Leadership

Webster's Dictionary defines leadership as the position or guidance of a person or thing that leads, directing, commanding, or guiding head, as of a group or activity. However Leadership has not one single definition, but many. Leadership is often an intangible factor that makes one group more effective than another. It exists at different levels within organizations and should be woven throughout the entire organization. Different organizations use different ways in effectively teaching or molding their employees how to be an effective leader. One such company is the R.E. Brown Company and Associates, who have developed a yearlong program that is strictly used as a program to teach their employees how to become a more effective leader. They use what they believe as the Nine Behaviors of leaders.

This program doesn't directly start off with the introduction of the nine behaviors, but of little tasks given to the participants. They are broken into small groups where they interact with each other, summarize common threads, and then present their findings to the larger group. Then once this has taken place they develop specific action plans to take back to their groups and from there on they work coherently together as a team. This develops a bond, and creates a model of team leadership, sharing, and reflection. Once this has happened then the teams are introduced to the nine behaviors of leadership where they discuss each one and try to use the information that they have gathered to take back to their own jobs were they can become even more successful then they have ever been before.

The Nine Behaviors that develop exception leaders are:

1. Motivating others through adaptive leadership, who knows when to direct, coach, facilitate, or delegate, depending on the task and person.

2. Empowering others, which is a sort of delegation that will help you as a leader to control the situation with the help of others.

3. Encouraging teamwork, which is balancing results, process, and relationships.

4. Preparing people for change allowing you to understand their psychological responses and helping them to create a positive change with force-field analysis.

5. Vision/Mission, which establishes guidelines for accomplishing a specific goal.

6. Using multiple options by allowing you to see different strategic possibilities and being open to more day-to-day options.

7. Taking intelligent risks, relating decision-making to risks and getting consensus.

8. Stretching personal creativity that renews personal resources.

9. Showing passion for work by demonstrating presence, inspiration, and energy.

Each company has their own way of developing programs that center on ones ability to become an effective leader; this was just one aspect that I was able to find.