Leadership Qualities: Inherent or Acquired?

Running Head: JUSTICE MANAGEMENT 0
JUSTICE MANAGEMENT
“Leadership qualities are inherent. Some people will innately make good leaders and others will
not. It is not something that can be passed on through education or training”

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Leaders are the person who leads a group of person with some special characteristics.
Some leadership qualities in a person are inherent. These qualities help a person to guide
other. The various persons have some leadership skills but only a few make the right use of
those skills. There are some inherent qualities such as confidence, boldness, attitude,
communication. Great man and trait theory favour that leaders are born not made. However,
it is not necessary that every person is born with such leadership skills. These skills can be
learned further through teaching and observation. In order to become a leader, it is required
by a person to initiate the idea of becoming a leader. On the other hand, behaviour theory
states that it is not necessary that all leaders are born rather there are some skills that can be
learned further with the help of training and observation. This theory mainly focuses on the
behaviour of people (Northouse, 2017). In this way, there are different skills that can be
acquired by the person with the help of teaching, observation, and training. In this essay, a
critical statement is presented in the argument that it is not necessary that leadership qualities
are inherent. By presenting different theories of leadership, the discussion is done clear.
It is not compulsory that leadership qualities are inborn. Yes, some leaders are born
with some special and unique qualities that make them a leader. These leadership qualities
include boldness, positive attitude, and self-confidence. In this regard, the trait theory of
leadership states that some leaders have some personality traits that make them the leader.
According to this theory, “leaders are born, not made.” It states that some core attributes in a
person make a person leader. It provides an indication of personal potential that can be
identified by an organization and developed further. In this regard Reece & Walker, (2016)
state that there are some singers whose voice is miracle that makes them a good singer. Their
skills are not developed through any type of training then also some people perform with
excellence. On the other hand, the behavioural theory states that people can be leaders by
learning, teaching, and observation. As per this theory, Leadership is a skill that sometimes
learns through perception, practice, training, and experience over time. It also states that the
special traits of a person depend on the behaviour. These behaviour people can learn from
themselves as well as from others. It believes that there is particular behaviour that leader
learn in order to become a leader. It means that persons are trained to become a leader. In this
regard, various organizations provide leadership training to help a person to start leading
others. In this way, behaviour theory provides the better perspective that leadership is not
only meant for a few persons. By eliminating the limitations of trait and great man theory,
this theory proves to be sometimes successful. Therefore, behavioural theory puts more

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emphasis on the skills and behaviour of people. Leadership is the choice of person; the people
who want to be a leader will always come forward in order to face the challenge (Storey,
2016). It is rightly said that a person’s hard work pays off. If a person has determined
something to do and working hard for that, he or she will achieve that.
The belief of “Great Man Theory” states that great leaders are born with some unique
features such as confidence, intelligence, charisma, and social skills. All these features make
the person leaders from childhood (Gebert, Heinitz & Buengeler, 2016). It applies to some
person who got some special skills that make them a leader. Various persons have all
leadership skills from childhood. It helps them in becoming leaders by leading and guiding
other. Some people have charisma leadership skills that help a person to lead other. The most
notable example of charismatic leadership is Bob Brown who has some special characteristic
that helps him in becoming Prime Minister (Grabo & van, 2016). The influencing
characteristic helps such persons to lead other members. Leadership cannot be taught by
anyone, but it can be learned through mentoring and coaching. The best example of
leadership skills can be learned further is Bill Gates who despite several failures has done
innovation. Microsoft is the innovation done by Bill Gates and now it is the most successful
software industry (Amanchukwu, Stanley, & Ololube, 2015). It is understood that a leader’s
skills are not always inherent but can be learned through teaching, coaching as well as
mentoring. Teaching is the best possible way to learn something. Teaching is a most
important way to help students to learn various skills. Various skills are required by a person
to become leaders. The person in the journey of school can learn all these skills. The main
important skill that is developed through teaching is communication skills. Various activities
are developing in schools that help in communicating with each other. Group projects are
given to the student in which they talk with each other and develop their communication
skills. Now a day, students are more interested in more extracurricular activities (Borich,
2016). Leadership skills can be learned by motivating students to participate in
extracurricular activities. By including students in groups and further encouraging them to
developing leadership helps a person to grow in their early age. All these activities are given
more focus in schools so that they can learn diversifies skills that will groom them further.
Besides this, self-motivation activities in classrooms are the first step that develops the strong
ability of self-motivation in students. Classroom activities enhance the collaboration skills of
a person by knowing the importance of teamwork. In these activities, some persons learn how
to praise others as well as how to solve the conflicts. A leader that a person can learn from