Being an exceptional leader is being able to inspire, motivate, and lead others towards achieving a common goal or vision. It is the charisma to make your subjects want to follow you or resilience to navigate the challenges and uncertainties of group collaboration.
Since I was a child, leadership is one aspect of life that has always called my name. It has been a very challenging concept for me because I have faced several problems and challenges leading people. But no matter how much I try to run away from it, I always find myself around the arena of leadership.
Are leaders born or made? It’s the same age-long debate that has not been settled till date.
While my childhood and adult experiences look like I was born a leader, the lessons I had to learn my whole life made me believe that leadership can be learned. Here, I will show you some qualities that can make you an exceptional leader as you continue in your leadership quest.
But first, let’s have a understanding of what being an exceptional leader entail.
Understanding Exceptional Leadership
Leadership is one aspect of human lives we all cannot overlook. We can’t do without leadership, especially when people come together for a common purpose.
The central idea of leadership is to organize people to have a collective focus or goal, to avoid conflicts or resolve them when they arise. A leader is best described as everyone’s person and represent the interest of everyone and not just a select few. Serious problems begin to arise when a leader begins to take sides.
Being an exceptional leader not only requires being able to control people but also making them happy to be under your leadership. This is where many leaders, including myself, have struggled.
In the next section, you will see 10 qualities you can develop to become a more effective and exceptional leader going forward.
Qualities of an Exceptional Leader
Some of the top qualities of an exceptional leader are vision, communication, humility, competence, resilience, problem-solving mindset, adaptability, emotional intelligence, accountability, delegation, collaboration, strategic planning, and continuous learning.
Here, I will share in detail what these qualities of an exceptional leader are and how you can develop them to lead more effectively.
1. Vision
On visionary leadership, I will refer to the words of Simon Sinek, a popular proponent of visionary leadership, an author, motivational speaker, and organizational consultant known for his bestselling book “Start With Why” and his TED Talk titled “How Great Leaders Inspire Action.” According to him, visionary leadership involves having a clear sense of purpose and direction that inspires others to action.
Having a clear vision about your goals and plans will make your followers to believe more in you and your leadership. But more importantly, you must be able to communicate your vision effectively, so that they can be inspired to keep putting in their best into the organization.
Another renown proponent of visionary leadership I would like to mention is Oleg Konovalov. He is one of the world’s top leadership experts who has shared several thoughts on visionary leadership. He emphasizes that visionary leadership involves creating a compelling vision of the future that inspires and motivates others to act toward its realization.
Visionary leaders can see beyond the current reality and envision a significantly different and better future. They can also communicate their vision in a way that inspires and engages those they are leading, and to build a strong team of individuals aligned with their vision and commited to achieving it.
Other thoughts by Oleg includes the following:
- Visionary leaders are unconventional in their thinking pattern and are willing to take risks or challenge the status quo to achieve their vision.
- They can adapt to changing circumstances and adjust their vision accordingly while maintaining a clear sense of direction.
- Visionary leaders can inspire a sense of purpose and meaning in their followers and create a culture that supports and reinforces their vision.
2. Communication
Being an exceptional leader not only requires you to have a clear vision and sense of direction but also the ability to communicate your vision to others. Good communication reinforces a sense of belonging and inclusiveness in your team members.
To be able to communicate effectively, you need to establish an effective communication channel. This entails expressing your vision in a clear manner, giving room for feedback to ensure they got the message, and actively listening to their contributions as well.
To be an exceptional leader, you need to show that you are genuinely curious and would be open to learn from your team members as well. This also stimulates them to learn more and get more engaged in the goal in hand.
Good communicators also understand the importance of nonverbal communication such as body language, gestures, and intonation. By adjusting these, you can communicate more than what the spoken words alone would say. For example, using a falling forceful intonation at the end of every statement gives confidence and authority to your words.
Effective communication is always a two-way thing; pay attention to their response as you speak. That way you can get their feedback whether they understand you or not, thus making you know when to recap or paraphrase.
