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Leadership: Inherent or Developed

In: Business and Management

Submitted By masonga
Words 3865
Pages 16
Leadership: Inherent or developed?
Gary Mason
Regent University

June 26, 2016

Leadership: Inherent or developed?
Introduction
Leadership is required in nearly every aspect of our lives; it is so important that leadership, and the traits that make up leadership, have been studied extensively for decades. In industry the viability of the organization depends so heavily on leadership that many companies fail, not due to a poor product, or bad marketing but simply due to poor leadership since “…leadership…may affect work team processes and results”. (Santos, Caetano, & Tavares, 2015, p. 470) Although “nearly $15 billion is spent yearly…” (Prager, 2016, p. 30) on leadership development programs “study after study says leadership development is not effective, senior leaders don’t believe it works”! (Prager, 2016, p. 30)
With the amount of money being spent on leadership development, clearly there is a belief that it is possible to train someone to become a leader. Still, “86% of HR and business leaders see leadership shortfalls as a top-three issue”. (Prager, 2016, p. 32) If leadership development is important enough to spend $15 billion dollars a year to provide, yet 86% of business leaders and Human Resource officers still consider the development of leadership skills a significant issue because of remaining shortfalls in leadership in spite of the investment, there is plainly a disconnect.
But, what attributes or skills are recognized as good leadership traits? According to Marques there are several personal traits that identify people who can be good leaders: Morals and Values which have been developed over time and through experience, Ethics, Integrity, Honesty and Trust, Vision, Respect, Passion, Commitment, Compassion, Justice, Kindness, Forgiveness, Courage and Love among others. (Marques, 2009) In order to develop leadership it is important to

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