Leaders.

[Sarge47]

Endworld Guy got me to thinking, what do you feel that the qualities of a good leader are and how do you spot a bad one?

[natertot]

There are usually subtle signs, but I look for morals. The best leaders to me are people with a consious.

[Celticwarrior]

Some one who doesn't need to bark orders, but simply states in a confident manner what must be done. Someone who leads by example, not by proxy. Someone who thinks about the people under his/her charge before themselves. Someone who inspires and pulls out the best in those under them, rather than evoking fear or loathing. Someone who commands respect not because of their rank or position or some social hierarchy, but by the nature of their accomplishments and experience. Someone who doesn't make the term "fragging" suddenly much clearer to everyone underneath them.

[SARKY]

Someone who looks out for their people. Also someone who recognizes the talents and skills of others and who knows when and where to delegate authority.

[hunter63]

Lots of traits are important, and I sure there will be a lot presented.
My experience is a good leader is some one that is willing to take on the responsibility for the group.

[Rick]

A good leader is one who can influence others to achieve a given objective. That person's traits are inconsequential. You can list out all the huggy, happy stuff you want but if a person can get you from point A to point B unscathed (literally or figuratively) then they are a good leader. While we'd all rather have the huggy, happy stuff I've worked for some pretty stern task masters that were excellent leaders and would take them hands down over some I've liked a lot more. They had a clear understanding of the goal, what it took to achieve it and how best to motivate you as an individual and the team as a whole. They also didn't hesitate to take corrective action when a member thought non-compliance was an option.

I don't need a leader to be my friend. I need them to define the object and set the pace.

[oldtrap59]

I think a good leader makes the statement "the buck stops here" and means it. Also a good leader needs to be honest with his or her group of followers. Don't tell me that if I lie to the leader or leaders I've broken the law, but the leader or leaders can tell me whatever they want and I'm supposed to follow blindly. Honesty is the most important thing to me in a leader. Hard to find nowdays.IMO I agree with Rick.

Oldtrap

[Endworld Guy]

LEADER QUOTES

"You don't lead by hitting people over the head-that's assault, not leadership. Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it"
-General Dwight D. Eisenhower

"When you're in command, COMMAND!"
-Adm. Chester Nimitz

Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way"
-General George S. Patton
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"Tell the Vietnamese they've got to draw in their horns or we're going to bomb them back into the Stone Age"
-USAF Gen.Curtis LeMay, 1964

"Sergeant, if my troops have to stand in line out here in the rain, i'll stand here too"
-New Battalion commander Col. Norman Schwarzkopf joins the chow line, Nam 1969

"When I look round to see how we can win the war I see that there is only one sure path...and that is absolutely devastating, exterminating attack by very heavy bombers from this country upon the Nazi homeland"
-Winston Churchill July 1940

"I must follow them. I am their leader"
-Andrew Law Bonar (British politician 1858-1923)

"The Black Hills are MINE, we want no white men here!"
-Sioux Chief Crazy Horse

"The main thing in life is to have good men around you"
-Fieldmarshal Friedrich von Paulus

"Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far"
-Franklin D. Roosevelt

"It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it"
-Gen Douglas MacArthur

"The most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people"
-Franklin Roosevelt

"At 2 a.m. I directed two hard punches at the 'hinges' of the final break-out area. That finished the battle"
-Montgomery defeats the Afrika Korps at Alamein
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"Fighter pilots fall into two broad categories: those who go out to kill and those who, secretly, desperately, know they are going to get killed—the hunters and the hunted"
-Gen Nathan F. Twining, USAF

"I was happy in the midst of dangers and inconveniences"
-Daniel Boone

"A true man hates no one"
-Napoleon Bonaparte

"23 March- Blizzard bad as ever--tomorrow last chance--must be near the end. We shall march for the depot with or without our effects and die in our tracks"
-One of the final diary entries by Robert Scott, Antarctica 1912

"This is war. Somebody's gonna pay.....Countries that harbor terrorists are as guilty as they are.....Give us the terrorists or we'll come and get 'em.....America will never seek a permission slip to defend herself.....A soft line toward terror is not gonna happen on my watch.....My job is to secure the homeland and thats exactly what i'm gonna do.....We will not sit back and wait to be hit again.....Iran must not be allowed to have nuclear weapons"
-Pres George W. Bush

