If we talk about what character traits a person in a leadership position should have, it is worth taking into account not only personal characteristics, but also the field of activity in which he works. There are examples that demonstrate that not all qualities of a successful person lead to a positive result. The main thing for a leader is the ability to maintain a balance between the desire to complete a task and the resources expended.
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Strength of character
This refers to the ability to persistently strive for a goal, maintaining interest in it despite failures, boredom and temporary lack of progress.
It is the combination of passion, resilience and self-discipline that moves us forward despite obstacles. According to psychologist Angela Duckworth, author of the book “Grit,” this quality is even more important for success than talent or intelligence. No matter how gifted you are, without strong character you will achieve little. It is he who helps to strive for the goal over time.
How to develop them in yourself
To improve yourself and develop leadership qualities, you take a step that is not given right away. It is necessary to recognize the negative characteristics and understand where improvements and improvements are needed. Working on yourself, it is not always possible to eliminate weak points, but do not be upset. The great ones of this world are also imperfect. By using the positive aspects wisely, you can balance the psychological aspects that affect your level of success.
Analyzing recent events and comparing them with the above characteristics of prosperous people, negative aspects become obvious. Self-development needs to start with the little things:
- Setting a goal and systematically moving towards it in small steps.
- Self-study in all areas that influence the type of activity, systematic work on the general broadening of one’s horizons.
- Strengthening discipline and self-control by giving up bad habits and regular exercise.
Even these minimal actions will show results within the first month.
To achieve the best results, keep a diary and collect in it the qualities that need to be achieved. Having compiled a list of actions and strictly observing the sequence, they move towards the intended goal.
Ability to adapt
We live in a world that is constantly changing, and this process is unlikely to slow down in the future. The skills, knowledge and connections that were important yesterday may very well be worthless tomorrow. Therefore, the ability to change and adapt to new conditions is an extremely important skill. Most companies will need people who have it to remain relevant.
Darwin also said that it is not the strongest or the smartest who survive, but the one who best adapts to change. This ability to adapt, improvise and change strategy depending on the problem gives a human an advantage over a computer.
What is success
You can figure out how to become a successful person only after you understand what “success” is. The concept is subjective. Some people want to achieve an increase in wages and a promotion up the career ladder. Others dream of a strong family with a bunch of children and a house. Still others plan to gain recognition in sports or business.
Only those people who make efforts to achieve the goals and objectives set when planning their personal life become successful.
To become successful, you need to work hard and study. Also, be persistent before sacrificing personal time devoted to “rest,” sometimes to idleness. You will have to develop a “special” way of thinking, a love for what you do. Otherwise, there will be no result, and attempts to achieve success will fail. Only persistent desire and hard work lead to the goal.
For an opinion on what success is and how to understand it, watch the video:
Accepting failure
Paradoxically, the first step to success is failure. Nothing is perfect and nothing can be perfect. Try, fail and try again. At the same time, focus not on the results, but on the lessons learned: those who learn them will achieve success in the future. Every failure brings you closer to your goal. If, of course, you study on it. And we truly “fail” only if we don’t get back on our feet after falling.
“An iterative evolutionary algorithm involving variation and selection finds solutions in a world where problems are constantly changing, trying every possible option and doing whatever might work,” writes economist Tim Harford in Through Failure to Victory. Darwin's laws in life and business."
So if you fail, try to learn from it as soon as possible.
TOP 10 qualities of a successful person
If you step away from being tied to a particular profession, there are a number of features necessary for a leader:
- Self-confidence is a necessary quality, but it must be balanced. Of course, it is important to move forward, realizing that there are no insoluble problems, but we need to take into account the degree of risk. A leader is responsible not only for himself, but also for those around him, therefore, when moving forward, it is necessary to clearly understand the consequences of the development of the situation.
- Result-oriented - helps to complete what you start. It is important to be able to convey this desire to subordinates and infect them with enthusiasm. Proper self-motivation opens up opportunities for transferring enthusiasm to the team.
- Self-control and discipline are components of business success. They help you follow the plan without shifting responsibility for the result to others, and allow you to lead the group forward.
- Planning and time management flow from one another and make it possible to eliminate unnecessary actions. A calculated and thoughtful approach saves time and resources.
