What is the Problem in Today's Leadership?

Essay by MLarsen1University, Bachelor'sA+, January 2003

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There is a problem with the leadership today. Leaders nowadays lack certain qualities and understanding. What quality or qualities are they lacking? I plan to decipher what some professionals and writers claim what makes a good leader and by that, determine what leaders lack.

According to Stephen R. Covey's, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, leaders have seven habits. He defines these habits as an intersection of knowledge, skill, and desire. The seven habits fall into three different levels, dependence, independence, and interdependence and two different areas within the levels, Private Victory and Public Victory. Private Victory has three named habits starting with "Be Proactive". This means a leader must take an initiative and be responsible for him or herself. Taking initiative does not mean you have to be too assertive, or aggressive, instead the leader must know their responsibility to make things happen. Covey states, "Our behavior is a function of our decisions, not our conditions" (Covey, pg 71).

In other words, you cannot blame circumstances, conditions, or conditioning for behavior. Behavior is a result of a conscious decision based on values and feeling. Recognize your responsibility and make it happen. Covey then moves onto Habit 2, "Begin with the End in Mind".

Begin with the End in Mind means that all things are first a mental creation and then second, a physical creation. Leadership being the mental creation and management is the physical creation. To accomplish this, first plan and then follow through with it. A leader must have the ability to envision and to see potential. If you cannot see it with your eyes then create it within your mind. The last habit in dependence level is Habit 3, the "Physical Creation".

Here you "organize and execute around priorities" (Covey, pg 149). Time management...