What is Leadership?

Throughout history leadership has played a major role in what we could call "organised life". Leadership isn't a trait reserved exclusively to humans; we've all heard of the Queen Bee and, of course, of the Lion King. Since the beginning of time, species have been under the leadership of one of their kind, the most obvious example being the human; a leader is someone who provides security, someone who negotiates with other leaders, someone who leads a group of people to prosperity. Without leaders, us humans would be lost, disunited and in perpetual dissonance. Leaders are therefore necessary for the "survival" of a community. Going back to a time when the most primitive version of the human sat around fires, clad in animal skins, using grunts in order to communicate, a distinguishable form of leadership already existed. It wasn't written down on paper or even officially established, but one individual, just one member of the clan would stand out for his strength, size, hunting abilities etc. and would thus automatically be distinct from the rest of the clan: the leader. Then, essential qualities for becoming a leader would have been completely different to what they are nowadays, and even now these differ depending on the type of leadership one might exercise. Had I been asked this question unexpectedly, I would immediately have answered something along the lines of "decisive, confident, considerate, and motivated"; however after being given information about the different types of leadership, I no longer see it as simple as that.

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