Self-leadership is the practice of influencing feelings and actions to achieve goals. Self-leadership means being in charge of your own life and taking responsibility for what happens. Further, this ability enhances self-efficacy, which improves decision-making skills, professional and personal productivity. Moreover, it has a positive effect on the self-perception and self-esteem of a person. This competence requires constant development, so a person feels that he is capable of more.
Self-leadership is, first of all, understanding what motivates you the most and focusing your attention through thoughts and actions on this motivating element. Thus, Harvey Milk was open about his orientation and supported other members of his campaign (Shilts, 2022). Self-leadership is also the development of some essential qualities and leadership potential. First of all, it is necessary to develop such a skill as responsibility. First of all, it is responsible for oneself, thoughts, speech, and behavior in general. However, a successful leader must understand that he cannot take on someone else’s responsibility. Instead, it is necessary to support and encourage people to take responsibility for themselves. Moreover, a self-leader needs to develop such a quality as the concentration of attention. Being mindful is a necessary task for a successful leader. This is especially important when the leader knows exactly what he needs and focuses his attention on it. Concentration helps not to be distracted by extraneous things in general or at the moment.
The leader has unquestioned working authority among the staff. Authority is based on moral and professional qualities, and it has been earned for many years. An effective leader observes cleanliness in business; he is a good specialist, disciplined, fair concerning colleagues, and balanced in communication. The leader is distinguished by efficiency since it is the basis of the performance of his subordinates. Thus, time management, the ability to plan one’s work, and knowledge of the subject area allow the leader to succeed in his business.
The organization allows the leader to assemble a team of first-class professionals and organize the necessary activity process. The whole team should work together to improve critical performance in a friendly environment. This is facilitated by creating group work when the result depends on joint efforts. The organization brings team members together and allows them to cope with the tasks more effectively. Moreover, the team leader’s support as a creator and member includes providing support to like-minded people and followers in a difficult situation. People will support just such a leader who cares not only about his interests but about them. Without this quality, it will be difficult for a leader to maintain authority.
Inner integrity is a leadership skill that integrates all of the above qualities. This is the creation of a balance of all parts and manifestations of a person. A person is integral when the whole essence of a person is directed like a stream in one direction, as if subject to a single plan. Workers want to follow the leader when he knows where to go and broadcast it with his whole being. A step towards finding integrity is the leader’s awareness of his mission or uniqueness. A person who understands his mission knows or feels what needs to be done while enjoying the very process of his activity and life in general. One of the central leadership qualities is time management, with the help of which the leader can control the process and deadlines. Time management is a technology for organizing and optimizing time. They will help if a person constantly late does not have time to fulfill all his plans.
Group Leadership and Teamwork
Group work contains expediently expended energy of managers and employees. In this case, we are talking about the power, labor, efforts, and abilities of the followers and leaders as members of the group. The unity of their work gives the so-called synergistic effect when the group’s forces are greater than the sum of the points of its members. This explains the increased interest in group processes, teamwork, and corporate relationships. The basis of group leadership is the desire to get a synergistic effect and then increase it. The impact of coordinating discretely acting workforce is achieved through the management of people or management, ranging from small groups to the industry as a whole. To enhance the effect, the inclusion of elements of leadership and the group leadership itself is required.
The longevity of a group is an essential factor in leadership. In a team that has been operating long enough to develop a stable structure and streamline the responsibilities of its members, the stability of the leader’s behavior is explained not only by situational reasons but also by the influence of established structural elements. The formal structure is relatively stable; it does not change from situation to situation; it is long-term. However, this fact does not always guarantee long-term leadership. Harvey Milk helped entrepreneurs and organized associations in which he himself took part (Shilts, 2022). In a tough group, interpersonal relationships are not necessarily stable; their emotional coloring can change. In the early stages of forming a group, an employee who can control the situation and solve the assigned tasks becomes a leader. At the same time, other group members express their readiness and desire to support him emotionally, which is most often based on first impressions.
As relations develop in the group, its structure is polished, the desire to get to know the leader weakens and the assessment of his personality and actions ceases to be unambiguously positive. The group dynamics become more complicated with the emergence of new contenders for leadership. The former leaders are doing their best to maintain their position in the group. The style of their behavior becomes tougher, which is often expressed in the creation of power groups or bureaucracies. At the same time, the nature of the leader’s influence on the group changes, and his perception by followers become negative instead of positive. The structure of communication, which has remained unchanged after the group has successfully solved its problem, will also be acceptable for solving similar issues if the order and principles of relations take root in the group. When a leader moves to a new group, the former status significantly impacts his claims in another team and contributes to his winning the position of leader.
The leader determines the direction of movement; the manager develops a plan and schedule for moving in the chosen direction. The leader inspires and motivates the staff; the manager monitors people’s performance and compliance with the requirements for the work performed. He encourages people to implement the plan; the manager monitors the achievement of intermediate goals. Authentic leaders have different technologies of motivation. First, when setting out his vision for the organization’s future, the leader must always consider what moral values ​​and traditions are inherent in the audience to which he addresses. This makes the work more meaningful in the eyes of employees. Secondly, the leader regularly involves team members in a discussion of possible ways to implement his plan or that part of it that is most to the liking of a particular employee. This makes people feel that they are being heard and that they impact the life of the organization.
Reference
Shilts, R. (2022). The mayor of Castro Street: The life and times of Harvey Milk. Atlantic Books.