Leadership: What makes a great

leader?
Mozes Haryanto Baottong

Introduction

Leadership is a process by which an executive can direct, guide and influence the behavior
and work of others towards accomplishment of specific goals in a given situation. Leadership
is the ability of a manager to induce the subordinates to work with confidence and zeal.

Leadership is the potential to influence behaviour of others. It is also defined as the capacity
to influence a group towards the realization of a goal. Leaders are required to develop future
visions, and to motivate the organizational members to want to achieve the visions.

According to Keith Davis, “Leadership is the ability to persuade others to seek defined
objectives enthusiastically. It is the human factor which binds a group together and motivates
it towards goals.”

Research Results
This case study analyses the leadership attribute in the modern-era based on interview with
different leader from different fields.
Based on the result interview, it can be found that the most significant attribute for a great
leader is communication-skill. All of them highlighted that a great leader should be able to
communicate effectively with team members. The leader should be able to communicate the
direction clearly and should be understand by the team members.
Solving problems is another attribute that define a great leader based on the interview. This
skill can be obtained by learning on the fields and experience. A leader should be able to
face problems and working together with the team to find solutions for different problems.
There are also several attribute that good leader should avoid such as micromanagement,
damaging creativity, and egocentric. Micromanagement will give high load to the team
member while the result will be far below expectation. While the leader who do not create
room for creativity will leave the team keep doing the same thing. Egocentric leader tend to
be
This research has been conducted by interviewing three distinctive leaders in different fields.
They have different standard on measuring how to become a great leader.

Defining a great leader for sure will give us a very broad view from different fields. Political
leader needs to have a very strong in understanding the condition of its team members
Leaders in sales and marketing – which has specific target – should have a very clear
understanding of its team members. Strength and Weaknesses of the team should be
identified correctly to enable the leader to give tasks based on the capability of the staff
member.
During a problem, the capability of a leader will be tested. Great leader should be able to
stay with the team member to solve the problems and issues. Capability to communicate
with the team is the basic skill that will enable the leader to solve the problems together with
all the team members.

Figure 1. Tag crowd that shows different phrase related to a great leader

Table 1. Result from interview coding

Conclusions

Great Leaders needs many attributes and most of them are obtained during the process of
interaction between the leader and the staff members. Communication-skill is believed to be
the most important attribute that a great leader should have. Besides that capability to solve
problems is also another attribute that is needed to bring leader to be a great leader.

Reference:

https://www.managementstudyguide.com/leadership_basics.htm

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