennis outlines four key elements to gain this trust. Primarily, constancy must be enforced. Leaders must stay the course. Second, congruity is essential. This is so the leaders can “walk the talk.” Third, reliability is needed so that leaders are present when it matters most. Lastly, leaders honor their commitments through integrity. All of these important, aspects gain the trust of their followers by their side.
As a whole, Warren Bennis defined the values and achievement plan for becoming the most successful leader one can be. He highlighted the link between self knowledge and business. A leader is not just “doing a job” or “running a company,” but it’s finding one’s personal vision. Bennis tries to do as much as he possibly he can to shatter this myth. Today, more people are starting to learn what leadership exactly means and what is expected of a leader. It might be evident that in the future competition will be harder
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I really enjoyed diving deep into Bennis’ mind of what it really means to have the qualities of a leader. Bennis strongest points relates a manager to a leader. It was an inspiring comparison that really opened my eyes on what I viewed a leader to be. I felt Bennis made his points clear and I never felt confused or unclear about his writing. In the world that I live in today, the meanings are tossed and turned everywhere leaving everyone confused on what it truly means to be a successful leader. After reading this, I feel encouraged to step up and actually make the most of situations that are tossed my direction. I feel this book gave me a whole new outlook on life and I feel rewarded I had the opportunity to read
In this book, the authors Tom Rath and Barry Conchie examine the question “What are the keys to being an effective leader?” To answer this question they had a team that reviewed data collected from Gallup polls. The data came from interviews from 20,000 senior leaders, over a million teams and more than fifty years of Gallup Polls of the most admired leaders in the world. The authors then had the team do a study of more than 10,000 followers to find out why they follow the influential leaders in their life.
Leadership is a quality which cannot be acquired by any person from the other but it can be acquired by self-determination of a person. Leadership can best be called the personality of the very highest ability-whether in ruling, thinking, imagining, innovation, warring, or religious influencing. Leadership is practiced not so much in words a it is in attitude and in actions. Their actions leave a long lasting memory in the line of history and lead up to may events that occur today. To be a leader one will need many qualities. Leaders have a purpose and strategies to accomplish that purpose. They are driven and motivated. In the end they should be able to attain good results. These innate talents help to make up a leader that will succeed and be efficient in carrying out tasks. But, the purpose of this paper is determine what truly makes a leader successful. A successful leader should be considered more on their impact rather than their accomplishments of their organizations alone for they are not sufficient in determining the key to their success .
The Leadership Challenge by Kouzes and Posner (2007) is the result of twenty years of research on the factors that influence and create great leadership. Through studies and stories from leaders with various backgrounds throughout the world, the practices and characteristics that create great leadership are delineated. Leadership is viewed not as a group of inherent characteristics, but as learned behavior that anyone can achieve. The goal of Kouzes and Posner’s book is to inspire and educate leaders through transformational leadership. As such, leadership is about mobilizing others to become and do extraordinary things.
How to become a successful and strong leader? What are essential characteristics that are imperative to become one? These questions were asked many centuries ago, as well as they are asked today. Niccolo Machiavelli wrote one of the most influential treatises on leadership that is still utilized in politics and management today. One of the defining conceptions he explores is locating a balance between being virtuous and righteous and practicing carefully selected deceit and cunning.
Though a little dry to read at times, I found this book to be an excellent beginner’s guide to leadership. Although the idea of “corporate” can be a bit dull after a while, Bennis and Nanus continuously attempt to liven it up with real-life examples of their strategies put into practice. They make it clear that the strategies are not what they came up with out of nowhere, but have been determined from years of various case studies. One of my favorite aspects of the book is its ability to imbue an “I can do this!” attitude to the reader.
Leadership at times can be a complex topic to delve into and may appear to be a simple and graspable concept for a certain few. Leadership skills are not simply acquired through position, seniority, pay scale, or the amount of titles an individual holds but is a characteristic acquired or is an innate trait for the fortunate few who possess it. Leadership can be misconstrued with management; a manager “manages” the daily operations of a company’s work while a leader envisions, influences, and empowers the individuals around them.
I have been fortunate to work with several heads of departments within a couple years of graduating college. During this time, I have worked with quality leaders and not so great ones. The quality leaders were competent, skillful and endowed with people skills. These leaders gave me the opportunity to grow and a sense of purpose. After reading The Leadership Advantage by Warren Bennis, I was quickly reminded about a former superior of mine that lacked the understanding and knowledge of what qualities a leader should have. The company also did not entertain a culture that promotes employee satisfaction.
A leader needs to “believe” in oneself and have the confidence that whatever you say will excite and what you do can motivate others. You must be optimistic about what you do, do have some relevance for being in existence. Believe it or not, “leadership begins with you”.
My knowledge of leadership has been dramatically changed by reading the concepts presented within this book. True Me is designed to make you think about your leadership skills and help you to improve yourself. Potter and Hastings correlated a Christian theme through the book on management would appear to be a would be difficult for authors reaching out to a profane audience, but they remained committed in their beliefs, keeping their center of attention to the guiding principles of effective and enlightened leadership. Through out the book the authors reveal the eight characteristics that every leader must have to earn the trust and support of his or her staff, team, or organization.
Warren Bennis’s leadership theories from On Becoming a Leader serve as a guide to understanding the qualities sand strategies that great leaders often exemplify. Classic leaders like Hillary Clinton have vision, passion, and integrity. These three things are the basic ingredients that Bennis proposes that most great leaders have in common. These are all aspects of leadership that allow people to better understand themselves and the world around them. In Hillary’s case, it is because of her determination to take the lead on different social issues around the world as a prominent figurehead that has allow me to take a closer...
The leadership is a result of a combination of traits, with special emphasis on the personal qualities of the leader, which he should possess certain personality traits that would be special facilitators in leadership performance. This theory shows that leaders are born as such, there is no likelihood of 'making' them later with personal development techniques.
Leaders can have a powerful impact on the futures of many, and the way in which one approaches leadership is paramount to the type of impact one will have. Continual growth in the areas of knowledge I have and seek to acquire, as well as recognizing my leadership style and utilizing my personal strengths to the fullest, is vital to the successful implementation of my personal philosophy of leadership.
Leaders will no matter what have an influence on our world. They have missions, dreams and ambition, and with these things they are bound to go far. For leaders, what makes these dreams come true is having strong qualities such as leadership practices, values and strengths. If developed and learned how to use correctly, these are what take leaders to the next level and accomplish great things. In the following paper I will talk about leadership in our ever-changing world, explore my leadership practices, values and strengths as well as elaborate on the goals I have made to challenge myself as a leader.
As Yukl (2010) indicates, such factors (e.g. personality, values and capacities) attributed to a leader. Normally it is widespread acknowledged that someone is born to be a lead...
Leaders of the future will be faced with many challenges. As the world changes, we must adapt the ways in which we face these challenges, and in turn grow as leaders. A leader is not merely someone which commands a group or organization. A good leader exhibits the ability to take an average team of individuals and achieve greatness. Leadership is not supervision or leading. It is the ability to inspire or influence others towards the end goal. As Barendsen and Gardner stated (2006), “the best leaders are individuals who, in their work, exhibit three distinct meanings of good: (1) an excellent technical and professional quality and competence, (2) an ethical orientation, and (3) a completely engaged sense of fulfillment and meaningfulness” (p. 266). Good leaders must utilize all of these traits in order to meet the challenges of the future. A few emerging challenges that future