College Success Requires Leadership by Josh

College Success Requires Leadership by Josh - March 2015 Scholarship Essay

Growing up as a kid, I heard this phrase a lot—“You are either a leader or a follower.” At my school, we had a chapel message specifically on being a leader or a follower. The speaker made points about how good it was to be a leader and how unimportant it was to be a follower. After he finished his message, he told us to close our eyes, and stand up if we felt like we were leaders. Being the rebellious kid I was in fourth grade, I peeked and saw many of my friends stood up. I, of course, had to stand up too in order to be cool like my friends. Looking back on the phrase, I realize that it is wrong. Whether we realize it or not, we all have leadership skills, and developing those skills will determine our success in life.

In my speech class, I learned that you cannot not communicate. This simple means we are always communicating something—even choosing to say nothing will communicate a message. In the same way, we are all leaders. This is where another phrase comes into play—“Lead by example.” Leading by example mean we lead by action or doing something. Whether it is as small as picking up a piece of trash or something big like pulling over on the side on a road to help a homeless man, we are leaders every single day. People will be watching your actions. They could be coworkers, siblings, or strangers. We can either be effective leaders or ineffective ones.

The success of life is based upon two things. It is based upon who you are right now, and who you are striving to become. Since we know that we are all leaders on some level, our success is ultimately based on how well you train your leadership skills. Those skills include: being proactive, flexible, respectful, enthusiastic, open-minded, well educated, and many more. These are the necessary skills that will determine what kind of job you will get and how well you will perform that job. These skills are what colleges look for because they know that these are the basic elements of success. Are leadership skills necessary for college success? I would say they are necessary, but I would also take it a step further. It is one thing to have the skill, but it is another thing to intentionally train those skills in order to eventually perfect them.

All of us are born leaders. Whether we realize it or not, we all have leadership skills, and developing those skills will determine our success in life. We are either effective or ineffective leaders. In order to achieve success in college and even after college, we must actively train our leadership skills so that we will become effective leaders.