Live your legacy, that is what you leave: Future aspirations of leaders of singapore construction industry

Abstract

Leadership has been looked at through various lenses such as behaviours, styles and skills. Recent works have attempted to view leadership from the lens of the legacies that leaders want to leave behind. The legacies of the leaders do not only provide a perspective about the impact they want to have on the people and organizations but also portray the future they want to see. Interviews with leaders of professional organizations and AEC firms in Singapore show their desires for developing their followers as leaders and turning their firms into successful organizations. The interviews also reveal the anxiety of the leaders about issues in the industry such as lack of professionalism and adversarialism. Thinking about leadership purpose and leaving a legacy is not something the leaders should be doing in the last stages of the careers. Rather, the leaders should be clear about what they want to achieve from their leadership and what impact they want to have on their followers and organizations. This can help the leaders to understand and then live the legacies they want to leave behind.