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News | Nov. 4, 2018

Leadership roles

By Tunisha Fluitt DLA Land and Maritime Level II Mentoring Program

Everyone has a Leadership role. In business and life there are owners, managers, project leaders and informal leaders.

A leader is someone who encourages others to succeed and move forward so that one day that person too will become a leader in some form. This is usually a spouse or significant other, a friend, a boss, a mentor or someone that has encouraged you along your career and life path.

Owners are entrepreneurs that are bringing their ideas to life, working toward their own success and become their own boss. Many owners do not have management skills so they seek professional advice to become a more effective leader and rely on others to assist with managing their organization.

Managers are mid-level leaders that assist with managing various aspects of an organization. Additionally, managers communicate and set objectives for their personnel and decide what work needs to be organized, divided, and completed for the team to meet the organization’s goals. Thirdly, managers analyze and measure performance but most importantly, managers assist in developing personnel.

Project leaders lead people through a certain project and communicate with people the basic information of the project. The project leader is always there to answer questions and assist on the project until the team completes the task.

Informal leaders seem to be in a unique position not based on formal authority. Informal leaders can influence other people of their organization because they are often charismatic, may have an outspoken nature or have a strong determination. Most informal leaders have a technical skill or a vital behavior that they bring to life that others trust and pay attention to them.

There are many leaders not just in business but in the household as well. Everyday we have people making executive life decisions in dividing up duties for their families, whether a mother, father, grandparent or child.

With support, encouragement and the right resources anyone can become a leader, it may just take a different scenario to bring out that confidence for that person to take charge of the situation.