As a leader, it is my job to create an enabling environment to bring out the best in people. But one must also be alert to circumstances that may be affecting employees’ productivity and try and see how you can help them to be more effective at work.

A vital first step is creating a workplace where people feel comfortable calling out the issues that stand in the way of your vision. To do this, your leadership team must be comfortable with this type of environment.

Team Number One The only way for a leader to establish this collective mentality on a team is by ensuring that all members place a higher priority on the team they're a member of than the team they lead in their departments. A good way to go about this is simply to ask them which team is their first priority. I've found that many well-intentioned executives will admit that in spite of their commitment to the team that they're a member of, the team they lead is their first priority. They'll point out that they hired their direct reports, they sit near them and spend more time with them every day, and they enjoy being the leader of that team. Moreover, they feel a sense of loyalty to the people they manage, and feel that those people want and need their protection. This is absolutely natural, common, and understandable. And dangerous.

The role of a leader is to create an environment in which great ideas can happen.

The only thing of real importance that leaders do is to create and manage culture. If you do not manage culture, it manages you, and you may not even be aware of the extent to which this is happening.

The goal of a leader is to give no orders," Captain Marquet explains. "Leaders are to provide direction and intent and allow others to figure out what to do and how to get there.

As a leader, my priorities are transformation, excellence and sustainability. These priorities are interrelated because excellence without transformation is not sustainable, and where there is transformation without excellence, there is no integrity.

What is important for a leader is that which makes him a leader. It is the needs of his people.

Therefore, our common goal as leaders is to provide for an environment where the democratic institutions can thrive – provide for rule of law, human rights, democratic governance, and free and fair elections. And we must enforce accountability, accountability, and again, accountability. The people will do the rest in a democracy. For only in a democracy is everyone provided with opportunities for self-development and realization.

Good leadership is not just a matter of making things happen; it is a matter of making essential things happen, making important and productive things happen, and helping people feel good about what is happening. Leaders need to have a vision, but they also need to know how to convince others that their vision can manifest, and how to empower them to participate in the mission of bringing the vision about.

Give people the opportunity to prove themselves, but assign key roles to trusted people. Stakeholder engagement is really key and you cannot succeed as a leader without it.

A leader’s job is not to put greatness into people, but rather to recognize that it already exists, and to create the environment where that greatness can emerge and grow.

1) Have a Vision and Develop a Game Plan. A leader must be able to provide a clear vision of a transformed future. Vision encompasses strategy and goal-setting, but is more than simply having a plan. Vision is a passionate commitment to creatively closing the gap between the present reality and the desired future.
2) Communicate Your Vision. A vision is useless unless it can be shared with others. A leader must possess a wide range of communication skills- articulating issues, listening to what others have to say, and understanding diverse perspectives.
3) Hire Excellent People and Delegate Authority and Responsibility. Leaders develop the networks, relationships, and culture that form a community. In healthy communities, everyone can find meaning and motivation. A "team" attitude exists and individuals are eager to cooperate for the common good. Collaboration makes a community greater than the sum of its parts and enables a vision to be realized. In short, this is the crucial idea of empowerment at all levels.
4) Make Decisions and Take Risks. True leaders must have the courage to act. They take risks and make tough decisions. Without risk there is no progress. Leaders must be willing to make bold moves and embrace the seemingly impossible.
5) Admit Mistakes and Apologize When Necessary. A leader who encourages risk-taking must understand that mistakes will be made. A leader should quickly recoginze mistakes, apologize, and remedy the situation. Accountable leaders learn from their mistakes and make changes. Being accountable means being in charge of your choices.
6) Be Trustworthy and Care about Others. Visions are based on values. For good leaders, the means are just as important as the end. They make improvements with integrity, taking the right actions for the right reasons. They know that trust and credibility are central to the leadership process.
7) Never Give Up. Never give up. Work hard. Those simple statements are at the heart of successful leadership. The best leaders love what they're doing and put everything they have into their efforts. Leaders make commitments and have the determination to see them through.
8) Have a Sense of Humor. Good leaders aren't afraid to laugh with others and at themselves. They maintain a healthy sense of balance and perspective and know that humor can sometimes defuse a tense situation.

As far as possible the duty of a leader is to foresee dissatisfaction and to remedy injustice before complaints are made. To accomplish this he must maintain close contact with the men he controls. Let him go into the trenches if he is a general; let him arrive at the factory with his workmen now and then if he is the manager. He must have some imagination; an understanding of other men's lives is necessary to him, so that he may be able to protect those under him from unnecessary suffering. The secret of gaining their affection is to feel affection for them and to be able to do their jobs as well as they do them themselves. Men endure taking orders, and even like it, if the orders are given intelligently.