Developing Successful Community Leaders: A Handbook

The characteristics of effective leadership

The question of what leadership is is one that we frequently discuss in communities. How can we help? How can our communities develop stronger leadership? I’m going to provide some ideas today on what I think constitutes effective leadership and how you may better incorporate it into your community. As with everything, there is only one perspective and one method to consider. I’m not claiming that any of this is infallible, but I do hope that it may inspire some thinking in the majority of you on how you might use it in your own life.

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Therefore, we are all animals from the very beginning. Some of us are more like animals than others, especially those of you who don’t signal when changing lanes in traffic. You need to be shunned by society. Pack animals are what we are. We are gregarious creatures. Here, we have a tendency to view ourselves as these magnificent creatures. When we think about it, this is probably a little more true, and we often split the world into leaders and followers when discussing leadership.

And, you know, the notion that we need a select few of leaders because the majority of people are followers. And in my opinion, that’s typically quite true. This gives us some intriguing topics to consider. To begin with, there are always much more followers than leaders. Because not everyone is interested in or capable of being a leader, we must be careful to identify the right people. In addition, many followers aspire to be leaders because, as anyone who has never held a managerial position will attest, leaders seem to get to enjoy all the good things. It’s all trip reservations, expense receipts, and other such nonsense when you’re a manager. Therefore, our goal is to create leaders who can motivate others to follow them in ways that fulfill their desire to achieve goals in various ways.

The lobsters’ leadership

We are part of ecosystems and society, which is why lobsters are fascinating in this sense. Of course, being a great leader involves more than simply making wise choices and guiding others; it also involves responding to the environment and community in which you find yourself. To be honest, you become into a sort of tyrant if you don’t do it. In fact, lobsters often engage in combat to establish their authority within their own environments. The lobster that prevails in this battle may grow extremely strong, self-assured, and have a prosperous life ahead of it. The lobster that fails frequently experiences such a rejection that they may even perish; they get so discouraged by this that they collapse and never rise again.

And a common occurrence for those aspiring to leadership roles is that they make a lot of errors along the way. Additionally, it might occasionally be so discouraging that people simply lose their confidence and go on. Therefore, we must consider how we may assist individuals in responding to their surroundings in a way that promotes their success.

Additionally, there is the so-called IKEA effect. This is what you get when you search for “Lobster house” on Google Images. Since the IKEA effect occurs when individuals go and construct various objects, if Matt and I both purchase a table from IKEA, we will both construct it. Both of us will believe that our table is superior to the other’s. As a matter of fact, mine is superior. This is what I saw when I got a vision of lobsters doing the same thing. However, the other is that, in my opinion, excellent leaders are those who can appreciate not just their own inventions but also those of others. Because, as a leader, you would become rather totalitarian if you simply valued your own creations.

Values and principles

As we consider these broad ideas and principles, I would add that there are some individuals who believe that anyone can become a leader and that all it takes to understand how to lead is to follow flow charts and charts. What happens is that you have all of this self-help literature, seminars, and the like, where the main goal is to sell people on the key to excellent leadership. And I don’t think it works because, you know, this stuff doesn’t function if you don’t have the fundamental values and principles of great leadership in place. Some might respond, “All right. If someone says this to you in a social setting, you will naturally react, which will lead the conversation in that way. Personally, I think it’s all rubbish.

Therefore, I believe that we should concentrate on identifying the fundamental values that great leaders hold and how we can assist in fostering those values in communities. People will then naturally respond to this. When you combine all of this, you have what I refer to as “the governance paradox,” which is something we frequently observe in open source communities, where many individuals who wish to join governance boards and communities are power-hungry. And frequently, such individuals aren’t very excellent leaders; rather, they are only those who are prepared to work hard in order to be selected to those governing boards. Of course, this isn’t true for everyone. However, you would never see some of the world’s greatest leaders promoting themselves as such; rather, they just embody such traits in their personalities.

Therefore, how can we foster a culture of leadership without creating an environment where the only individuals who would want to hold a leadership role are those who are really only vying for power? I believe we consider three factors. The first is that, at our core, those individuals—as I have somewhat experienced—want prestige and legacy. In fact, having a certain position gives us that confidence, which is how we define ourselves as decent people. Second, we place too much weight on our ideas and labor. The third issue is the misconception that everyone can lead.

Finding individuals who care more about quality work than prestige and legacy is, in my opinion, the first step in developing outstanding leadership. Some people break that myth, appreciate the effort and inventions of others, and can teach others how to be very good at what they do.