In the first part of the book A Leaders Legacy it really opens your eyes as to the “qualifications” and aspects of a leader. Also the book speaks on legacies that leaders leave. It is important to understand that leaders do not do what they do to leave legacies, someone doesn’t base their decisions on a legacy. Something that stood out to be was that you don’t have to be a CEO of a company to be a leader, A true leader is someone that supports you, and can put someone else before themselves. This part of the book gives me hope that there is a space for people in the background of an organization to be leaders and that you have to appreciate everyone for what they do.
One topic in the book reminded me of our Greek community at Bridgewater. This topic states that you always want to leave something better than you found it. I believe this is true for all of our organizations, we want to better it for future members and this is why we are making effort to become better leaders.
Something that I thought was very important in the book is that Leaders ask for criticism. I believe this is a good quality for a strong leader to have, because you should want to hear the input to make themselves better at what they are doing and getting closer to leaving a legacy.
Passionate Leaders are willing to suffer: this left a very significant meaning to me. In live nothing comes easy, and I believe you gain strength and wisdom from pain and mistakes. This applies to the making of leaders. Nothing happens overnight and what the books says about these leaders being willing to suffer is absolutely correct. I believe someone that is considered a leader has overcome many obstacles to gain that respect.
With only this first part of the book, I realized that I have more leadership qualities than I give myself credit for. People have a cliché of what a leader is, when in reality anyone can be a la leader. I know that I am not smartest person in my class, the most outgoing, involved or loudest person in the organizations I’m at. Yet, I’m always willing to help someone that needs my help with anything and in one way or another I’m working my way up to becoming a leader.
I agree that the book is helping me to understand exactly what a leader is with the ideal qualities that all leaders should share. I too sometimes feel like I'm in the "background" of my organizations but it's true that everyone in the organization has something to offer.
ReplyDeleteSuffering is certainly a powerful teacher but the lessons learned through suffering means you didn't suffer in vain.
I agree that the book is helping me realize that I already possess some leadership qualities that I overlooked. The simple desire to help others is very important to being a leader.
I can't wait to get to know you better through GLAD!