Good leadership, as many might think, is not an end in itself, but rather a process to realize human potential. The big question is: what is process anyway?

Who can answer this question? I am not yet a hundred percent convinced of my own experiences or observations that I fully understand the essence of leadership. At times I think that I know it, but when I ponder its complexity I give up to my ignorance. Period!

Good leadership, however, as many pundits explain, is a process of achieving a goal or mission. A good leadership process, for me, is a step by step tapping of individual talents. It should be clear that leadership training or coaching is a person to person communication or interaction; it is not a collective process, but collective effort. Geniuses, for instance, are a byproduct of a long and unique leadership process. Genuine leadership signals two things: process and product.

Leadership Process

Leadership process might be abstruse in many ways. It is elusive as well as daunting at times. Leadership books put it as a social process, but I would like to see it as a process of potential realization. It is conventional wisdom that we are social beings, but when it comes to genuine leadership, we are individual processes that we should cultivate and harvest the individual talents uniquely.

Leadership Product

Leadership as a process engenders a number of qualities: equanimity, open-mindedness, creativity, affability, positive outlook, responsibility, but above all the ability to translate visions to reality. These are raw qualities until they are baked together into a fully developed leader.

Leadership as a process is then a squash of qualities. It is true that whenever we would like to prepare a juice, we squeeze a number of fruits together. Those fruits, however, take a number of years of cultivation as well as a number of means to harvest them. Besides, we do not cultivate fruit-plants in the same soil by the same means. The amounts of mineral composition, season, water, fertilizer and rain affect their growth significantly.

The same rule could be applied to leadership, too. As human beings, we are unique and that we need a different way of approaching or leadership training to cultivate or realize talents.

In conclusion, leadership is a process of germinating seeds and harvesting leaders. As a student of leadership you should always think as a process. You have not yet realized it. Do not ever think as a finished product. You are better than you. The best leader has to come yet. Patience, persistence, humility and the related qualities are indispensable as a force behind cultivation.

Doubt sometimes consumes us. We doubt that we have nothing to realize. Shake off that doubt. You have a seed within you. You might have seen it when you are passionate about something. Passion is something that emanates as a glimpse of your leadership greatness. From my experience, I may confirm that passion is a messenger that a leader is coming to visit us soon. Be ready to welcome that leader.