The ART of Leadership!

January 22, 2018

What is Leadership?

Shrouded as mysterious, charismatic and inexplicable, the word Leadership or Team Management is a difficult skill set to explain. But in today’s world, it has a heavy demand in the corporate world. Although, the Literal meaning says “the action of leading a group of people or an organization, or the ability to do this”. But implying it in actions is far more challenging task than understanding its meaning.

As a Leader, you might stand alone but believe me the view is amazing.

I believe, it is the course of learning, presenting, convincing and motivating others to attain the values you believe in. For me Leader is the person who understands everyone’s ability and utilizes it like an axis of a chart, keeping all the sentiments and progress milestones on check.

Nature Walkers Photo Contest — keep the sentiments and progress milestones on check

The market perspective towards any company or an organization is developed by inheriting the properties, morals, and values you and your followers work with. Keeping your moral and vision strong would be the first step towards good Leadership.

Keep your morals high and strong like Mt. Kanchenjunga.

Teachings from previous leaders

Leaders like Steve Jobs, an influential leader of my time, proven as a good subject to learn leadership from. His ideas, his struggle, his vision and a capability of managing hundreds of people and building an economic empire from nothing is the best case study you could ask for at this time of the world.

*I want to put a ding in the universe* .

I believe, he had a clear picture of the future age demand and how is he going to fulfill it. The terms he wants to invest his time played a major role in his career growth. His absolute determined characteristics made him lose his own company, but people forgot that he was a phoenix of the modern world and did rise back with his morals and ideas.

“I want to put a ding in the universe. The design is not just what it looks like and feels like. The design is how it works. We hire people who want to make the best things in the world.”
Steve Jobs

Another great personality I would like to develop my properties from, is mother Jijabai, Founder of the Maratha Empire and the driving force behind her Son, Chhatrapati Sivaji, (a Great Emperor in India history).

Mother Jijabai Shahaji Bhosale with her son Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj

Mother Jijabai was an able warrior and good administrator. She passed down her qualities to Chhatrapati Sivaji and instilled in him a sense of duty, courage, and fortitude to overcome any hardship. Under her guidance and care, Chhatrapati Shivaji developed within him a human touch that saw him harbor great respect for all women, a sense of justice, along with the love for his country, his religion and his quest for freedom of Maharashtra.

Shivaji Maharaj owes his greatness to the inspiration of his mother who dedicated her life in bringing up her son to become one of the greatest rulers of the Maratha Empire.

An Effective Leader

What you learn from previous successful leaders is that you need to know you and your team’s strength. You also need to have a strategic vision, patience, and determination in developing and analyzing effective skillsets for you and your team.

Beside Productivity and time management you should also encourage Social bonding, teamwork, optimization of resources and positive attitude towards your work. A stubbornness for your work and friendliness towards your team is an easy mantra to be an effective Leader.

Learn From Mistakes

My father used to say, “Getting punished for doing a mistake, will make you remember this incident and remind you not to do it again”. That time I use to think he is encouraging me to not get punished. But now I know he was encouraging me to do that mistake and get punished for it.

There are no mistakes in Life, just Lessons.

Until I do a mistake, how can I categories it as a mistake? True, but a mistake not studied or not gained proper knowledge from is stupidity. Repeating would be dumbness. I mean to say, do not get scared of making a mistake, but always evaluate before and learn after making one.

Team & Time Management

Team Management & Time Management are the major qualities one look for in a good leader. The challenging part is that these skills are developed on course of actions or on the field, but how will one learn Team management without a team?

Rise of Nations
Age of Empre

My personal suggestion would be to observe and learn to play strategic games like AOE (Age of Empire) or RON( Rise of Nation) to understand and develop these skills. These games are very good practice for distinguishing different roles and responsibilities of your resources.

And it also helps you to use them in favor of developing strong empire and army. Also, tracking your progress and challenging your progress with time are some tips for enhancing the qualities within you.

Understand the Position

Many Leaders miss out the objective with all the attention they get from the surrounding. Surely, a person in command sometimes gets dissolved with its power. Always remember, it’s the position where all eyes are looking at. The power is given to the position.

If you do not enhance the skills the position demands, you might be removed from that position. This job requires successive progress rate. Why? How will you be on top every day, if you don’t beat the topper every day?

The answer to it would be to learn the change. Jot down a three months milestone, favoring to its task. Make another one-month milestone, favoring to its task, and make another one-week milestone.

Make a chart, Let the axis be Team knowledge and team utilization. Point the cross-sections according to the schedule milestones and evaluate their progress every day. Learn the changes you face, use it to make the roadmap for the next quarter.

It gives me quality time with myself and for the new improvements, I want to implement in me and my team. This will surely help you to maintain and sustain your progress rate.

How We Use Leadership in Nature Walkers

Managing a group of 30 people in outdoor is a challenging responsibility to deal with. You surely need to strengthen your leadership skills in these situations. Especially when everyone is in full rush of adrenaline.

Kodachadri Trek — You need lot of strength to balance the group’s emotions and sentiments.

Understanding of group sentiments and local regulation are the key aspects we feel responsible for. We believe, when both learn each other well, we make a successful Adventure Travel out of it.

Any media we upload on our website or other social Medias are captured by Nature Walkers. We gather complete knowledge of the region, capture and record its terrain difficulty, divide the whole travel into sections and records individual time, learn the challenging points and forest/local regulation, calculate the risk factor involved, develop local bonding through community work & rural village development projects, connect directly with the travelers to evaluate their physical strength & limits, Acknowledge the participants with complete knowledge of the trek and travel plans with all the challenges involved to ensure a smooth and successful Trek.

Every Trek/Event in Nature Walkers is a test and learning experience for our Outdoor leaders and their leadership skills.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BcWs5G4lGlr/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

Only a good team can make a good leader and vice versa.