Leadership Traits - Donald Trump Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Leadership Traits - Donald Trump - Assignment Example In 1981, he bought the Trump Plaza in New York City and in 1982, bought a weekend estate in Greenwich, Connecticut. In 1983, the construction of Trump Tower was completed and USFL New Jersey Generals was acquired. In 1984, Trump opened Harrah’s at Trump Plaza Casino in Atlantic City. Trump bought Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida in 1985. In 1987 came the New York Times best seller â€Å"Trump: The Art of the Deal.† The later years continued with more and more acquisition, and the group’s entry into the TV (Wooten, 2008, pp.106-110). Leadership Traits American scholar Warren Bennis has identified four basic ingredients in every great leader. The first basic quality is guiding vision or management of attention. The leader must have a clear idea of what he or she wants to achieve. He must show courage to face the tough reality. The second quality is communicating the vision. The leader is there to communicate his passions to his people and it will bring hope and inspiration. Passion generally appears as enthusiasm. Again, people should not buy into every exciting idea; there should be a great deal of quality. The next thing is integrity which is the combination of self-knowledge, candor, and maturity. Leader must know his strengths and weaknesses, and must have clear idea about what he wants to do and the reason behind that. These three ingredients combine with a fourth ingredient – management of self. There should be mix of â€Å"curiosity and daring† with integrity. Leaders should be open to new ideas, willing to take risks, and try new things (Bennis, 2009, pp. 204-05, Bennis, 2010, p. 20). Now one may look at Trump’s leadership style in the light of Bennis’ four ingredients. Vision In Trump on Entrepreneurship, Trump says, â€Å"Entrepreneurship...History is full of famous leaders with extraordinary lives. From George Washington to John F. Kennedy, from Bill Gates to Donald Trump, the list is much diver sified. Here, this paper will focus on the life and leadership traits of Donald Trump, the â€Å"Real Estate Tycoon† in the light of Bennis’ competency criteria. Early History Donald Trump was born in Queens, New York on 14th June, 1946. He was the part of a demographic change which would later be known as â€Å"Baby Boom†. His father, Fred Trump, was a contractor in the housing market and operated in the Brooklyn and Queens boroughs. Fred was a highly successful businessman and was one of the richest persons in Queens (Payment, 2007, pp.1-5). Young Trump had his own way of doing things. He had a forceful personality from his childhood. In his 2nd grade, he punched the music teacher on his face. Trump was of the view that the teacher didn’t understand what he was saying. For this misbehavior, he was almost expelled from the school. In his book ‘Trump: The Art of the Deal’, he admits this fact by saying that it was not a proud moment. At 13, Donald was sent to New York Military Academy to improve upon his behavior (Payment, 2007, pp. 6-10 & 12). Donald Trump graduated in 1968 from the University of Pennsylvania (Wharton School of Finance) with a degree in economics. Trump got the passion for construction business from his father. His father knew almost all the processes of construction business. So, after completing his graduation, he continued with his life-long passion of constructing buildings (Wooten, 2008, pp. 20-23).