By Volunteer Uppasana Baruah, FHI Guwahati
Leadership is the very act of motivating people to achieve a common goal. A leader is someone who performs this act and must have some particular traits to perform his job efficiently. These sub qualities could be responsible nature, punctuality, impartiality, and honesty.
To instill such values in young minds many people have an important role to play. To begin with, the parents. The parents are the pillars who are responsible for encouraging their children from a very young age to participate in leadership activities at school or college. They should make their children responsible by giving them small tasks daily. This will help them learn a new thing and also become responsible.
The school and college administration as well has a very important role to play in this aspect. Organizing activities in groups and competitions is the key. When students form groups for such activities while selecting a leader for the same, they not only receive experience but also can improve themselves. A leader in such a group should be encouraged to always believe in teamwork. Young leaders are to be taught to enhance decision-making skills and team management.
Now, when it comes to encouraging children of economically challenged backgrounds to become leaders, it does take an extra effort. It’s a pitiful, fact that children from such backgrounds are naturally less confident. The others coming from better families already have access to good learning facilities and also have good speaking skills and so they do rule out others in the level of confidence. Hence, I believe confidence-building is the most important way to encourage children from economically weak backgrounds. They should not feel intimated and threatened by the presence of a stronger counterpart. This could be done by organizing speech enhancing programs that will help such children to be confident while presenting. Economically challenged children should be guided with the proper vocational skill to build their strengths. Communication skills should be encouraged through lots of interactions to ensure they are comfortable voicing their opinions. Inspiration is again extremely important. Children from underprivileged backgrounds should be told about the exceptional success stories of real-life leaders who set examples for them to follow their footprints and make them realize that no barrier can stop them to be what they want to be.
Exactly how they say, “Leaders are made, they are not born”, should be the slogan for all children regardless of their social or economic background.
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