So, what does this have to do with leadership?

Last month I asked an audience of leaders to tell me characteristics of an ideal leader. Their answers were (in order collected):

A good listener, enthusiasm, passion, shows appreciation, a visionary, role model, trusting, integrity, organized, knowledgeable, credibility, persuasive, charisma, team building, clarity of purpose, problem solver, attitude of service, leads by example, patience, willing to act without complete knowledge, understands followers, consistent, empowers other people, and adapts to change.

I'll add that this is essentially same list that I receive from other audiences when I ask this question. From this comes some useful insights.

Below is a situation I've met recently.

Early last month, me and my fiancé went to a furniture shop to look around for our new house.

Upon reaching shop at chongpang, a popular place in Singapore, a lady approached us politely and passed us some files with pictures of furniture. We browse through files and she even offer to help us look for color and design of our requirements.

In between, we make some changes on color we want but she still give us that smiling face and continue helping us. Well, this is good customer service. Don't you agree?

Of course, we'll make some bargains seeing our idea furniture. After some discussion, she agree to give us some discounts as we are going to buy two products from them.

After paying a deposit, we decided to browse for our next purchases for our master bedroom since we received very good customer service. She shows us around to cupboard and dressing table. There's also discount on items we prepare to buy. She even wrote down details of items on offer, in case when time we come to buy, it's not on offer anymore.

So happily, we left shop and decided to buy all our other furniture from this shop. Until here, we received before sale service.