You can be a good leader or a bad one. The choice is yours.

Think about the good leaders you have had. They are good because they made conscious decisions that have led them to be good. Maybe they did not sit there and say “I’m going to be a good leader,” but they chose to focus on doing their job well, they chose to communicate with you, they chose to be ethical, they chose to spend the time to help you develop, they chose an open-door policy rather than isolating themselves…whatever they did that made you think highly of them, they did it because they chose to.

The same goes for poor leaders. Maybe they did not wake up one day and say “I’m going to be a bad leader from now on,” but they made choices that make them a poor fit for their job. They chose to focus on themselves rather than their employees. They chose not to stand up for their people. They chose not to read or take classes or otherwise develop themselves. They chose to be lazy. They chose to stay in a position where they know they are not competent. They chose not to care about more than getting a paycheck. Whatever it is that makes them a poor leader, it’s the result of choices they’ve made.

So, what choices are YOU making?

If you are in a leadership role, are you consciously thinking about doing it well? Are you honest with yourself about how you are doing, and do you try to get feedback? Do you make the choice to be proactive? Or do you prefer to just sit back and let things happen however they happen? The only person who is truly responsible for your leadership ability is you, so take that responsibility and carry it out as best you can. Will it be challenging? Sure. But YOU decide whether or not to tackle that challenge.

It is possible, of course, to make the right choices, but be bad at it. Some people may just not have the talent to be a good leader. But then it’s time for another decision: do you acknowledge your problems, and try to fix them, or do you just stick with what you have got and hope for the best? Or perhaps, do you step out of a leadership position, and focus instead on your other talents? The decision, and the responsibility for it, is yours.

The title of this post is “Good Leadership is a Choice.” Just remember: so is poor leadership. It’s up to you what you want to do.