LEADERSHIP AND INFLUENCE ESSAY
"A good leader inspires people to have confidence in him/her, while a great leader inspires people to have confidence in themselves. A quote by Golda Mier, former Prime Minister of Israel, this great personality and others like Sir Ahmadu Bello, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, Nelson Mandela, have been a source of inspiration for me.
My first leadership role was during the 4 days state Battalion Camp organized by the Boys Brigade Niger Battalion. I participated in the Camp as a Sergeant boy of the 10th Niger Company 1st ECWA Church Minna. I served as the time-keeper for the duration of the Camp. I was responsible for the notification of all Camp activities such as Drills, Band Rehearsals, Lectures. Due to my dedication to the new post, I was promoted from Sergeant Non-Commission Officer to a Warrant Officer at the Passing Out Parade. This role offered me the opportunity to interact with different platoon leaders, which helped improve my leadership skills, my spiritual, personal and communication skills were also enhanced.
Secondly, during my compulsory national service in the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), I served as the President of the Health Community Development Service (CDS) Group of Ikono Local Government Area (LGA) of Akwa Ibom State. The CDS group is made up of fifty Corp Members, which I divided into a team of 10, each with a team leader that reports to me. As a spearhead who was determined to make a positive impact, I organized numerous activities in the Community Secondary Schools, which included seminars, lectures, sensitization and distribution of hand-bills. I made sure the programs were in detail and provided room for questions and answers. As a result, My team was able to influence over two hundred students from the community.
The rate at which students drop out of school, the number of teenage pregnancy and drug abuse has been of increase in my community. As such, I found it incumbent on me to form a teenagers' mentorship program in the church, which I head. Our activities are mainly advising, guiding and counselling teenagers on the effects of drug abuse, personal development and choosing a career path. We have impacted positively in the lives of at least twenty young boys and girls. With this program, I have had the opportunity to serve my community by giving these teenagers the chance to once again believe in themselves.
The leadership roles I have taken over the years have given me the opportunity to influence others, I have been able to create a positive change in my environment. I also believe I will be able to interact in the global network of over 50,000 leaders and influencers, given the chance.
Dear Duzaho,
I can say you have enormous leadership potential and by the reading of the essay, you have got some experience as well.
However, in my view, I would suggest that you merger paragraph one and two and make a stronger point. I don't see being a time keeper being such a convincing position to show your leadership potential.
I however, commend for staying within the limits of the instructions as far as word counting is concerned.
Otherwise I wish you all the best and encourage to continue reading other people's essays on this platform to broaden your ideas and skills
[moved from]
Hello! I'm no expert in critiquing essay but here are my opinions:
I'm a bit confused, you said your essay was about the career plan but I feel like the content is more on leadership and influencing?
If so, here are my thoughts on your essay as a leadership and influencing essay.
1. I'm a bit confused about what you do? Are you in the army? Can you explicitly state you role? You dived right into examples so I had to reread your essay a bit before I understood the context and even then I wasn't 100% sure.
2. You need to specify in detail how you applied you leadership skills to the situation at hand in the first paragraph you stated how your skill were enhanced but not how you applied them. For the second example you outlined what you did in the situation and the ultimately how your team influenced others. I'm seeing a bit of a disconnect here.
3. There aren't enough examples on how you influenced others. Say how you convinced someone that you idea was better than the other, or why something needed to be done instead of something else. A lot of your examples show more of you delegating rather than influencing.
That's just me though, I wish you luck fellow applicant!
Holt Educational Consultant - / 15384 Duzaho, of the three presentations that you gave in this essay, the only one that clearly indicates your roles as a potential leader and influence in your country is the last one. The one about the teenage mentorship program in your church. That can serve as a community based example of your leadership and influencing style since you interact with troubled teens and drop outs who truly need a leader and influential image in their lives.
By expanding upon this discussion to better highlight the instances of leadership and influencing in this group setting, you will better respond to the "national" requirement of the prompt. Depict instances when you had to lead the teenager and how you did it. Indicate a clear influencing instance in order to make sure that you drive home the point that through mentoring, you are making a change in these young adults lives, which is what national leadership and influencing can be about on a community wide scale.