Leadership
in any job position
Hierarchy
can give power,
but moral authority is only achieved with leadership.
It is possible
to have a boss and a leader in one group.
The boss
is the one that holds a higher position within a company, whilst the
leader is the person that enjoys moral authority over the rest of
the group.
In this
situation, the boss can give orders that will be observed and carried
out for fear of possible disciplinary sanctions, whilst a leader will
not give orders (he doesn’t have hierarchical authority) but
his indications, opinions and thoughts will be accepted by the rest
of the organization.
Therefore,
it is necessary to point out that leadership is not a role only reserved
for directors, but it is a role that anyone can carry out independent
of the job they have.
The capacity
of the leader to motivate the team, to reach objectives, to make decisions,
to achieve results, to be the reference of the group, etc. can be
carried out at every level of the organization.
Everybody
should be able to practise their leadership within the competing area.
For example,
in a company the MD can be a leader, but also the manager of a different
department, a salesperson, an administrative, a mechanic, etc can
also acts as a leader.
The MD
will practise his leadership on the whole organization, whilst the
head of a department will practise his leadership in his department,
and the salesperson, administrative or mechanic will play this role
amongst their colleagues.
An employee
that has an intermediate or low position in a company doesn’t
have to limit his performance to be a more mere conformist or follower,
but within his environment he can adopt an attitude which is active,
innovative, fighting, and worried for the good of the company and
therefore he can motivate the rest of the team.
In short,
a leader can exercise his leadership skills as if he was the boss
of a company.
In fact,
one of the responsibilities of the leader of a company is to promote
the leadership spirit at all levels of the organization.
A leader
that doesn’t manage to spread his enthusiasm, promote his values
and his work ethics is a leader that in a certain way has failed.
Besides,
the leader has the obligation to form new leaders amongst his colleagues
with a view that one day they can substitute him.
