Northouse defines leadership as “a complex process having multiple dimensions” (p.1) and a process whereby an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal” (p. 5).

There are few components of leadership which actually makes a leader. They are, process, power, influence, group context and goal attainment.

As mentioned above, Leadership is a process whereby an individual influences a group. So, for a leader, it is unavoidable to avoid the component “process” in leadership. This process involves planning, assumptions, analyzing risk factors and methods to eliminate them to achieve a certain goal. This process may be very brief or may even last several years depending on the goal.

Power in leadership doesn’t refer to the power of a leader to order the group. It is the power that should be within to influence the group or followers. It is the power to give enthusiasm and motivation, the power to enhance the capability of the group to work for and achieve the goal.

Being Influential is so important in leadership that, without influence, leadership does not exist. The power to influence the audience is one of the basic qualities a leader should have. A leader failing to influence his audience is not actually a good leader. The type and degree of influence is dependent on the leader’s style, objective, and the audience.

Groups are the content in which leadership takes place. A group is often made up of followers. When there is no group to be lead, there isn’t a purpose of leader. So group is an essential part of leadership. Often this is a group of people with common interests and sometimes not. At times there is an elitist attitude when discussing leaders and followers as the former has a degree of power, and the latter have less.  A leader is not above followers or better than followers. It’s just that, one takes the responsibility to lead. They are part of the same process and must be understood in relation to each other.  It is an integral part of being a leader to know his or her group well and is responsible to guide them to achieve the common goal.

Leadership includes goals attainment. And in fact, certain goals are the actual reasons for the formation of a leader. Leaders are primarily to work for effective way in utilizing a group effectively to achieve certain targets and goals. This means that, the leader must use his or her influence, power and capability to lead the group to achieve the set goals.

Leadership is an interactive process between the individual exerting the influence and those receiving the influence.  As such, a leader touches and is touched by followers.  The tide of power can be fluid  shift from the leader to the followers and vice versa.  Leadership is not a formality that follows a prescribed routine.  Some leadership styles will approach this, but none will ever be so set in stone that there is not some degree of elasticity. I don’t be judgmental on the role of each leader. Everyone in one way or the other is influencing an individual positively or negatively.

When you come across any leader in any field ,do you judge on all these criteria or just consider them to have their own individual preference on being a leader?Is this all about leadership in brief? Or, if you have any further inputs and suggestions, it’s all welcome.

 

Reference

Northouse, P. G. (2018). Leadership: Theory and practice, Eight Edition. Contingency theory. (Chapter 6) Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.