Leadership Characteristics and Lessons Learnt from Nelson Mandela

The essay analyzes the leadership characteristics required to be inbuilt in a leader. It discusses the nature of Nelson Mandela and his influence, his leadership qualities, and lessons learnt from his leadership style.

Running head: LEADERSHIP
Leadership
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

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Introduction
The essay helps in analyzing the leadership characteristics which are required to be
inbuilt in a leader. The different qualities are required to be identified which have made the
person a successful leader along with the nature of the influence of the leader. The different
aspects of the leader is required to be learnt which has been inspiring the individuals as to
become a great leader.
About Nelson Mandela
Nelson Mandela was South African anti-apartheid revolutionary, philanthropist and
political leader who was the president of South Africa from 1994 to 1999. He was the first black
head of the entire state and he was elected in a full representative democratic person. Mandela
was controversial figure for much of his life, however all these never affected him and he was
always in peace in handling the different issues in an efficient manner. He was born to Thembu
royal family in South Africa and he studied law at University of Fort Hare and furthermore he
became involved in anti-colonial and nationalist type of politics as well.
Nature of Nelson Mandela and Nature of his Influence
Nelson Mandela was a successful leader as there are different qualities which make him
different from others. As a leader he has the ability of learning and growing in an effective
manner (Saleem 2015). The nature of Nelson Mandela of learning along with growing is one of
the aspects which are helpful in becoming a positive leader as he was mainly focused on the
goals and showed grit and endurance as well.
Secondly, having a vision is the other nature of Nelson Mandela which is inspiring in
nature as he is a man with vision. It was a vision which inspired him in order to pursue creation

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of creating peace in the entire world and due to the remarkable endurance (Anderson and Sun
2017). The ability of Nelson Mandela to envision the goals which reaches into the philanthropic
pursuits is the other aspect which can be learnt from the leader.
These are the major characteristics which has huge influence on the different individuals
as the main focus of Nelson Mandela is on learning and growing and this aspect will be helpful
in growing in life.
Furthermore, having a vision towards the different tasks which are being performed by
them is the other aspect which creates huge influence on the individuals to become more
enthusiastic in performing the various activities effectively and with joint efforts as well.
As a leader, this is essential to provide equal importance to all the employees working in
the organization which will assist the employees in feeling strong and this will be able to
increase their morale in performing the activities as well (Romager et al. 2017).
Leadership Qualities of Nelson Mandela
There are various kinds of leadership qualities of Nelson Mandela which can be taken
into consideration are as follows:
He is a transformational leader which was the main characteristic of Nelson Mandela as
this will put the company in a position to grow effectively and this helps the leader in taking and
considering the viewpoints of the different employees or subordinates working under him (Choi,
Kim and Kang 2017).
Furthermore, as a transformational leader, Nelson Mandela tried to provide motivation to
employees along with self management which helped him in effectively managing the direction

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of the organization appropriately (Nanjundeswaraswamy and Swamy 2014). The ability to make
difficult decisions is the other aspect wherein this was noticed that Nelson Mandela used to take
difficult decisions with proper vision and the difficult decisions were made easier as well
(Yahaya and Ebrahim 2016).
Lessons Learnt from Leadership Style of Nelson Mandela
There are various lessons which has been learnt from Nelson Mandela are that as a
leader, this is essential to handle the various kinds of decisions in an easy manner. Furthermore,
all the employees should be provided with equal opportunity in order to motivate the employees
appropriately. Moreover, this has been noticed that Nelson Mandela has the caring attitude which
will help the individuals in becoming successful as a leader. The main aspect of becoming
successful leader is to have confidence on themselves and the subordinates which will help in
managing the overall efficiency.
Conclusion
Therefore, this can be concluded that leadership is one of the major aspects which is
required to be taken into consideration in order to support the different employees. Furthermore,
in this essay the different characteristics and nature of style of leadership of Nelson Mandela
have been discussed which provided motivation in creating a vision while becoming a successful
leader and there should be less pride when they become successful.

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References
Anderson, M.H. and Sun, P.Y., 2017. Reviewing leadership styles: Overlaps and the need for a
new ‘full‐range’theory. International Journal of Management Reviews, 19(1), pp.76-96.
Choi, S.B., Kim, K. and Kang, S.W., 2017. Effects of transformational and shared leadership
styles on employees' perception of team effectiveness. Social Behavior and Personality: an
international journal, 45(3), pp.377-386.
Nanjundeswaraswamy, T.S. and Swamy, D.R., 2014. Leadership styles. Advances in
management, 7(2), p.57.
Romager, J., Hughes, K., Trimble, J., Verburg, M., Camp, J. and Jones, M., 2017. Influences of
Authentic Leadership Styles and Challenges to Enduring Pervasive Leadership Models.
Saleem, H., 2015. The impact of leadership styles on job satisfaction and mediating role of
perceived organizational politics. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 172, pp.563-569.
Yahaya, R. and Ebrahim, F., 2016. Leadership styles and organizational commitment: literature
review. Journal of Management Development, 35(2), pp.190-216.