Q. What exactly is a citizen leader?
A. A person who brings their character and courage to making a contribution on behalf of the community and the common good.
Look closely at the people around you who are in positions of leadership or who aspire to positions of leadership.
Character: What are their guiding principles? Are their values ones that inspire you to want to follow their lead? Do those individuals regularly speak and act in ways that reflect the qualities they profess (or is it lip service)? Which individuals do have the qualities of character that would engage your enthusiasm?
Courage: Which individuals do have the courage of character to live by their values?
Contribution to one’s community and the common good: Do the man and women who aspire to leadership positions participate in or champion efforts to better their world and create great places for us all to live, work and play? or conversely, Are their efforts regularly or largely self-serving?
Now, with the responses to these questions in hand, which of the individuals would you want to follow?
If you hope to be an engaging leader — that is, if you hope to have anyone want to follow your lead – then you need to be a person that others would want to follow.
And by extension, if companies or communities or churches or schools or civic and social organizations hope to grow their cadre of leaders – they need to insist that their men and women be people whom others would want to follow.
It starts with citizen leadership.