Meaning of Leadership
- leadership is the art of motivating a group of people to act towards achieving a common goal.
- In business, leadership is linked to performance.
- Leadership is a process by which a person influences others to accomplish an objective and directs the organization in a way that makes it more cohesive and coherent.
- Any one who acts as a model to others is often called a “leader”.
- Leadership is attribute of that person who is an ideal for the other members of the group
- Leadership is the art of influencing others to direct their will, abilities and efforts to the achievement of leader’s goals.
- Leadership focuses on “people” aspect of management.
- Process Leadership –
- Leaders carry out the process by applying their leadership knowledge and skills.
- Trait Leadership –
- We know that we have traits that can influence our actions.
- It was once common to believe that leaders were born rather than made.
What Leadership guru says about leadership?
- Warren Bennis in “The End of leadership” to make the point that effective leadership cannot exist without the full inclusion, initiatives, and the cooperation of employees i.e. one cannot be a great leader without great followers.
- Barry Posner “In the past, business believed that a leader was like the captain of a ship: cool, calm, collected. Now, we see that leaders need to be human. They need to be in touch, they need to be empathetic, and they need to be with people. Leaders need to be a part of what’s going on, not apart from what’s going on.
Definitions Of Leadership
- Peter Drucker defined leader as someone who has followers.
- In the 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, John Maxwell gave definition of leadership as “leadership is influence – nothing more, nothing less.”
- Warren Bennis’ defined leadership as ‘a function of knowing oneself, having a vision that is well communicated, building trust among colleagues, and taking effective action to realize one’s own leadership potential.’
- According to MacIver and Page Leadership is the capacity to persuade or to direct man that comes from personal qualities apart from office. (Trump)
- According to Pigors, “Leadership is a process of control in which by the assumption of superiority a person or group regulates the activities of others for purposes of his own choosing.”
- Chester Bernard (1938) gave a definition of leadership, “leadership is the ability of a superior to influence the behaviour of subordinates and persuade them to follow a particular course of action”.
- Williams (2005), states that, “leadership is an interactive art in which the leader is dancing with the context, the problem, the faction, and the objective.”