Ways to Define Leadership

             Leadership is a word and a concept that is used in a variety of circumstances; it is not always used correctly, and leadership is not often fully understood. Sometimes "leadership" is used interchangeably with "management" and that is incorrect because a "leader" does not have to be in a position of authority to lead. Those in authority are certainly obliged to lead, and expected to lead, albeit many executives and managers have never been effective in motivating or leading others. This paper will review and present several definitions of leadership, including military leadership, "servant leadership," sports leadership – and it will present the difference between managing and leading.
             In the Journal of Leadership Studies (Funk, 43-45) the author points out that "while virtually every definition of leadership...in both scholarly and practitioner-oriented writings focus on the knowledge, skills, abilities, and traits of the leader," there is no "reasonable agreement" on precisely which "traits and behaviors" are indeed leadership-related. In a survey of 110 "managers, administrators and professionals," the majority said leadership was "a skill or ability," but some defined it as a "role or position."
             The function of leadership is to "...create change within the context of a social process that creates leadership relationships." In other words, leadership is a social process, and that needs to be taken into consideration by those who would presume to have the talent and ambition to be great leaders.
             In the journal History Today, the leadership style of Queen Elizabeth I is reviewed, and it is pertinent because the queen was a "female monarch in a male world" (Doran, 29). Among viewers of the recent BBC TV special on Elizabeth, the queen scored highest "on her bravery and leadership qualities"; even though she displayed "a mixture of radiating charm and unpredictable rages," and "enjoyed the flattery" of her underlings, she...

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Ways to Define Leadership. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 13:16, March 28, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/202671.html