Personal Leadership Philosophy
All leaders have differing perspectives and experiences on their leadership approach and the necessary qualities for effective leadership. Similarly, not all situations necessitate a similar kind of leadership style. Many experts across many articles and books agree on some principles required for leading teams to greatness, but the most critical factor is whether or not a leader gets the job done. Great leaders can adapt to their environments and empower teams to succeed together. Every leader is different, but one aspect of commonality is the leadership philosophy that enhances great leaders’ development and practice. A leadership philosophy is defined as a leaders’ attitude, which serves as the guiding principle for their behaviours (Spillane & Joullié, 2015). Though formal leadership theories have continued to evolve over the last decades, all great leaders appear to adhere to the overarching philosophy which directs their actions. These philosophies evolve through experiences, research, past failures, and successes. This paper is an account of my leadership philosophies that critically reflect good leaders’ characteristics, which include core values, personal mission, vision statement, and an analysis of the Clifton Strengths Assessment’s results.
My Personal Leadership Philosophy
As a transformational leader, my leadership philosophy statement is: I believe in constant change as the only path forward. I will motivate my team members through setting goals and overcoming all challenges to achieve success. As their leader, I will continuously provide constant guidance, support, and inspiration to improve the team and individual performance. My key characteristics are behaving with charisma, adaptability, passion, purpose, drive, competence, intelligent, broad-minded, supportive, dependable, determined, imaginative, loyal, ambitious, caring, independent, and self-controlled. Transformational leaders are continually evolving and creating new goals and benchmarks for their teams. The leaders devote most of their time to instituting goals and paths to success for all teams, along with developing new processes and practices to enhance the overall work. In nursing, transformational leaders recognize the critical ingredients to success are clear and consistent focus on the team members’ vision and the ability to keep a bigger dream than any other fears, particularly when the journey gets tough (Marshall, & Broome, 2021). Having a dream and inspiring others is not enough. Transformational leaders should believe in their capabilities to achieve their dreams and develop that belief in their team members by providing continuing support and encouraging team members throughout their journey. As a result, when all individuals are inspired with a mutual vision by a transformational leader, they are inherently motivated to accomplish the vision rather than satisfaction with the status quo.
Core Values
The core values are service to all, faith, community, personal integrity, team-building, communication, valuing cultural diversity, and working collaboratively with the community. As a leader, I want to always be of service to my teams and community by developing a servant’s heart to help the community. We are all of one community, the community of man, and to always have faith that what we do will no matter how big or small, will help the community thrive and grow as I am my brother’s keeper. My vision statement is to Love God and others by understanding and being compassionate to everyone at work and in the community. My mission statement is that God has called me to be a loyal servant, role model, and coach to help others run life’s race more successfully.
Clifton Strengths Assessment Results
The Clifton Strengths Assessment results revealed that the top five strength themes are responsibility, empathy, achiever, connectedness, and developer. These five themes are categorized under the relationship building and executing strength domains. The relationship-building domain themes are connectedness, developer, and empathy, whereas the executing domain themes are achiever and responsibility. Thus, most of the strengths are ranked under the relationship building domain that deals with people and have the innate ability to take the human element into the equation. Consistent with my personal vision, mission statement, and core values, the Clifton Strengths Assessment results focus on how individuals fit into the larger pictures and create paths for teams and the whole community to thrive (Rath, 2017). Therefore, these themes support building robust relational connections, binding teams and communities together around an idea, cause, or each other.
Based on these results, there are two primary behaviours that I wish to strengthen and become an effective leader at work and community, namely connectedness and empathy. The empathy theme is manifested as sensing others’ feelings by imagining themselves in their lives and situations. This can be developed by appreciating and refining the gift for understanding the thoughts and feelings of others. The development plan for enhancing empathy is experiencing the main differences in people, identifying their own feelings, nurturing emotional intelligence, and asking others for their perspectives and feelings regarding situations regularly. For example, strong empathy skills can be built by travelling or working in a multicultural environment where one can learn how others see and experience life differently. Another example is silently comparing people’s responses to what one might have assumed they would be. This will sharpen the empathic skills and learn more about other team members and the community.
Next, the connectedness theme can be evidenced by having faith in the linkages among all things by believing there are little coincidences and that nearly all events have meanings. This can be developed by helping others see connections and achieving a sense of purpose in everyday life. Various strategies can be implemented to improve upon connectedness to accomplish the personal vision. This includes mentoring community members and coaching actions to enhance connectedness as well as caring and supporting persons at work and community. For example, being a connected leader in the work environment can be applied by having tough conversations, addressing challenging situations and providing difficult feedback in a caring, compassionate, and supportive manner. In summary, the plan for enhancing the connectedness strength entails coaching and developing others, participating in skill practice sessions with the community, guidance around personal development, growing high potential and building deeper relationships.
References
- Daly, J., Speedy, S., & Jackson, D. (2015). Leadership & nursing: Contemporary perspectives. Elsevier.
- Marshall, E. S., & Broome, M. (2021). Transformational leadership in nursing: From expert clinician to influential leader. Springer Publishing Company, LLC.
- Rath, T., & Gallup, Inc. (2017). Strengthsfinder 2.0. Gallup Press.
- Spillane, R. & Joullié, J.E. (2015). Philosophy of Leadership: The Power of Authority. Palgrave Macmillan.