- Efficiency is a derivative of self-confidence. By being aware of the vector of activity and taking clear sequential steps, a person increases productivity. While the unsure hesitates over every decision.
- Communication skills are the main trait of a successful individual, no matter whether he leads a team or not. The ability not only to speak, but also to listen, and most importantly, to hear, contributes to the formation of correct conclusions. Using this knowledge, it is not difficult to control society.
- Patience is a quality of a leader; it makes it possible to strive and achieve goals, not paying attention to failures, maneuvering in a sea of circumstances.
- Responsibility allows you to soberly assess the consequences of your activities. Thanks to it, a person selects only feasible tasks for implementation.
- Independence is seen as an opportunity to distance yourself from envy and gossip. Helps to direct a clear mind towards profitable and useful things. A successful person will not participate in empty conversations and discussions, wasting precious time.
- A creative approach is creative thinking that allows you to rotate a situation from different angles, see opportunities and new solutions. Generating ideas is a hallmark of leaders; they are able to create projects out of nothing and implement them in the most unexpected way.
Flexibility in learning
As futurist Alvin Toffler said, in the 21st century, the illiterate will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn. Real learning begins with your career. It requires you to constantly acquire new knowledge, and in the process you will have to repeatedly abandon outdated methods.
To succeed in the modern world, you need to be constantly ready to adapt: forget old rules and learn new ones. This requires questioning commonly held beliefs, challenging old views, and relearning what is currently important to your work, your industry, and your life in general.
What kind of person is considered successful?
Each group of people, united by purpose or social status, has different ideas about well-being. It depends on the person’s ambitions, his personality. If we are talking about success in business, then the indicators will be: career growth, reaching leadership positions, achieving global goals, making open and scientific breakthroughs.
The criteria for well-being are individual, and in each area they are considered holistically from different points of view: the internal structure of the organization, the principles of a person and the degree of personal development. For example, for an actor, success is recognition, being in demand; for a scientist - recognition and popularity; for software developers - the amount of profit from sales. But this does not mean that the designated representatives of the professions have reached the heights they dreamed of. As a rule, these people are unhappy in the domestic sphere. An aspect such as an unsuccessful personal life does not allow one to be called happy. Each individual has moral principles and foundations, and what is success for one is failure for another. Therefore, it is difficult to consider specific character traits in a general way.
Working with information
The ability to comprehend, analyze and apply information is an extremely important skill. After all, in order to make decisions and cope with problems, you need to collect reliable data, evaluate it and choose the most suitable option for a particular situation.
Someone who can look at a problem from different angles often finds an unexpectedly elegant solution, while simultaneously revealing how narrowly others have viewed the issue.
This requires both critical and creative thinking. According to philosopher Francis Bacon, critical thinking is the desire to seek and the testing of patience. It presupposes a rejection of haste in passing judgments and caution in their execution, as well as hatred of any kind of deception. Creative thinking is based on ingenuity and the ability to find new ways to perform old tasks.
Volitional characteristics
Let's touch on the main ones:
Purposefulness is a person’s focus on the chosen result of an activity. This property is divided into a strategic variety and a tactical one. The first is, in general, a person’s actions based on his moral positions, values and ideals. The second is the movement of the individual “step by step”, from one micro-goal to another until the result is achieved.
Initiative is a person’s focus on taking action. Usually precedes the beginning of a volitional act. Independent individuals have this property. Initiative is associated with independence.
Independence is a person’s voluntary and active attitude to make decisions in accordance with his principles and beliefs.
Will is not considered an innate quality , but is considered by psychology as a quality, the formation of which occurs on the basis of a person’s personal choice.
Emotional intellect
People with high levels of emotional intelligence have well-developed sensitivity, empathy, and self-awareness. They also know how to communicate perfectly: this skill helps to build relationships with others, understand their motives and predict their reactions.
All areas of activity that require emotional intelligence, which is not available to computers, will be very popular in the future. And if you're not a very social person, you still have time to develop communication skills to better understand others.
How to Determine Your Best Character Traits: A List of Exercises
- You need to identify your strengths and weaknesses . Think about what actions or work gives you positive emotions? Write them down on paper, ranking them from the most pleasant to the most undesirable.
- Determine your life values . To do this, they should also be written down on a piece of paper. Think about what values can help you develop, and which ones, on the contrary, will only drag you down. Having decided on this, try to rethink your beliefs.
