Salvation Army William Booth Founder. Research Paper

Profile in Leadership: William Booth
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Introduction
The best leaders are not born; they are made. In the book The Leadership Challenge by Kouzes and Posner (2012), the authors conducted a thorough study about what it takes to become an “exemplary” leader. After interviewing and writing thousands of leaders, Kouzes and Posner (2012) managed to compress the five most important practices that an exemplary leader should exhibit, these are: model the way, inspire a shared vision, challenge the process, enable others to act, and encourage the heart. Kouzes and Posner (2012) concluded that if a leader possess these qualities, that leader can eventually make extraordinary things happen in an organization.
One organization that managed to give extraordinary accomplishments is the Salvation Army. In 1852, William Booth started to preach the streets of London. Booth preached about helping the poor and converting them to Christianity; however, the established churches of the time discriminated Booth and the poor people, thus, began the start of a mission to improve their lives while facing violence and persecution. The people initially named their organization as the volunteer army but later changed the organization's name which is Salvation Army. In 1885, about 250,000 people already converted to the Salvation Army in the United Kingdom. In 1879, the Salvation Army had its first constituent meeting in Philadelphia, USA (Weedmark, 2019). Although William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army, is regarded as a great leader, his leadership history should be studied to see whether he exhibited the five practices that Kouzes and Posner identified and to further establish the veracity of these practices.
Model the Way
In model the way, it is imperative that leaders have a set of values and principles to which a leader firmly believes (Kouzes & Posner, 2012). However, preaching these values alone does not guarantee the development of an exemplary leader. The leader needs to show these values by aligning them with purposive action to show how serious a leader in upholding integrity to their own principles (Kouzes & Posner, 2012). In the Salvation army, William Booth was poverty stricken from the early days of his life (Bale, 1990). During this time, three guiding ideas emerged in his mind, these are: "the determination to get on in the world, ambition to work for an alleviation of the miseries of the poor; and, a longing to get right with God (Bale, 1990, p.1)." When William Booth saw the people in East End of London, England that are suffering from extreme poverty, he announced that his destiny is an evangelical mission to offer himself as an instrument of God for the salvation of the people (Bale, 1990). In the East End of London, Booth founded a Christian mission that will eventually be the Salvation Army (Merrit, 2006). In the Salvation Army, the mission statement expresses:
The Salvation Army, an international movement, is an evangelical part of the universal Christian Church. Its message is based on the Bible. Its ministry is motivated by the love of God. Its mission is to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and to me...