Some people argue that successful leaders in government, industry, or other fields must be highly competitive. Other people claim that in order to be successful, a leader must be willing and able to cooperate with others.Write a response in which you disc

What makes an ordinary human being a leader? In my humble opinion, what differentiates a leader from a John Doe is his or her ability to gain the good-will and support from a variety of people, empathize with the others no matter what their weaknesses or foils are and the quality of being forbearing throughout the journey to success. Considering these three elements, what is striking and crucial for a leader; cooperation or competition? According to many pedagogical experts, while the first is acquired by teamwork during childhood, the latter is especially obtained with a grade-oriented, performance-based way of study at school. The stance of the author of the prompt is crystal clear; it is stated that in order for a child to be a successful leader in any kind of field, sense of cooperation is a crucial characteristic, rather than competition.

Many experts assert that sense of cooperation and competition are complementary features for a leader. Since a leader should be able vie for his position in the field in the beginning; sense of competition is vital. He or she should be able to surpass the competitors or rivals and show the supporters or constituents that "the one with solutions" is him or her. For instance, before the presidential elections in the United States, the candidates get together in a TV program and criticize each other. These programs provide a great source of information for the floating voters. In order to defeat the competitor with words, a leader should be able to outweigh why the others should be voting for him or her, rather than the other person. This feature requires a sense of competition, in order to be a leader, one must be in a never-ending competition with the rivals.

However, the leader should also be able to work in a team. The United States or almost any other country in the World -except for the autocratic, anti-democratic states- is ruled not by a single person; but rather a group of bureaucrats managed by one single leader. The buttress of this can be seen in almost any meeting of Donald Trump with the press. He asks questions to his consultants while answering most of the questions he receives, especially the questions about significant matters, related to the international relations. Because no matter how intelligent or well-rounded a person is, every person needs a second opinion or a contradictive approach. This is why a sense of cooperation, being able to be a part of a team is so important for a leader.

On the other hand, even though both sense of cooperation and competition are vital for a leader; experts claim that raising children in a competitive atmosphere can also be detrimental. Because competition inhibits stress in children, which may result in alienation from school or family in the end. Also, "fake competitions" poses another threat. In schools where all the children are rewarded even though they are the last ones on a competition, the successful children feel that their urge to success worth nothing. Thus, even though sense of competition is so important in raising the leaders of the future, one must be so careful and find a way in between.

As a result, even though the author states that the sense of competition is not important in raising a leader, I believe that it is just as important as the sense of cooperation. Because one person needs to be competitive in order to surpass the rivals and take the lead. However, in order to rule a country or a company, the leader also has to be the part of a team which provides him or her with different approaches to different matters.