- Analyze the behavior of people you look up to. Try to identify their best qualities. Consider if you have them.
- Remember the happiest moments of your life. Why did you feel happy? What influenced this?
- Analyze the information received from previous answers. Try to trace the same points in each of the questions. These will be the qualities that you strive to develop.
- Now let's move on to the analysis of real life . Does what you want match the real picture?
- Research where you live . What advantages and disadvantages does this place have? We do the same with regard to the place of work.
- Think about it, your environment slows down your personal development, or vice versa, contributes to its development.
- Ask your friends what character traits they can identify in you.
- Analyze the answers of your friends. What character traits are most often repeated? Write them down on a piece of paper.
- You can create your own self-portrait. The information obtained during these exercises will help you get the most truthful description of your personal qualities.
- Analyze the self-portrait. What would you like to change? Highlight your weaknesses and strengths. Think about what you need to strengthen your strengths, how to acquire new ones?
Personal branding
The impression that is created about you is very important. Among other things, it helps to inspire trust among colleagues, clients and managers.
In many areas, being successful means standing out in some way. Think about what you are particularly good at. Select one or more skills around which you will build your personal brand.
Also think about what your social media profiles say about you. If you're not active on platforms relevant to your work, it's time to get active. Update your information to match your new look. Start with the basics: remove inappropriate photos and change your email name to something more professional.
Professional quality
For career growth and getting a prestigious job, it is important to determine your strong professional qualities. These are character traits that will help in career development; they will be a good help for developing your own business.
- Learning something new quickly , especially in our progressive society, is a very important trait for a good employee. Today it is important to be able to quickly find an approach to emerging innovations in the technical field and be able to quickly master the intricacies of your professional activity.
- Hard work. You can't do without this either. To achieve something you need to be ready to make every effort. You need to be ready to spend your time and perform the task efficiently.
- Responsibility. This character trait will be useful in everyday life, but in the workplace, responsibility will follow you everywhere. This applies not only to leadership positions; even an ordinary worker must be able to approach his work responsibly and be able to be responsible for his actions.
- Organized. It can determine an employee's productivity in the workplace. More organized people can quickly decide on priority tasks and can plan their day to get the most out of every minute. This quality helps even in everyday life. The ability to organize your day allows you to spend a minimum of time doing the maximum amount of work.
Deep Thinking
We are usually not taught to think - it is assumed that we already know how to do it. But having information is not the same as understanding. Deeper thinking leads to deeper living. And the superficial is the opposite. So think about how deep a thinker you are.
Challenge yourself for the next year to commit to going deeper into the areas that matter to you. This will help you understand them better. Compare results, analyze, understand and apply different mental models.
It’s like reading. If you read a book once, you will only have a superficial understanding of the subject. And if you read it several times, make extracts, formulate conclusions, then you will understand the topic much better.
What are they?
Strong character traits help us develop, achieve success at work and carry out our plans. Having strong character traits helps us cope with difficulties more easily and achieve more in life. What can be added to the list of such qualities:
- Good willpower helps you do what you need to do. For many, it is difficult to concentrate on work and give up on what they want. With the help of willpower, a strong personality can control his emotions, which helps him achieve success.
- Communication skills help in many areas of activity. With the help of this character trait, you can easily find a common language with the team, introduce your ideas, “win” people over to your side, convincing them that you are right.
- Determination. A person who possesses this quality can clearly define his own goals and achieve them.
- Self confidence. Self-confidence is one of the main qualities of a good leader, a professional in his field. Only those who have this quality can take risks and take a step forward. Such individuals rarely suffer from depression, and sometimes are not aware of this concept at all. They can lead a crowd, control other people, and always try to take a step forward.
- Persistence. No matter what difficulties appear on the path of a persistent person, he is able to overcome them to achieve his own goal. Perseverance allows you to not give up on your original plans and move forward.
- Optimism. Another strong side of every person. One of its advantages is that an optimistic person never loses heart. It is pleasant to communicate with him, and apathy and bad mood do not prevent him from moving forward. Most importantly, such a person turns any negative experience into a useful life lesson, and not into a reason to stop. Being an optimist is not a bad thing, as many may think, because positive thinking is the basis of self-development.
