What makes a Leader

Ocean of humanity is spectrum of varied shades and hues of attributes attained by individuals forming the ocean. This gives rise to natural leadership of some in a society making others as followers of these distinguished natural leaders, also known as born leaders of the society. 

The first and foremost sign of a natural leadership is that the leader never works to acquire it but the people force it by recognizing his/her leadership attributes. Very demonstrative examples of ancient times are those of Ram and Krishna of India. The former never boasted of his strengths and attributes while the latter put all resources - moral and immoral, under him to force his leadership on the people. In-spite of this, Ram has been more popular than Krishna. Ram is still remembered for his noble deeds while Krishna is known for his fraudulent activities out of fear only.      

I have shortlisted the attributes which make a person natural leader of his/her society -

Courage or Fearlessness

Life is full of adversities or it is considered so by most of the people. Facing an adversity and overcoming it needs courage which everybody does not have. So, people always need somebody to help them in their adverse situations and like to depend on him/her marking him/her as their leader, crowned or uncrowned. 

Courage has a possibility of being misused for personal gains or for oppressing others. This may force others to accept leadership of the courageous but under duress only. This leadership gets forgotten as soon as the situation gets altered. This makes another attribute essential for natural leadership.

Fairness

Fairness has two faces like those of a coin - Honesty of the self, and Unbiased judgment about others. Honesty demands that the person is free from vices like greed for wealth and authority. Since leadership involves dealing with others, judging the people on merit becomes a prerequisite for the leader. This requires a high caliber of intellect in the person to understand others' merits without any bias, in opinion as well in actions.

Unexpected Goodness

Goodness of personality includes goodness of character and is always desirable. But what impresses the people is an unexpected and unimaginable goodness of the person. This is not an expected quality because nobody can expect such a goodness, but is appreciated by one and all. Here the underlying philosophy is that if a person is what is expected of him/her, he/she is not an exceptional person and gives no new standard of goodness to the society as a leader. A person with unexpected goodness remains an indisputable leader of the society. This puts a new burden on the leader of ever behaving in a way better than what is usually expected of him/her. This keep on raising expectations of the society leading it to ever-higher levels of morality. And this what a true leadership means. 


Going beyond expectations of people requires the person to be a great visionary, possible through his/her exposure wider and broader than that of other members of the society. This is achieved through studies, research and a nature of experimentalist of the leader. He/she remains always open to what is possible rather than just what is foreseen. This is just like going beyond the visible horizon, and this what real development of humanity means.