If you want to be a leader who
attracts quality people, the key is to become a person of
quality yourself. Leadership is the ability to attract someone
to the gifts, skills, and opportunities you offer as an owner,
as a manger, as a parent. I call leadership the great challenge
of life.
What's important in leadership is
refining your skills. All great leaders keep working on
themselves until they become effective. Here are some specifics:
1) Learn to be strong but not
rude. It is an extra step you must take to become a powerful,
capable leader with a wide range of reach. Some people mistake
rudeness for strength. It's not even a good substitute.
2) Learn to be kind but not weak.
We must not mistake kindness for weakness. Kindness isn't weak.
Kindness is a certain type of strength. We must be kind enough
to tell somebody the truth. We must be kind enough and
considerate enough to lay it on the line. We must be kind enough
to tell it like it is and not deal in delusion.
3) Learn to be bold but not a
bully. It takes boldness to win the day. To build your
influence, you've got to walk in front of your group. You've
got to be willing to take the first arrow, tackle the first
problem, discover the first sign of trouble.
4) You've got to learn to be
humble, but not timid. You can't get to the high life by being
timid. Some people mistake timidity for humility. Humility is
almost a God-like word. A sense of awe. A sense of wonder. An
awareness of the human soul and spirit. An understanding that
there is something unique about the human drama versus the rest
of life. Humility is a grasp of the distance between us and the
stars, yet having the feeling that we're part of the stars. So
humility is a virtue; but timidity is a disease. Timidity is an
affliction. It can be cured, but it is a problem.
5) Be proud but not arrogant. It
takes pride to win the day. It takes pride to build your
ambition. It takes pride in community. It takes pride in cause,
in accomplishment. But the key to becoming a good leader is
being proud without being arrogant. In fact I believe the worst
kind of arrogance is arrogance from ignorance. It's when you
don't know that you don't know. Now that kind of arrogance is
intolerable. If someone is smart and arrogant, we can tolerate
that. But if someone is ignorant and arrogant, that's just too
much to take.
6) Develop humor without folly.
That's important for a leader. In leadership, we learn that
it's okay to be witty, but not silly. It's okay to be fun, but
not foolish.
Lastly, deal in realities. Deal
in truth. Save yourself the agony. Just accept life like it is.
Life is unique. Some people call it tragic, but I'd like to
think it's unique. The whole drama of life is unique. It's
fascinating. And I've found that the skills that work well for
one leader may not work at all for another. But the fundamental
skills of leadership can be adapted to work well for just about
everyone: at work, in the community, and at home.
To Your Success,
Jim
Rohn
This
article was submitted by Jim Rohn, America's Foremost Business
Philosopher. To subscribe to the Free Jim Rohn Weekly E-zine go
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