Leaders are born not made? What is a leader? According to Dr. Paul Hersey, leadership is “working with and through others to achieve objectives. ” Given this definition, anyone in a position whose achievement requires the support of others can play the role of a leader. So in my understanding, a great leader is both born and made. Both parts are essential to a true leader. Some people are born with innate qualities that predispose them to being leaders, and other people while not naturally gifted with leadership ability can acquire it.
Moreover, all leaders, born or made, can improve their ability with desire, experience and effort. At birth, we are all born with genes inherited from our parents, for a select few the genetic predispositions for the leadership qualities are more favourable toward leadership qualities. For example, our current president Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III also known as PNoy, is in my opinion, a naturally born leader. Being the son of former President Cory Aquino and Benigno Simeon “Ninoy” Aquino, Jr. , he has the genes of these great leaders who fought bravely for the country.
He is a president who decides thoroughly and makes decisions that are right and just. After we are born for the first few years of our lives we are in constant interaction with others, some to which we attach real and sustained admiration and others where this admiration is punctual. From those interactions we refine our values and our natural behaviours are reinforced positively, which would increase the frequency of the behaviours or negatively which would diminish the frequency of the behaviours. Before you become a good leader, you first become a good follower”, that statement is proved by Napoleon Bonaparte the “Emperor of the French”. Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader who rose to prominence during the latter stages of the French Revolution and its associated wars in Europe. His legal reform, the Napoleonic Code, has been a major influence on many civil law jurisdictions worldwide, but he is best remembered for his role in the wars led against France by a series of coalitions, the so-called Napoleonic Wars.
The Term Paper on Politics, Presidents and War
War is inevitably an exercise in politics. In the best case the political process provides checks and balances that can contain or even prevent war. In other cases the political process itself is the primary driving force towards war. These two realities are not mutually exclusive. The Persian Gulf War of 1991 provided evidence of both political realities. Politics influenced the nature and the ...
But before achieving all this, he started from a scratch. He trained as an artillery officer in mainland France. He then followed orders from above until crawled his way up by showing his potentials until he finally was assigned to be a leader and led the successful invasion of the Italian Peninsula. Everyone can develop their capacity to lead. When someone is committed to, and practises using their leadership capabilities at all levels in their life, then they can and will develop their own potential as a leader.
Therefore we can conclude there are indeed, born leaders. These are the people to whom others look, even from a very early age; they seem willing to be seen and heard, take risks, stand up for what they believe. They do have charisma, people want to hear what they have to say, they want to get things done and bring people along with them. In summary, I would conclude that while there are natural born leaders, leaders can indeed be “made” or developed if one adopts a growth oriented mind-set.
The bottom line is, it is not how a leader comes by their skill that is relevant whether he was naturally born a leader or became a leader by acquiring the skills of being. It only matters that they possess the requisite skills for the job, and that they are willing to apply those skills for the benefit of those they lead. There is no perfect leader, no single right way to lead, and no shortcuts to become a great leader.
