Using a nutrition analogy and our body’s diet, the cell phone is today a portal to our digital life. This digital being coexists with our biological being, but the difference is that since it is a much more recent phenomenon, how its use impacts individuals has not been studied in depth. Therefore, it is an issue of efficiency, which leads us to think that politicians should be trained and supported in a different way. It does not make sense to think that we can have good results in our societies without it. It is like thinking that we will win a soccer world cup or a gold medal in the Olympic games without all the preparation and the coaching and training of these athletes. Usage of leadership concepts which derives from the leadership desired, or the results desired, rather than from a common generic function betray a misleading normative bias. To say that leadership is manifested in a political environment may avail us of little if we then become enmired in locating the criteria for “good” leadership and “good” politics! The approach to this sort of dilemma may best begin with an acceptance of the objective coexistence of leadership and politics and work from there toward a conception that is less value-bound. Servant leadership is the best leadership style for maximizing a person’s positive influence. For example, servant leaders eliminate self-serving behaviors and instead focus on the needs of their employees, customers, clients, and community. In essence, they’re always asking themselves, “How can I provide value?”

Scientifically speaking, EI is a predictor of professional success. Studies conducted by TalentSmart® found 90 percent of high performers at work have a high emotional quotient (EQ measures EI). The good news is, unlike a person’s intelligence quotient (IQ), EQ can grow over time. For more information on growing your EI, start with Daniel Goleman’s Emotional Intelligence. Devote Time to Learning and Teaching House and Aditya have made a substantial case for both the achievements and the difficulties of leadership studies and noted that one of the major problems is that the “current study of leadership … continues to focus excessively on superior-subordinate relationships to the exclusion of several functions that leaders perform and to the exclusion of organizational and environmental variables that are crucial to effective leadership performance” (House and Aditya 1997, 465). They also assert that there are generic leadership functions which “represent broad classes of specific leader behaviors” (House and Aditya 1997, 449). The idea is that a generic function can be enacted by diverse behaviors in different settings, e.g., group maintenance may be seen as such a generic function which is performed by leaders in most, if not all, settings. The notion of generic functions is useful if not applied too selectively. After all, the same role may be served in different cultures by different behavior. The variety of behavior that serves the political nature of leadership will not deny the fact that a fundamental function (it may best be called a metafunction) of all leadership, regardless of setting, is to be political. Once this step is taken, it may become more possible to identify the behaviors which serve that metafunction.Leadership emerges from relationships but it is insufficient to say that leaders emerge from group interaction alone. There must be a pattern as well as a frequency to that interaction, but neither tells us anything about the content of the interaction. The pattern should be triggered by the primary political process in which the functions of conflict processing and resolution are performed. The intensity of interaction–a function of time and frequency taken together–may reveal even more. Small groups which have a stable leadership structure may be able to resolve conflict more efficiently than those with unstable structures which must spend time searching for leadership in the conflict resolution process (see Verba 1961, 159). Visual perspective can be trained, but it can also be worked on from the content we consume through different dimensions. Kenneth Janda discussed the nature of the problems which occur when conventional words are taken into the specialized “vocabulary of those attempting to construct a systematic body of knowledge about social behavior” (Janda 1960, 345-47). He identified “at least two” of those problems as (1) “the delusion of sufficiency” and (2) “confusion by similarity.” The first re fers to a “premature satisfaction with the analytical utility of the concept being proposed.” The variety of meanings normally associated with a word may not account for built-in contradictions and inconsistencies, for example. In other cases the word in question might be used too hastily in a taken-for-granted manner which may not support rigorous analysis. The “delusion of sufficiency produces concepts which are not analytically tight and are therefore inadequate for exacting study” (Janda 1960, 346). The second, confusion by similarity, “relates to the entanglement of a carefully formulated concept with one or more other analytically distinct concepts that share the same label” (Janda 1960, 346).

