Leadership

Part A

The definition of leadership has evolved and developed significantly in the past decades. This can be seen from Rost (1991) research on the materials analysed from the 1900 to the 1990, finding more then 200 different definitions for leadership. All these definitions have been given by various scholars in the past century all agreeing that leadership is about one individual influencing other individuals to achieve a goal. The definition for leadership, extradited from a Northouse defines leadership as ‘the process in which an individual influences the group of individuals to attain a common goal’. Leadership is relevant to all types of settings, whether it be a business, academic or even a social setting. This can be seen from leaders such as Steve Jobs in the business industry or even a principle in an academic environment who are all influencing group of individuals to achieve a goal that they have set out whether it be reaching a certain number of sales or increasing students pass rates.

The first approach to ever systematically attempt to study leadership was the trait approach, various scholars since the early 1900’s have come up with theories, detailing traits of a leader. The trait theories that were developed believed that certain individuals have certain special qualities or characteristics that enable them to be an effective leader. Benson (1994) however disagreed with this statement, believeving that true leaders are not born but are invented. Northouse (2007, P.18) compiled a list, which showed all the traits that scholars in the past century have identified and associated with effective leadership. The list displayed several traits as being on several of the scholars lists where as a few were only in one or two. The strength of the trait approach is that it focuses primarily on the leader because it believes that the leaders qualities are the main component to the leadership process, this enables organisations to pick the right individuals...