Leadership is being equally passionate, kind, smart, and humble.
Passion – Without a passion, any job will be a drag that causes burn out, stress and inability to perform at your full potential. Passion in love, in life, in school, and at work is a fuel that keeps us going, helping us go faster and is essential for us to success. Steve Jobs said – “Without passion, any rational person would give up”.
Kindness – Kindness is what helps to contain our egos. Our ego wants us to always be right. However, if we are always right, than someone is always wrong. There are leaders who are so possessed with finding whose fault it was, that they miss the fact that it is not a person, rather, it is the environment that needs to be examined. I heard once that Kabbalah teaches that the person who stole from his boss will be punished, but bigger karma punishment will be on the boss who allowed the environment and circumstance where someone could steal. As my spiritual leader Wayne Dyer brilliantly stated: “ If you have a choice to be right or to be kind, pick Kind”.
Smart – A good leader should be a subject matter expert in their industry, they have to know how to do research, how to analyze the information, how to summarize it and how to drive to a conclusion. Smart leader can recognize intelligence in others and hire even smarted people for the team.
Humble – A true leader is the one who acknowledges others’ work and achievements. Way too many bosses want to take credit for someone else job. Humble leader treats everyone with the same respect. Lastly, but maybe the most important is only a humble leader can recognize their own mistakes.