Why are Leaders Important?
Leaders are important because they inspire others to achieve great things. No matter if it is a business or a sports team, without a strong leader, the rest of the group will not achieve objectives as quickly or as proficiently as they could otherwise.
A good leader can also inspire creativity amongst the group, getting them to generate new ideas and methods of working. Some of these ideas could ultimately end up being highly beneficial for the organisation in the future (e.g. a new product range or a more efficient way of moving raw materials to where they are needed within a factory).
Without a strong manager and leader, a group will typically work at a slower pace and be far less motivated. The amount and quality of their work will suffer overall.
Developing Leadership Skills
The best leaders are usually people who are born with certain attributes and a natural level of certain interpersonal skills. They are excellent communicators, and will be able to influence others to get everyone working towards a common purpose. Even the way a person thinks will have an effect on their leadership style and overall influence on others.
Although the type of person someone is will play a big part in the kind of leader they will be (e.g. an introvert versus an extrovert), leadership abilities are by no means set in stone from birth! Leadership skills, just like all skills, can be developed, refined and improved in order to raise an individual up to a higher level of ability.
While there is no substitute for experience, as a leader will often find then they continue to develop and improve their skills over the course of their working life, the other way of learning and developing these crucial leadership skills is by enrolling on a leadership course.
A course taught by a tutor who has experience of leading others can provide a tremendous amount of useful information; not only about the skills and qualities needed to be an effective leader, but also providing examples of what worked for them in the past and what did not.
One of the most important things that all leaders need to keep in mind is that different people will respond to the same method of motivation in remarkably contrasting ways. The carrot and stick concept of motivation is a common example of this. Some employees will respond well to criticism of their work by becoming more determined to do better, whereas others will find that their motivation collapses. The fact that employees can react in such different ways to similar proposals is why business coaching is such a key tool for many leaders and managers, as it enables them to really understand how their employee thinks and what tactic would be optimal to improve their performance.
Why are Leadership e-Books Useful?
There is no denying that a good leadership course can provide a tremendous wealth of useful information for aspiring leaders. Even those currently in a leadership role, who potentially have a number of years' worth of experience in leading others, are still likely to discover something new on an effective leadership training course.
Unfortunately, just like courses on any subject, no matter how good the course tutor is and how engaging their training session was, over time the information will start to be lost from the delegate's memory. Hopefully they will have begun to put what they have learnt into practice as soon as they returned to work, but there are likely to be at least a few things they have forgotten about. Unlikely as it is, even if they remembered absolutely everything that was taught on the course, there may be points that were not fully understood or would benefit from additional self-study. This is where leadership e-books can play an important role.
A leadership e-book can be read at a time to suit you, and fit in with your busy work and personal life. Unlike a course which is a one-off event, an e-book can be read over and over again, so that all of the useful information can be understood and remembered for future use. It can also be referred to in the future if a particularly challenging issue arises and you are unsure about how best to handle it.
Leadership Courses
As well as providing the Leadership Useful Guide e-book package, we offer a number of leadership courses, both classroom and online, including leadership and management courses accredited by ILM. We can also deliver courses at your premises exclusively for your employees, and/or develop completely bespoke leadership courses to suit your industry and working practices.
The leadership courses we offer include: