What Makes a Leader

What Makes a Leader

Truly effective leaders can be distinguished by a high degree of emotional intelligence, which includes self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy and social skill. Identifying individuals with the “right stuff” to be leaders is more art than science. Many large companies today have employed trained psychologists to develop “competency models” to aid them in identifying, training, and promoting likely stars in the leadership firmament. Emotional intelligence not only distinguishes outstanding leaders but can also be linked to strong performance. People who have a high degree of self-awareness recognize how their feelings affect them, other people and their job performance. Self-regulation frees us from being prisoners of our feelings. Due to self-regulation, leaders control their feelings and impulses, to create an environment of trust and fairness. Motivation drives passion in leader to work for reasons that go beyond money or status, with strong desires to achieve goals. Empathy is particularly important today as a component of leadership for three reasons; increasing use of teams, globalization and retaining talent. Social skill is moving people in direction you desire. For the sake of performance, these are ingredients that leaders “need to have”.