Leadership Theory

To understand leadership I have decided to focus on the following areas that I believe constitute the essence of leadership;
1. What is leadership?
Leadership is a continuous process by which an individual (the leader) with the help of the group (the led) make progress on a certain aspect of their environment with the aim that at the end of a period, they will have arrived at a desirable destination or set a standard for the proceeding group to make it to a desirable destination.
Now, until I joined the School of Community Leadership, I was not aware of spiritual leadership which I believe should be the standard for any leadership if we are going to lead for God.
This concept of spiritual leadership makes it obvious that the desired destination for the leadership process should be that which God wants for a particular group of people. This is why the individual who assumes the leadership has to firstly consult with God and always to so as they lead the people.
2. What Does Leadership Involve
a. To be effective, the process of leading would involve firstly understanding where the target group is at the moment. Let’s say the leader will have to carefully consider the spiritual, economic, mental and any other stand point of the group basing on what improvements he wants to make. A marketing manager may want to make sure the company gets more presence in the market or that the customers consider the company product as the only solution to their need. A church leader may want to increase a church’s involvement in the community of to develop more of the peoples spiritual gifting. Whatever the case, first understand where the group is at the moment.
b. Set the goal to be achieved. Any leader without a goal to achieve is merely wasting time, his, the peoples and God’s. This goal could be a based on the vision that he has or on what the group believes is their desired point of destination.
Spiritual leaders will have to get their goals from God. This means that the leader will have to go there before the people have been there. He has to believe in the desired destination as if that destination were already here with us. That’s why when he communicates it to the led; they have no option but to believe as well.
c. Identify with the people to be led. Every leader has got to identify with the people that he is leading. The people have got to feel that he is one of them and is for them. Sometimes this unique identifier exists even before the leader emerges but there are times when the leader has got to come to the people to identify with them.
Ghandi was a well educated lawyer who probably would not have suffered the injustice the average Indian suffered at the hands of the British, Moses too was a prince in the palace but these men came down to the standard of the people they were to lead, they forsook some sort of prestigious and privileged positions to lead.
d. Communicate the task and motive of your leadership at every step.
Every leader would have to keep the direction of the led open to them at every step of the way. It has got to be so clear to all the people involved that no mistake about it can go unnoticed and uncorrected. This communication too has got to be continuous at every new development or correction.
This communication will also involve communicating ones influence and power while leading. Influence has got to be communicated well for people to follow; power has got to be accurately communicated for people to trust. We want to follow one that we believe has the power to make the changes desired but that one has got to be in position to influence us and the other authorities involved in achieving the desired destination.
NOTE: These are also my core values when leading now.

e. Involve the led.
Although it may be hard to imagine, the leader has got to find more ways of involving the led to participate in the leadership. Not everyone can be a leader but all of us need to take part in the leadership. The citizens of a country register to vote leaders into power, the members of a church need to make it a habit to pray for their leaders, children in a home make sure the chore are done, they respond to the instructions of the parents. At whatever stage, the led need to be encouraged to participate in the leadership. It could be participation in decision making or simply response to the necessary actions to help achieve the desired destination.
3. Who is a leader?
After looking at leadership it’s easy to understand who a leader is. Not everyone can be a leader at the same point, we all cannot be presidents of a republic or general managers of a company only one can lead from that point, but we all can contribute to his leadership and we can lead at other points or stages depending on the hierarchy of authority in the organisation.
The leader is that person that stands at the front and leads to the desired destination, he communicate to the and helps them not only believe that they can get there but that they have the ability to contribute to the journey to the desired destination. The fact that he identifies with the led enables him to touch their strongest desires and inspire their deepest energies. It should be noted that a leader’s understanding of those he leads helps him lead almost effortlessly because in the process of leading each is placed at the position of both development and expressing of their passions.
I think of a pastor who fails to realise that one of the people he leads is passionate about hospital ministry and instead places him in charge of the youth in the church. That pastor fails to realise that its not just about filling positions but also developing those one leads and helping them express their God-given passions.

NOTE: That’s why the measure of a leader’s success is most accurately got from those that are being led or were led at the time the leader led them.

Life Experiences
My eeliest significant leadership experience was when I was a School council speaker. In the position I was the only student at the ordinary level that sat at the school council that decided which undisciplined students were to be dismissed from the school and which ones would be retained. I know now that I failed to lead well because instead of firstly getting counsel from God on what correct judgement would be, I went with the flow and order of the day. Had I realised that the position I held required the wisdom and counsel of God, I know that I would not only have saved some innocent students but would have led to corrective measures that would have seen many of the boys make more meaning of their lives earlier on in life. Worse still, I was a culprit of some of the indiscipline that the boys were being punished for.

In contrast:
Today am a children church leader at the Watoto children’s village at Bbira and I have already been practicing some of these principles. What I devised was a mentorship and friendship way of leading. I have a team of children that teach with me. They are students and they stay in the village at Bbira.
So I sat with them and agreed to attach ten children that come to children church from the village to each of them. The point was I will follow these five children so that they can follow up the other fifty or so children, I also had to show them what I mean by following them up.
I pray for them on a regular basis because I believe that it would be very useless to lead with a team that one never prays for them. But I also got more involved in their lives; I started sharing myself with them. I go to their homes so that I can get the report about them from the mothers and also started following their academic performance up. I believe the individual should develop wholesomely and that is the reason why I monitor their discipline and academics, I constantly inquire about their spiritual standing, whether they pray and study the Word and how often.
I do this so that I can get to know them very well and this also gives them a chance to know me and ask the questions that are relevant to ask. I want them to learn from me and I pray that I learn from God as much as I should teach them and use for myself.

Challenges;
• I still need to grow in understanding their gifts and callings, their passions and abilities. This I know will take the Hand of God as I seek Him on the subject and about each individual on the team.
• Consistence is the other challenge and area in which I need to grow. Because the time I spend in the village is limited, I find that I fail to make time for all of them at the same time and sometimes I fail to follow up on a particular issue earlier tackled.