3) Why the Leader Matters

During High School, I took a leadership class. In that class, our job is to organize and prepare for school events. In order to do that, everyone in the class was divided into certain sections. For example, my section was in charge of hosting events for the faculty and giving rewards and certificates to honor. In general, everyone had to work together in order for events to run smoothly. Having leadership was important for this class because we were given our own responsibilities. This was a class where we were teaching ourselves how to work together rather than being "fed with spoons."

Before I took this class in my freshman year, I was actually a very shy person. Therefore, I didn't have that much confidence. According to Group Communication, "direction and influence" define leadership. (O'Hair) From taking leadership, I learned that I had to be more confident in order to become a leader.

Direction is knowing what you are doing. Being a good leader means you are able to guide people through any situation. A teacher is a leader for example. Teachers are good leaders because they guide and teach you about certain subjects. It is assumed that the students have no knowledge about the subject. The teachers are in charge of making sure students understand it. However, if you had a teacher that did not know the subject he or she was teaching, then he or she can't really teach. In that case, the teacher wouldn't really be a teacher or a leader because he or she wouldn't be able to provide any direction or guidance.

Another important aspect is influence. Guiding a class is important but both direction and influence are complementary. Being influential means persuading your audience to care what you are talking about. A teacher can be good at guiding students. However, if he or she looks very bored, the students will think that it is acceptable to be bored about the subject because the teacher looks bored as well. In contrast, if the teacher looked enthusiastic and eager to teach the subject, students will more likely pay attention. In most cases, students will even have fun learning the subject.

In my experience in leadership, these two aspects were very important. Most of the time, we were busy. Sometimes, it got to the point where we had no leader present. In that case, we had to improvise and become leaders ourselves. We had to figure out what to do when no one was there to guide us. Sometimes, there would be some lazy people sitting and doing nothing. In order to make them work, I had to be a leader and tell them that they need to work. In order to make them work, I had to be influential or sound like doing the work was important. If I did not practice these two aspects, I would not be able to work on my own or encourage others to work with me as well.

- Pink Bean