I
Leadership has a mentality. Leadership has a thinking. Leadership thinking is influenced by the purpose and thirst to make life better for others. Leadership mentality is empowered by the attitude of results-oriented offerings. As long as leaders do not lose this vision, they stay in the domain of positive impact.
II
Leadership is visionary. Though vision is often personal, the vision of a leader is such that the personal dream and thirst of one man is given for the benefit of many. This is the value of shared vision that welcomes leadership humility and opens the door for true collaboration.
III
Leaders attract their kind in potential and actual. Where this is feigned at any point of delivering value to the envisioned space, the leader’s quotient is imbued with enough sensibilities to identify leaks in the value delivery funnel.
IV
Through examples and models, leaders produce their kind. Followers are raised to be leaders in the mould of leaders through leadership example. A truly great follower should be able to replicate the leadership’s potencies. That is unalloyed loyalty. It is the adaptability of the human quotient. Followers know the minds of their leaders and they know how far-reaching leadership decisions can affect them.
V
Leaders do more than they say. Where a leader fails to lead by example from his own household and unable to manage own affairs, the people have an idea of what to expect. Where leaders ask the people to endure while they enjoy the proceeds of the people’s endurance for their own interests, there is great harm that may lead to mutiny where the people are not bereft of courage.
VI
Leaders communicate vision. Leaders act their vision. Leaders are persistent in their vision. Through the tenacity of action, words are lived, and beliefs laid bare. This is the transparency by which truly results-oriented leadership communicates impact. All can testify to this regardless of the divide they belong because posterity is the judge of leadership delivery.
VII
Leadership is a pact with service: service beyond self; service to the community and the people; service to mankind and the preservation of all creation within the sphere in which the leader has been called to operate.
VIII
With service comes the mindset of selflessness. This is the attitude to sacrifice your life for the comfort of others. It is a hard place to be in and that is one strong bane of leadership that has caused the abuse of power.
IX
Servant-leadership is at the core of leadership essence and value. Leaders who connect with and accept this reality live on the goodwill of their service, as opposed to other appropriated gains that ‘earns’ a leader culpability. Guilt is stronger than the filched mind can appropriate.
X
Leadership power is bequeathed to those who lead through popular choice. This is the annals of mankind as ordained by the Maker, but this is not without the permission of same, for whom total accountability shall be rendered. An absence of this reality is the reason for ineptitude in the space. No one serves God without serving man
XI
Leadership is not personal. No leader is in leadership, whether positional or otherwise to serve own personal objectives or purpose. A leader with an ulterior motive or hidden agenda shall only live in the regrets of wasted opportunity of the time they have been allotted.
XII
Leaders are often deceived by their cohorts; the people who are closest to them. These men are carefully chosen to support the leader to carry on the business of leadership. If they choose to bend the facts to their own purpose, they shall bear the consequences of same.
XIII
Burdens are not physical loads that leaders bear on their heads. They are the responsibilities that they bear in their minds. These burdens rob them of sleep oftentimes. Where they are genuinely affected by the burdens and problems of those they lead, they would find answers through the same burdens as they genuinely brood on them or even in their sleep. They receive solution in their waking thoughts, too; but what they do with these insights is again, their responsibility.
XIV
Truth and accountability are the leader’s greatest tools. Without these, the leader operates with a hollow and warped consciousness. Every leader shall account for their stewardship. They shall be made to say with and in their conscience how they used the obvious against the purpose for which they were permitted the access. Turning truth into a lie locks the leader out of partnership with the divine who called them into service.
XV
A leader’s sincerity can be proved by consistent character seen through daily actions. Every leader must be open to public scrutiny and evaluation. Character is victory, not a gift. A leader who lacks great character has their weakness exposed because their words do not align with their actions. They are constantly embroiled in sophistry likened only to a forked tongue.
XVI
Leaders owe the people continuous account of their stewardship. Leaders who think otherwise live in the deception of their own guile and shall be taken in by their craft. It does not take long to unveil sincerity. It takes but a short time too, to tell otherwise. These things are obvious to as many as seek to know.
XVII
A leader’s character is influence on the people. It is impossible for a leader to be straight and the people brazenly exhibit crookedness. The sincerity of leadership is an exposition of insincerity and negativity in the leader’s sphere of influence. Where leaders cut corners and justify their mean actions, the same trickles down to the people. These things cannot be hidden for long because they become examples and models that the people emulate.
XVIII
Leaders are humans. They are not super-humans. They make mistakes. Leaders must never present themselves as otherwise. Where they do, they must remember that they are always in the court of public opinion, but more importantly that they are judged by their results. A leader’s vulnerabilities must not be hidden from the people. It is the denial of transparency.
XIX
A leader’s self-righteousness does not validate his inadequacies; rather it exposes it. The qualities that a leader parades are the actions that transmute to results. These qualities keep the leader sane through moments of insanity thrown up in challenging situations. Leaders lead when the demands of leadership call. No leader truly leads except in challenging seasons where their commitment and other virtues are put to the test.
XX
Leadership value reflects in the people. This is what either determines leadership success or its failure. A failed leader means a failed people and a failed state. A successful leader is the great leader whose leadership leads to critical transformation, first of the minds of the people and the entirety of their lot. The people are the legacies of a true leader’s service. Leadership reflects practically in the people.
