The characteristics, which distinguish a leader from the rest of the crowd, are not found in every individual. Every walk of life people with certain characteristics emerge as successful leaders. Whether managers at workplace, or the captains of sports teams, the leaders have certain behavior that sets them apart and make people follow them. As it is often said, great leaders are not born but made by various characteristics, habits and behavior they showcase. Successful leaders learn positive behaviors, which over the long time unconsciously become characteristic of their nature.

The contingency theory of leadership suggests that the leaders are based on the contingency and this theory suggest that leaders are developed based on the situation or actions. This theory suggests that the key attribute of leaders is one who always has the backup plan.

The behavioral theory describes leaders as the set of behavior exhibits by the leaders. In order to become a successful leader, one must project some distinct behaviors. Among the various such behaviors, one of the most important one is that the leader must make sure that his followers feel safe to approach him. He must be accessible to his followers. It is not uncommon for the followers or junior employees get intimidated by the power and position of his seniors or leaders. This could make the senior managers good professional but not a successful leader. A leader is successful when he is able to bring the attention of his followers from his personality to his actions and encourage them to come up with their own ideas and opinions. Thus the successful leaders effectively make others feel secure to speak to him and give their own views. 

Another behavior prominent among successful leaders is to effectively make decisions. The role of leaders either makes decision-making in the workplace easier or takes decision making them. The main aim is to ensure that the goal is achieved for the team or the company. Successful leaders are expert in making informed and knowledgeable decisions even in some stressful situations. The ability to successfully communicate is one of the greatest assets of a leader. They are able to communicate the performance expectations effectively to their team members and followers. They also use communication medium to reinforce company’s mission and visions and the importance of part played by employees in the overall picture of the company’s success. For example, if a team leader keeps the team on track with the company’s goals, the performance of the team would be effective and fruitful (Crevani, Lindgren and Packendorff, 2010).

The Trait theory of leadership advocates that the leaders are based on the internal traits. In managing people successfully, the role of a leader incorporates knowing the attitudes, competences and areas for development in his employees. Effective leader make use of these information to challenge his employees and help them attain higher potential of their capabilities. Though it keeps the followers always on their toes, but also allows them to grow with their leaders. Such leaders also allow people to be accountable for themselves in order to inculcate responsibility and sense of belongingness. Although it does not imply that such leaders give control to others, but ensure that by becoming accountable employees learn to become proactive and responsible. More importantly, the successful leaders lead by setting their own examples. They consistently work towards setting up an acceptable example for their followers to trail. They tend to effectively practice what they are preaching to their followers. They are much more mindful of each action as they are aware that people are watching him as an example (Ciulla, 2013).

The Full Range theory of leadership is the contemporary theory of leadership that is a component of transformational leadership, which enhances motivation and morale by connecting the employee’s sense of identity to a project and the collective identity of the organization. For a leader to be successful in the business world, it is important that he have thorough hold of the various aspects of the performance and people who are capable of achieving those performances. They efficiently review the data and evaluate performances put in by his team in respect to the company’s investment in them. They also believe in acknowledging the commendable and hard work put in by his teams, irrespective of the results. They are attentive in rewarding and recognizing the dependable performers in their team and never take them for granted. Also, successful leaders believe in the process of continuous feedback. Efficacious leaders continuously offer feedback and also allow reciprocal feedback from followers in order to create reliable associations with them. Followers also desire to ensure their leaders that their words and actions are being paid attention to and progressive insights and feedbacks are appreciated. Such leaders comprehend the supremacy of perspective and importance of feedback to achieve greater progress in the business (Zaccaro, LaPort and José, 2013).

Along with the personality traits a successful leader must be able to recognize the talent pool of his employees and best possible ways to make use of it. They are specialists at triggering the competences of their followers and know how and when to deploy their exclusive ability in a particular situation. Also, even the successful leaders have many followers, they never hesitate to ask questions and look for counsel as and when needed (Smith, 2011). A good leader never stops learning and accept the limitations and weaknesses that he and his knowledge might have. Instead he keeps on looking for new ideas, concepts and knowledge so as to make themselves improved by using the knowledge of others.

Another important behavioral pattern of successful leaders is their ability to deal with the problems in a time-bound manner, without procrastinating it. They have expertise and knowledge to reach to the core of the matter and thus efficiently solve the problems at hand. They use past experience and examples of others to learn and come up with solution that benefits all the stakeholders (Shamim, 2014). They also emanate positive energy among the colleagues and subordinates.  Their attitude helps in creating inspirational and positive culture at workplace.  They also know the art of motivating their followers and bring out their best performances. They stimulate actions in the positive direction and are not disrupted by failures. They prove to be excellent teachers. They never stop teaching their colleagues and followers. By teaching they make sure their followers are well versed with the relevant information and knowledge that would help them perform better to achieve the overall goals set by the company. They effectively mentor people around them and support people who have zeal to reach higher goals in their lives (Hopen, 2010).

The successful leader put in investment in his relationships. They don’t fierce protect their dominance; rather they expand it continuously by investing in commonly fruitful relationships (Wang, 2014). They influence people by playing the role of lifters rather than mere leaders. They instigate advancement for others along with his own and the company’s growth. They share their success and help others to reach success. Also, the leaders have strong behavior to not only come forward and take responsibilities but enjoy accomplishment of such responsibilities and duties. This give them sense of achievement and inspire them to progress further in their live as well as motivate others around him. They love the role of leadership not for the power or admiration it brings in but for the responsible meaningfulness and purpose it gives to their work and lives (Spears, 2010). 

The pros and cons of different attributes of leaders and different theories of leaders suggest that the greatest attribute of leaders is the ability to lead from front. It is important that the leaders should take a balanced approach while managing the team. It is recommended that the leaders should always take the feedback from its subordinates. It is recommended that the leaders should be able to show the vision to the team members.

Thus it is said that when a leader becomes successful, they not only serve the purpose of motivation, encouragement and mentoring for the followers but they enjoy doing so. They find the higher sense of purpose in doing so. We can conclude by saying that a leader is successful when his behavior helps them to sustain their accomplishments and increase the value of their role in the company and lives of the people he come across. The successful leader ultimately becomes an enabler of culture, abilities and beneficiary results. 

Ciulla, J.B., 2013. Leadership ethics. Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Crevani, L., Lindgren, M. and Packendorff, J., 2010. Leadership, not leaders: On the study of leadership as practices and interactions. Scandinavian Journal of Management, 26(1), pp.77-86.

Hopen, D., 2010. The changing role and practices of successful leaders. The Journal for Quality and Participation, 33(1), p.4.

Spears, L.C., 2010. Character and servant leadership: Ten characteristics of effective, caring leaders. The Journal of Virtues & Leadership, 1(1), pp.25-30.

Shamim, A, & Ghazali, Z 2014, ‘A Conceptual Model for Developing Customer Value Co-Creation Behaviour in Retailing’, Global Business & Management Research, 6, 3, pp. 185-196

Smith, E.A., (2011) ‘The role of tacit and explicit knowledge in the workplace’, Journal of Knowledge Management, 5 (4), pp.311-321

Wang,S.,  Noe R.A. &Wang ,Z.  (2014)  Motivating Knowledge Sharing in Knowledge Management Systems: A Quasi–Field Experiment Journal of ManagementVol. 40 No. 4, 978-1009 

Zaccaro, S.J., LaPort, K. and José, I., 2013. The attributes of successful leaders: A performance requirements approach.