Who’s your favorite leader?

Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, Narendra Modi, Virat Kohli, Jack Ma, or someone else?

Now take a moment to identify a personality trait you would like to borrow from them. It could be anything – speaking style, persuasiveness, or passion for the work they do.

Effective leadership is 70% about inspiring others. It is about making people better than you found them. You don’t need a title of a CEO, MD Or VC to be a leader. You just need a handful of qualities that will make you a leader in your own right.

What are these qualities? Read on:

• Confidence

Confidence is an effective leadership trait. Pick any leader from history or even someone from the present times, you will notice confidence oozing out naturally from their personality. It’s easy to spot that there is no pretense or fakeness involved. Just pure confidence.

If you are confident of yourself, you can easily develop a following at your workplace. People get drawn towards confident and assertive individuals to imbibe the same quality from them. Remember that a person who is quietly confident often makes the best leader.

Leaders are known for this: John C. Maxwell, Eleanor Roosevelt

• Commitment

The most admirable leadership trait is the commitment to their work. Leaders from all over the world are known for their hard work and earnestness for their work. If you aspire to become a leader, give your hundred percent when you’re working on a task.

Tony Robbins said, “Stay committed to your decisions, but flexible in your approach.” 

Leaders are known for this: Barbara Corcoran, Steve Jobs

• Delegation

You cannot do everything on your own unless you want to stay until 11 PM at your office completing your tasks. Delegation is an art and not many are proficient in it. If you have a way with delegating tasks, you’re definitely a leader-material.

Good leaders recognize that delegation does more than simply passing the task to someone else. It is about trusting and believing he/she can handle the task given to them – which again is a great quality to have as a leader.

Leaders are known for this: Eli Broad, Andrew Carnegie

• Communication

Developing excellent communication skills is absolutely essential to effective leadership. Great leaders always share knowledge and ideas to transmit a sense of urgency and enthusiasm to others.

If you are a novice or veteran, solid communication skills can advance your career by leaps and bounds. It makes you more knowledgeable, persuasive, and likable.

Leaders are known for this: George Bernard Shaw, Tony Robbins

• Inspire

The best leaders are the ones who can inspire. If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are on the right track. Leadership is about encouraging people to make progress, no matter how slow.

Leaders are known for this: James M. Kouze, John Quincy Adams

• Empathy

Leadership is about empathy. Being able to listen and respond with empathy is overwhelmingly the one interaction skill that outshines all other skills.

Without empathy, it’s impossible to build a team or nurture a new generation of leaders. You can’t inspire followers or elicit loyalty. It is essential in negotiations and sales as it allows you to know your target’s desires and what risks they are or aren’t willing to take.

Leaders are known for this: Oprah Winfrey, Simon Sinek

Wrapping up

A true leader has the confidence to stand alone, the courage to make the tough decisions, and the compassion to listen to the needs of others. He doesn’t set out to be a leader but becomes one by the equality of his actions and integrity of his intent.

These qualities are the foundation of good leadership. While some of these leadership qualities may be more naturally present in the personality of a leader, it is definitely something you can develop and strengthen over time.