When asked the question, “what makes a good leader,” the first thought that goes through my mind is to go into detail on all the approaches and studies I learned in my introduction to leadership studies class. There have been countless of studies done on what makes someone a good leader each with wide variety of different approaches and models tested. All the approaches and theories have their own guidelines on what defines a good leader. For example, the trait approach lists out five leadership traits that make a good leader while the leadership-member exchange theory focuses on the follower’s relationship with the leader. Each theory has standards set for leaders to follow, but do these theories truly define what makes a good leader?
One thing my professor for this course does is after teaching us about a specific leadership theory, she makes us compare it to our own lives. She always asks us to think of a “leader” in our lives who we believe follows these guidelines. Something that I noticed when asked this is that everyone’s answers are different. Some of the qualities go together, might be because they go along with the theory mentioned in class, but all the “leaders” mentioned have something that stands out to them. Whether it’s the relationship between the leader and the follower or a specific moment that stands out, none of the descriptions are the identical.
This made me start to think. What does make a good leader? When preparing my post, I wrote down all the approaches mentioned in class and the characteristics behind all of them. Shortly after starting to write the post, I deleted the text. Leadership is a broad concept with many different theories and tests behind it. Everyone wants to be considered a good leader. Companies constantly ask for leadership experience if you want to be hired and even with positions on campus they want some sort of leadership experience. Everything is centered around being a good leader and having that experience, but instead of asking about what experience of leadership you may have, we should start asking more about the quality of leadership you have experienced and how that impacts your life.
This goes into my next idea: the important leaders in your life reflect what you think makes a good leader. This also goes into another idea of how we create our own definitions of leadership. The theories provide a strong foundation for what is expected of a good leader, but the people in our lives that we consider “good leaders” possess the qualities we believe define leadership. Everyone has their own perspectives on leadership and that goes to show also who we think these good leaders in our life are.
So back to the main question at hand: What makes a good leader? A good leader on our lives is someone we look up to; it is someone who stands out to us; it is someone who makes us a better person. These “good leaders” possess our own unique definitions of leadership and strive for a better change in our lives. Think about all the people in your life you define as a “good leader.” These good leaders define the characteristics you want to possess and highlight some of the most important things in your life. The theories are great examples for guidelines on how to be a good leader, but overall what makes a good leader is someone who possess the qualities that you believe defines leadership.