3. Humility
Humility is one of the most important things that make an exceptional leader. Humility makes people see you as approachable and deserving of respect. When you are humble, it makes your subjects to be submissive to you as well but when you are not, it is not uncommon to have followers who are trying to bring you down.
People don’t often want to be bossed around, or giving commands even if they are the right order. They want to be understood and allowed to act freely. Acting and speaking in a humble manner can make anybody oblige to your request without even imposing it on them.
Being humble should show both in how you act and how you speak. Use suggestive tone when making requests, instead of dishing out commands.
Think of yourself as the least important member of the group, and you will see how much valued you will be before your followers. Humility is a very important quality that makes you an exceptional leader in any type of leadership anywhere in the world.
3. Competence
People look to their leaders for inspiration and motivation. Demonstrating competence at what you do makes them have more confident in you and your leadership.
Competence is the attribute of being knowledgeable at what you do. Not only should you be able to make plans, but you should be well-vast about how to implement those plans if you were the only person in the group.
Being competent involves understanding how to lead people towards a common goal, as well as how to achieve the common goals. When you demonstrate competence, people are happier to be under your leadership. This is a sign of exceptional leadership.
Your desire to achieve competence should transcend beyond being so at only one point in time. You should be committed to a life of continuous learning about trends, new information, and better ways to manage human, physical and financial resources in the organization.
4. Inspiration
Asides from being competent and having a sense of vision and direction, you should be a direct source of inspiration to your followers to be an exceptional leader. You should act and say things that motivates and inspires those you lead to achieve results.
One useful way to inspire your followers is telling them about their potentials. Talk about how special, awesome, and irreplaceable they are. That inspires them to do better ever after.
Leaders who withhold praises and positive affirmations from their team members end up making them feel unappreciated and demotivated. It is not only enough to issue instructions or communicate plans, you should inspire them with all you do or say to them.
5. Problem-solving mindset
Having a problem-solving mindset makes you an exceptional leader because it helps you get things done. A problem-solving mindset is a mindset that allows the leader to face challenges instead of running away from them.
Everyone expects the leader to be strong and resilient. And if accidentally, problems arise in the group or organization, the most important question you should be asking is “What is the way out of this?”
Not everyone has this problem-solving mindset. Thus, demonstrating this quality already sets you apart on this pedestal of exceptional leadership. When people see that you are able to turn things around for success, they are better inspired to continue with you.
Two important aspects of problem-solving that many leaders find hard to grapple with are fear of failure and fear of conflict. They are afraid of conflicts because they do not have the wherewithal to resolve them.
But exceptional leaders have understood that conflicts are inevitable aspects of every group and they have well-equipped themselves to resolve them without disintegrating the group.
This same approach applies to other problems or challenges that may arise at any point. Adopting a problem-solving mindset makes you an exceptional and effective leader.
This mindset also requires you to develop your capacity for strategic/critical thinking, which is the approach of considering long-term goals and outcomes before a decision is made. Will the benefits outweigh the risks? Do they align with the organization’s overall strategy?
6. Adaptability
Exceptional leaders do not have to be too rigid. Being flexible and adaptable makes it easier to get along with other people, keeps you open enough to receive helpful contributions from your team members, as well as build your resilience during setbacks and challenges.
Exceptional leaders do not back down at the slightest sight of failure. They exercise their passion and resilience till the very end even if they don’t clearly see a breakthrough at the time.
Being able to adapt to situations and people in the organization can ensure a seamless quest as you lead them. People are different and situations are ever-dynamic. Adaptability makes a leader exceptional because it gives him the ability to develop ways to navigate through the circumstances and come out even better and more efficient.
7. Emotional intelligence and maturity
As long as humans are involved, there is definitely going to be some show of emotions. Humans are emotional beings and you cannot truly be an exceptional leader if you don’t first learn to master human emotions. This is what is referred to as emotional intelligence or maturity.
Emotional intelligence teaches you to situate people’s actions in the context of their emotions. It is not always about punishing people for every little things they did or did not do. Sometimes, you need to demonstrate empathy by actively trying to understand their emotions and connect actions to emotions.
