What People look for in Leaders?

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In 1987, James Kouzes and Barry Posner, published the acclaimed
The Leadership Challenge. In 2007 the 4th edition of the book hit the bookstores and it continues to be one of the most referenced books about “practical knowledge” on leadership.

In the book Kouzes and Posner identify 20 characteristics that people look for in a leader. They administered a questionnaire to more than 75000 people around the world and asked them to chose seven characteristics they looked for in a leader. In over 25 years of research, they found out that 4 characteristics receive over 50% of preferences consistently. That is, at least one out of two respondents have chosen that characteristic in a leader.

The following is the list of the 20 Leadership Characteristics ordered by their relevance as appears in the 4th edition of the book. Please take into account that only the top four have consistently received the most of the votes since the first edition of the book (1987).

  1. HONEST
  2. FORWARD LOOKING
  3. INSPIRING
  4. COMPETENT

  5. Intelligent
  6. Fair minded
  7. Straightforward
  8. Broad minded
  9. Supportive
  10. Dependable
  11. Cooperative
  12. Courageous
  13. Determined
  14. Caring
  15. Imaginative
  16. Mature
  17. Ambitious
  18. Loyal
  19. Self Controlled
  20. Independent

What’s in it for us? First of all, although circumstances change and the world moves faster people’s basic needs doesn’t seem to change, and that translates into what we look for in others.

Do you want to be a leader? Are you in a position to lead? Then go on and give the best of yourself to be:
HONEST
FORWARD LOOKING
INSPIRING

and COMPETENT

Remember Be Alert, Be A Leader :)

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3 comments

1 Mwamachi S M { 02.28.09 at 9:35 am }

the piece of words ars inspiring and motivating

2 Leaders are Competent | BeALeader.Net { 03.04.09 at 7:56 am }

[...] the post What People Look For In Leaders I talked about the characteristics people was looking for in leaders. The qualities were taken from [...]

3 zakariyau { 03.12.09 at 6:28 am }

This is very interesting . I need materials like this on entrepreneurship

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