With Ongoing Leadership Development Long Island Businesses Gain An Edge

By Frances Stone


Management and management training used to be the big buzz words in business but that has changed. These days leaders, instead of managers, run companies and self directed teams. Teams are tasked with specific goals and they have quite a lot of say in how they plan to achieve those goals. But for teams to work effectively, they need to be lead well. Thankfully, with proper training in leadership development Long Island companies thrive and prosper.

Everybody has the potential to be a leader. Studies have shown that there are certain characteristics shared by all great leaders. It has also been proven that people can develop new characteristics and shed undesirable ones. This means that anyone can be developed as a leader. This is the reason why so many companies spend a lot of money on programs aiming to develop and nurture leaders.

Managers are managers in all situations but with teams, the role of leader can change according to circumstances. One team member may, for example, be brilliant at doing presentation and will therefore assume the role of leader when the team has to make presentations. Thereafter the leader may be someone else again. It is important to note that there are many people who do not desire to take the lead.

It is not just leaders at the top of the organization that should benefit from programs developing leaders. Organizations need a depth of strong leaders and must therefore develop leaders at all levels of the organization. Even established and recognized leaders can benefit greatly from such programs. The modern view on training focuses on life long learning. It prevents people from becoming complacent or stagnant.

Good programs do not just focus on the development of new characteristics. They also cover the high value of failures and personal weaknesses. Many great leaders have said that the most valuable lessons they ever learnt were from mistakes and failures. Nobody is perfect and that is why good leaders must also have the ability to recognize their own weaknesses and to implement strategies to turn those weaknesses into strong points.

There is no shortage of courses, workshops, seminars and programs designed to develop leaders. It is always a good idea to ask service providers for references. Courses should have very clear objectives and service providers must be prepared to explain how those objectives will be achieved and what their instructional methodology will be. Programs under consideration should be properly accredited.

Formal courses and programs are certainly very useful for exposing developing leaders to new ideas and knowledge. It is at the workplace, however, that these ideas have to be tried and implemented. To this end some companies use independent coaches to guide promising new leaders. These coaches make no decisions. They simply act to motivate their clients, to make them think before acting and to be their sounding boards.

Without strong leaders at all levels of the organization, no company can hope to thrive in this competitive modern business environment. Programs to develop leaders should therefore be seen as an investment in the future. A business with strong leaders is better focused.




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