by Nasimul Islam, Bangladesh, ELP 2014 Written on July 21, 2014.   Traditionally, leadership and its skills were attributed to people in high positions and political stalwarts. It was considered that leaders are people who will show ways for others and make decisions for others, a position for which others will look up towards a person for guidance and someone who will hold a power of position. As people looked deeply into leadership and its skills, they realized that leadership is about taking charge of one's life and its circumstances and is a set of concepts and skills that one can acquire in order to enhance one's own personal satisfaction and bring results to themselves and to a group to achieve a vision. So what is leadership and what are leadership skills? A leader is someone who is aware of themself and know how their actions impact on others. A leader is someone who understands other people’s needs and motivations and works with them in a positive manner in order to create harmony and aspirations so that positive results can be achieved together. However, to realize the fruits of leadership, a person needs to possess leadership skills. It starts from understanding the self and appreciating one’s own unique gifts and qualities. It requires that people adopt and live by a set of beliefs and outlooks of their own that will bring inner peace and joy and generate self-confidence in expressing and living by themself. It requires skills that will help people manage the limited time of their lives and the stress from living it. Once a person feels comfortable under his/her own skin, then leadership requires understanding other people’s personalities and motivations so that all can work together harmoniously. The very basic foundation of leadership is the ability to communicate with others in a positive way to achieve results. The communication skill is the glue that holds all other leadership skills together and we all need to learn it. In real life, we all have a vision. But the reality is that to achieve that vision, we need to communicate those to others, understand others, and persuade others about our vision. But communication skills are not enough. We need to have skills to collaborate with others, negotiate with others and manage conflicts. If the desired state is different from the present, we need to know how to manage change and deal with uncertain times. So to live our life in an empowered and productive way, and to achieve our goals and aspirations, we all need to be leaders and to acquire leadership skills. The leadership is not a mantra of a few in high positions who will exercise dictates for us, but it is everyone's business, so that we can all be happier, content, empowered and confident in achieving our own goals and visions. So leadership is everyone's business and we need to convey this fact to everyone on a mass scale. The challenge is how to effectively convey this to all people and to reach everyone with the cutting edge technologies of leadership skills.