"If you hang around with losers you become a loser"
-Donald Trump

"Give me a man who'll fight!"
-Pres Roosevelt looking for a commander to stop Japanese expansion after Pearl Harbor (He found one in Adm. Chester Nimitz)

"We need to destroy, not attack, not damage, not surround. I want to destroy the Republican Guard"
-General H. Norman Schwarzkopf
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"I decided to ignore my orders and to take command at the front with my own hands as soon as possible"
-Rommel (arriving in Africa 1941)

"Take arrows in your forehead not in your back"
-Samurai maxim

"Cowards die many times before their deaths,but the valiant taste of death but once"
-Shakespeare's J. Caesar

"When it comes your time to die,be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death,so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way.Sing your death song and die like a hero going home"
-Shawnee Chief Tecumseh, 1768 -1813

"I attribute my success on the battlefield to always being on the spot to see and do everything for myself"
-Duke of Wellington

"Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers who can cut through argument, debate and doubt, to offer a solution everybody can understand"
-Gen. Colin Powell

"A person without a sense of humour is like a wagon without springs, it's jolted by every pebble on the road"
-Henry Ward Beecher

"Before America entered the war I knew we could not win it, but after she entered I knew we could not lose.
To have the United States at our side was to me the greatest joy. Now at this very moment I knew the United States was in the war, up to the neck and in to the death.
So we had won after all!...Hitler's fate was sealed. Mussolini's fate was sealed. As for the Japanese, they would be ground to powder"
-Winston Churchill

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[Endworld Guy]

I posted this excerpt from Schwarzkopfs autobiog 'It Doesn't Take a Hero' in a military forum a while back, as it's a great example of how strong decisive leadership will pull a sloppy group together.
He's the newly-arrived battalion commander Colonel in Nam 1969 and choppers out to inspect his Companies in the field-

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[Rick]

It looks like Post 8 was cut and pasted from afewgoodmen.com. Let's post credit when we do that. Otherwise it's copyright infringement.

[Thaddius Bickerton]

I'm not to sure how I feel about leaders these days.

Hitler was generally known as just der Führer ("the Leader")

It is a pretty difficult thing to discuss.

I will offer up that the issue is between forced obedience, and chosen to lead.

Once I accept a leader (not to likely, i'm pretty happy leading myself) I will follow him until he breaks the agreement I made of my own free will to follow him.

If I am forced to follow, then I am not being lead, I am being ruled / commanded / dictated to.

It gets complicated.

It is like calling someone sensei, When someone calls themselves sensei or shidoshi or any other honorific I immediately start loosing respect for them. The term leader or sensei etc flows from the student / follower to the leader, not the other way around.

So I guess to me a leader is someone I choose to follow of my own free will.

ETA: Spot a bad leader: They place themselves above those they lead in importance, The old "I'm to important to die" go protect me and die to keep me safe is an immediate deal breaker for me. Now if you dig into it you will find that General Lee was always having to be pulled back to safety by his men, not because he felt he was to important, but because they so valued his leadership that the men protected him, knowing he protected them with his skills. For a good leader you could do worse than look at him I suppose.

That's freedom for ya, ain't it?

[Celticwarrior]

I think the saddest day in military history was the moment that Generals started commanding their troops from behind them, rather than out in front of them. Kinda hard to FOLLOW someone into battle who is hiding in a tent way in the back and radioing in the orders that send his men to their deaths.

[Power Giant]

A good leader has a "strength" about them. It's the way they carry themselves. People are usually drawn towards them. A warrior should be willing to kill or die for a good leader, without hesitation.

[canid]

A good leader is made of quality braided steel, should be rubberized, and the crimping for the eye ferrules should show round divots, with no sign of cutting or shearing. the snaps should likewise show radiused bends without creasing. they should have barrel swivels which rotate smoothly, even if twisted under lateral tension.

[Rick]

I thought of that about half way through this post but I'm glad I waited. Your eloquence trumped anything I might have come up with. Bravo!

Thad - I suppose if I called myself the Supreme Allied Commander of the Universe then my respect meter would start dropping. I'll have to work on that. (walks off, maybe Supreme Allied Commander of the Solar System.....Hmmm, not bad.)

[Pal334]

MY Opinion:

Good leader
Confident
Fair
Not arrogant
Acts Decisively
Caring
Listens well
Seldom needs to raise his / her voice
And strictly enforces rules of conduct

Signs of a BAD Leader
Is loud
Unfair
Basically the opposites of a good leader in short