Another aspect of emotional intelligence and maturity is being able to keep your own emotions in check. At several times, your followers will say words or act in ways that may provoke you to get emotional. As much as lies in you, you should resist the urge to throw up emotions every time, so that when you do, it can truly hold much significance and gravity.
Some signs of emotional immaturity include being too rash when dealing with other people without considering their emotions, and expressing high emotions too often. Take a moment to reflect before you condemn or offer punishments to those you are leading.
Also, being able to keep your emotions in check in the public can make you look more emotionally mature. Even when they behave abnormally or say things they should not say, avoid the temptation to rank or express too much anger in the public.
8. Accountability
Accountability is the quality of being open and transparent in what you do as a leader. It is the quality of being responsible to your actions in the organizations.
Accountability makes you an exceptional leader by building people’s trust in you. When you are accountable, you consciously ensure that you can take responsibility for your actions even if no one is there to supervise or watch you.
Lack of accountability is a major setback against becoming an exceptional leader because it makes people to see you as a deceiver trying to hide something under the hood. They lose trust in you, and this can seriously affect the quality of your leadership over them.
As a leader, you must protect your integrity and trustworthiness at all cost. This is why you need to develop this sense of accountability or the quality of being honest, ethically guided, and consistent in your actions at all times.
9. Delegation
The primary goal of leadership is integration and cohesiveness. This means a leader is required to be the force that integrates together every component of the organization including the people in it, so that everything and everyone can work together in harmony.
Neither you alone or anyone else can do the work more efficiently as when everyone is involved. This is why delegation is one of the best signs of highly effective and exceptional leaders.
Delegation involves the following steps:
- Knowing what tasks are available
- Knowing what tasks are suitable for available manpower in consideration of their special ability
- Persuasively delegating the tasks to the available people
- Following it up with motivation and regularly inspiring them
- Giving rewards and reinforcements to them for successes along the way
Delegation is not necessarily a way to get lazy as most people think. It is a means of position yourself at the central position to be able to coordinate every aspect of the goal or objective.
Beyond ensuring operational efficiency in the organization, correct delegation gets everyone involved, develops their skills as members of the team, and reinforce their feeling of inclusiveness and membership in the group. Once people feel included, it empowers them to contribute their best to the success of the team.
10. Collaboration
Exceptional leaders are excellent team players. They not only feel comfortable working with everyone else but they also create a good atmosphere for everyone to perform.
Great leaders foster a sense of unity, peace, and free the working environment from unnecessary hostility, strife, and negative energy. They turn conflicts between two people into a fertile ground for stronger bond between them. They try to find out deeper or personal things that may affect a team member’s productivity in a caring way.
The power of collaboration comes from the idea that two good heads are better than one, and even more with more people involved. It is therefore worth it if you go the extra mile to restore harmony or inner peace to a team member who is feeling demotivated or excluded.
Leaders who understand the importance of collaboration foster a sense of unity and teamwork among team members to leverage the diverse strengths and abilities of the team. Some other specific ways to achieve collaboration include:
- Learning to appreciate people more when they perform, make a suggestion, or contribute in any way to the growth of the group. In my own experience, I have found that saying the words “Thank you very much” make people to feel more welcome and appreciated in a group.
- Active listening can also enhance collaboration in a group. You should pay special attention when your followers are making a suggestion, comment, or contribution, and after they are done, repeat it to show that you have noted it down. Always make them feel that their opinions are being heard and recognized.
- Avoid taking sides as much as possible. When people present contrary opinions or suggestions, thank them equally and look for important positives from both sides. If you are still unclear with their opinion, ask them for clarification. Making people feel like their opinions do not matter can dampen their willingness for collaboration.
- Lastly, when faced with a conflict, listen to both sides equally and judge the case fairly. Point out what each of them did right and what they could have done to do better and prevent the conflict. Don’t point out wrongs only for one person and declare the other righteous. Most conflicts usually have both subtle errors from both sides.
