I don’t usually respond to prompts, but today’s one is about leadership, so I can’t resist. The prompt for today asks, ‘What makes a good leader?’

I’m going to write a couple of textbook definitions and then add my own comments about what good leadership looks like.

The U.S. Army defines leadership as, “the activity of influencing people by providing purpose, direction, and motivation to accomplish the mission and improve the organization.”¹

Dr. Andrew J. DuBrin defines leadership as, “the ability to inspire confidence and support among the people who are needed to achieve organizational goals.”²

Dr. John P. Kotter says that, “Leadership defines what the future looks like, aligns people with that vision, and inspires them to make it happen despite the obstacles. 

• Establishing direction: developing a vision of the future often the distant future – and strategies for producing the changes needed to achieve that vision.

• Aligning people: communicating direction in words and deeds to all those whose cooperations may be needed so as to influence the creation of teams and coalitions that understand the vision and strategies and that accept their validity.

• Motivating and inspiring: energizing people to overcome major political, bureaucratic, and resource barriers to change by satisfying basic, but often unfulfilled, human needs.”³

Then Dr. Barbara Kellerman says that, “A leader chooses a particular course of action and then in some way gets others to go along; or, more subtly, the leader encourages the led to “choose” the course that the group will follow.”⁴

The above are definitions of leadership and what a good leader should be doing in order to lead and influence an organization. However, we can’t forget that there are also bad leaders. Here are the seven types of bad leadership:⁵

• Incompetent leadership: the leader and at least some followers lack the will or skills (or both) to sustain effective action. With regard to at least one important leadership challenge, they do not create positive change. 
• Rigid leadership: the leader and at least some followers are stiff and unyielding. Although they may be competent, they are unable or unwilling to adapt to new ideas, new information, or changing times. 
• Intemperate leadership: the leader lacks self-control and is aided and abetted by followers who are unwilling or unable effectively to intervene.
• Callous leadership: the leader and at least some followers are uncaring or unkind. Ignored or discounted are the needs, wants, and wishes of most members of the group or organization, especially subordinates. 
• Corrupt leadership: the leader and at least some followers lie, cheat, or steal. To a degree that exceeds the norm, they put self-interest ahead of the public interest. 
• Insular leadership: the leader and at least some followers minimize or disregard the health and welfare of “others” – that is, those outside the group or organization for which they are directly responsible. 
• Evil leadership: the leader and at least some followers commit atrocities. They use pain as an instrument of power. The harm done to men, women, and children is severe rather than slight. The harm can be physical, psychological, or both. 

At the end, leadership is about people and community. As I mentioned in one of my early posts, ‘You can’t Lead Alone,’ a good leader is a 360-degree leader. A good leader needs to lead and influence not only his or her people but also their peers/co-workers and his or her boss. A good leader also needs to lead and influence people outside their area of responsibility.

All this leadership talk may sound like it is directed at businesses and organizations only, but it also applies to our families.

Merriam-Webster dictionary defines family as “the basic unit in society traditionally consisting of two parents rearing their children.”⁶ In some cases, the family is led by a single parent. We either lead or co-lead our family, striving to influence and inspire them to be successful in life and to make positive contributions to a better society.

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1. https://armypubs.army.mil/epubs/DR_pubs/DR_a/ARN18529-ADP_6-22-000-WEB-1.pdf ↩︎
2. Dubrin, Andrew J. Leadership – Research Findings, Practice, and Skills. (pp. 2). 
   Massachusetts: Houghton Mifflin Company ↩︎
3. Kotter, John P. Leading Change. (P. 25-26). Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Press, 1996. ↩︎
4. Kellerman, Barbara. Bad Leadership. (P. XIII). Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Press, 2004. ↩︎
5. Kellerman, Barbara. Bad Leadership. (P. 40-46). Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Press, 2004. ↩︎
6. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/family ↩︎

• Leadership