Introduction
A person’s success depends on many factors but there are qualities that play the key role and distinguish the individual from the rest of the public. This paper will analyze the top three qualities of Ronald Reagan’s leadership that made him a successful leader and compare his leadership style with my own experience.
President Ronald Reagan’s Leadership Qualities
The leader I admire is President Ronald Reagan. I chose him because of his significant leadership abilities. There is a wide a range of Reagan’s leadership qualities that allowed him to make a successful career but three of them were the most powerful and need extra attention. First, President Reagan had a strong commitment to the nation’s values, particularly he shared the same sense of right and wrong (McFarlane, 2011). He was not afraid of taking risk and ready to help countries that lived worse than the U.S. Reagan demonstrated respect to neighboring countries and communities (McFarlane, 2011).
Second, President Reagan showed a mixture of integrity and political bravery. This means that he used to do correct things without paying attention to the potential negative effects of those activities on his political career. For example, he fired the air traffic controllers when they stopped working in 1981 although it was against the Taft-Hartley Act (McFarlane, 2011). Despite the words of his advisers that this action would displease organized labor and reduce the support during the next elections, President Reagan showed political courage. He understood that the situation with air traffic controllers was a question of law, obligation, and providing public safety. Another example is his idea to change American nuclear doctrine. He was strongly against the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction believing that it could lead to the destruction of humankind. Instead, he offered defense against nuclear weapons (McFarlane, 2011). All the population groups including famous senators and nuclear specialists criticized such position but Reagan continued to support his idea and won.
Finally, President Reagan had the ability to inspire confidence and receive the people’s support. He was a brilliant communicator; thus, he could describe his policies to the public and make them believe that these ideas were good for the U.S. (McFarlane, 2011). Other presidents had some of these qualities but none had all of them (McFarlane, 2011). This made President Reagan a great leade.
Personal Leadership Style
I consider myself a transformational leader. Most of my career, I have been leading others in the logistics (sales and services) industry. Like all transformational leaders, I try to inspire my colleagues to develop themselves because I believe that this will benefit the organization. I am also attentive to the anxieties and needs of the employees I lead (Robbins & Judge, 2013). If I see that some of my followers face issues that they cannot solve during a long period, I help them to look at these problems in different ways. In addition, I encourage employees to make additional effort to reach group objectives. The following qualities allow me to maintain high productivity within the group as well as ensure increased job satisfaction and high team sprit. Besides, the group that I lead has a low turnover, low absenteeism, whereas corporate efficiency and adaptability are high.
Comparison and Contrast of both Leadership Styles
My leadership style and leadership qualities of President Reagan have both similar and different features. In particular, we both have the ability to inspire confidence and gain the people’s support. Like Reagan, I always explain my policies to my followers so that they understand why they have to execute my demands. On the other hand, I am not as good communicator as Reagan was; s a result, unfortunately, my team does not understand me in all cases. Sometimes, they avoid doing some tasks believing that they are not important.
Besides, Reagan and I are committed to the values of the insinuations we work for. For example, my company appreciates its clients and tries to deliver excellent customer service. In my work, I also put interests of customers higher than any other aspects like keeping good relations with suppliers or protecting followers that made a mistake.
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However, I do not have much courage to protect my ideas if I feel the opposition especially when it goes from my supervisors. I value my career higher than the interests of the company. For instance, if I see some issues in delivering services, I inform supervisors about them and offer solutions. If my ideas are not approved, I reject them. On the other hand, Reagan had more powers than I do, so he could allow himself to do what he wanted.
How to Improve My Leadership Style
The analysis of my leadership style reveals that I have to improve a list of qualities. First, I need to enhance my ability to influence. Gary Yukl (2013) recommends to apply eleven forms of influence including individual identification, legitimate demand, and inspirational requests. For this, I should improve my communicative skills. Second, I need to increase confidence in my own ideas. This would help me to gain more support among both followers and supervisors. Reagan’s experience demonstrates that innovative things always face the opposition but later the person gains recognition. This clearly relates to the right ideas.
Conclusion
In conclusion, my leadership style has many things in common that of Reagan. However, I need to become braver in supporting my ideas to gain the same degree of success. My ability to influence and communicative skills also require improving. Nevertheless, my continuous experience of working on leading positions indicates that I chose the right path to success.
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