Epic Thoughts About Leadership

I have been involved in many organizations and clubs throughout my short life time and have seen leadership either blown to smitherines, carried out with great skill and capability, or just apathetically struggled through.  Here is my crappy common sense list of what I think is Good and Bad leadership. I think it can be applied to a bunch of areas, whether you are in charge of a 350 member sports organization, a 10 man team of student government, or a 50 person church group or organization
You Should:

Remain strong through the end of your term. That is, if you have a term. Most leaders do. I feel like its how able and into it you are after you have weathered all the storms that really proves what kind of leader you are. 

You should not:

Fizzle Out. You start strong, but end up getting distracted with other things. Awesome. no not really.

You should:

Meet often with your underlings, whether other e-board members, second tier leaders, or just members of your group in general. You always want to know how things are going with them, what they are thinking, how they are relating to each other.

You should not:

Not care about your people. Your people are what make or break you. Every leader has crappy people under neath them, but they are the ones that set the pace for the rest of the group. Ya cant leave em behind, but if you can get them to work with the group, you are golden. If people feel like you care about them, they will care about you, or hopefully, the organization.

You should:

Be clear and specific. People want to know how they are performing, either individually or as a group. Tell them what you expect, set clear goals and clear deadlines. Tell people if they are failing or doing wrong. Praise them when they are doing great, and then tell them what could make them even greater.

You should Not:

Be willy nilly. "Well, maybe we can meet then," or "umm hmm yeah I will talk to you about that sometime." NO. Commit. Do it. Be straight up. If you say you are going to talk to someone about something, DO IT. Otherwise people will lack faith in your ability to progress and promise.

You should:

Understand that everyone's feelings are important. Even if they are not. If someone has hurt feelings, or unrest in a situation. Get to the bottom of it, listen to what they have to say, and care. Sometimes, just someone caring about something soothes it over. 

You should not:

Dismiss someones feelings. Dont ever say to someone who has any sort of hurt feelings or issues, "Oh its not that big of a deal, just work it out by yourself." No. You have EPICALLY failed at life. Your leadership is down the drain. As a leader, if people dont think you care, then they are going to not give a crap about anything you say, and will probably talk crap about you or revolt. Just saying. 

You should:

Delegate. Delegation is key here. In order to delegate helpfully, you must get a grasp of people's strengths or weaknesses. If Susie is great at making design and loves art, then let her make the posters, if Billy is going to school for Accounting, and needs practice, then by all means, assign him the task. Delegation helps people feel involved, actually be involved, and as a leader, you are doing a very important thing by helping people to mature and grow. 

You should not:

Do everything yourself. Another epic fail. If you do everything yourself than you fail to equip future leaders to run your organization or group. And if you are doing everything yourself, why are you even in a leadership position, you might as well venture out and start your own selfish club. 

You should:

Expect from others as much as you put out. Expect that if you come to every meeting, that they come to every meeting. You dont have time to waste, and neither do they. This conveys a sense of mutual respect and importance to what needs to be done. Special exceptions of course. And make every effort to go out of your way make the meetings/club time/special event a priority in your schedules. Others will soon follow suit. Also, if someone has a special circumstance where they cannot attend a required meeting, then go out of your way to keep them updated on whats going on, maybe meet with them separately. Its important. Trust me. This also has to do with delegation. If you expect someone to stamp 350 envelopes, a crappy job at best, than you better be willing to sit down with them and help out, or atleast show interested and thankfulness for that person. 

You should not:

Expect from others what you cannot bring to the table. If you do not show up on time, dont expect it from others. If you dont care about the financial situation of your club, dont expect others to care. If you are negative about certain aspects of the group, then others will be too. Just think about it. You are a leader, they are following your lead.

You should:

Be chill. Dont flip out easily. Lifes going to be ok. It will go on. 

You should not:

Be a crazy uptight fool who cannot forget anything or cannot look over anything. Get over yourself.

You should:

Have fun.