With few notable exceptions, such as James MacGregor Burns’s Leadership (1978), attempts to pursue an explicit understanding of the political nature of leadership have been conspicuously absent from the literature. Effectively, Bums saw leadership as a sociopolitical process enacted by individuals in interaction with others, but even he seemed focused on leadership in public politics rather than on the politics in leadership. (Or at least, Bums seems to have been convinced that the most meaningful forms of leadership are those that operate at the highest levels of public politics.) Both are vertical models, and if we look at the last decades in the region, we will see them competing with different levels of success depending on the country. But over time, a crisis of representation has grown in much of the continent. Societies that have radically changed the way they connect, consume, and inform themselves must choose between political leaders who continue to try to replicate outdated formulas and emerging leaders who are unprepared or opportunistic, building on people’s resentment and disenchantment. The spiritual and religious dimension also constitutes an important element to consider. It is important to understand how it shapes our beliefs and values, our thought process, our self-knowledge practices, and our relationship with transcendence. Although it is a more private dimension, omitting it from the analysis implies leaving out a dimension that occupies an important part of people’s lives.Teams also show us counterexamples, where egos and individualities tolerate each other, but clearly convey that there is no such sense of shared belonging. The similarities with the realities of political forces are very clear when viewed from this lens. Leaders can adopt a two-part strategy for managing political conflict in the workplace: Following the practices outlined in this article, they can develop norms and procedures for averting conflicts altogether while also making plans for managing them when they arise. One dimension has to do with looking at other realities; seeing what is happening in other countries; ideally traveling, but if not, at least consuming content that shows us we can find solutions to problems that we think are exclusively our own, but that exist everywhere; and reading about global perspectives. These are all ways of broadening our strictly local perspective. In this context of volatility, uncertainty, and complexity, we should look at the human dimension, seeing empathy and an emotional bond with the population as a basic and necessary condition. That requires moving away from caudillista, messianic, charismatic, or technocratic leadership models. Awareness of your humanity and connection with others is a path that helps prevent the evils of abuse of power or bad rulers. In ancient Rome, the Caesars had a slave whose task was to whisper in their ear that they were mortal. Since the existence of man, there has been insight into how power impacts the individual, how to prevent the madness of power, and how to ensure good rulers. There was little point in asking them to think strategically, to design a more horizontal and empathetic leadership, to allow for team building, or to think long term, because they were basically trying to survive from day to day.

Clearly, any effort to understand leadership faces daunting problems. Both the virtue and the vice in the way of thinking which has been suggested in this article lies in its generally objective attitude; it does not immediately help us to discover the secrets of how to lead but it may hold some promise for helping us to see why and how all leadership processes take form and, thus, allow us to ask better questions. Hopefully, it will help bring leadership study more prominently into the range of vision of social and political scientists. Clearly, leadership must be understood to involve more than the exercise of formal authority. It must also be understood as a critical element in the process by which authority is both created and sustained (Weaver 1991, 161). The “office holder” may not be the locus of leadership in a social structure. A concern with leadership qua power and authority in formal organizations effectively diverts attention from the structures and processes of informal power and authority and, therefore, leadership within those organizations or in other social structures (Weaver 1991, 162). Leadership must involve more than performing an office; it must define and be defined “by virtue of intricate reciprocities of behavior and perceptions” (Weaver 1991, 162). 1 will repeat here a position that I have made before that “leadership is a generically political role that has something important to do with initiative in the definition, articulation, and/or authoritative allocation of values in any social construct” (Weaver 1991,162) . An old, apocryphal riddle asks “What is the difference between a politician and a statesman?” and is answered with the observation that “a statesman is a politician with whom one agrees.” So too, with most students of leadership, “a nonleader is anyone who acts the same as a leader except that we disagree with her or him in some significant way.” The view of political leaders taking care of their bodies becomes even more necessary when you consider that the athlete has a career limited by age, but the political leader has a much longer career. There is enormous opportunity for improvement in strengthening the entire training system, as the political experience is a longer one and therefore provides more time for learning and training. Today, we can learn from the many experiences of high-performance athletes who have prolonged their competitive lives. Continuous Procedure: Leadership is a continuous process. A leader must constantly oversee and supervise their team members to ensure that everyone is working toward the same goals and not deviating from them.

Leftwinch, A., ed. 1990. New Developments in Political Science. Brookfield, VT: Gower Publishing Co. The support of doctors, nutritionists, physical trainers, kinesiologists, and other specialties is important if one wants to avoid voluntarism and wants to take advantage of scientific knowledge and advances that continue to develop. This conception of leadership also has another very complex side effect: it scares many people away from the possibility of becoming leaders. If you think that to be a leader you must be a chosen one, somebody superior from the rest, then it’s probable you will exclude yourself from that category. Understanding that the heroes, the founding fathers, and the great leaders of humanity were and are as human as everyone else is key. In Latin America, this vertical tradition was combined with the culture of the caudillo, which combines religious elements with a power based on being the incarnation of the people. That leadership style always had dramatic aspects of sacrifice and of express omission of oneself for the “love of the people.” The leader never retires; he is always willing to sacrifice longer for the people. It does not occur to him to train new people and he can justify corruption or any abuse of power in his redemptive mission. Achieving Shared Organisational Goals: A leader's role in an organisation is to guide employees in achieving shared goals. The leader brings people and their efforts together to achieve common goals.