Much has been written about the characteristics of great leaders. I have found 13 characteristics that hold true for the great leaders I have known. There are other ingredients to excellent leadership, but if you have all 13 of these characteristics, you are probably one of the elite leaders.

Great Leaders:

  • Operate from a set of values
  • Are Congruent and live their vision
  • Are passionate and infect others with that passion
  • Value Transparency
  • Have high Emotional Intelligence
  • Never stop learning
  • Believe work is play
  • Balance the needs of stakeholders and don’t worry about popularity
  • Foster great followership
  • Make large trust deposits
  • Practice ubiquitous reinforcement
  • Do better in a crisis
  • Develop others

To read the details of these 13 dimensions, see my white paper.