Bass Factors, Team and Negative Leadership - Essay Example

? Question Set 5 (School) 4 March This paper will serve to address the five different questions regarding Bass’ factors, team leadership, negative leadership, personality types, the glass ceiling, and Metropole Services. A look into the different case studies will be provided, and a thorough analysis of the different situations will be presented. Keywords: Bass’ factors, team leadership, negative leadership, personality types, the glass ceiling, Metropole Services Question Set 5 1. Bass’s factors. Identify and explain four of Bass’ factors associated with transformational. Give examples from your own experiences or observations that illustrate the use of two of these factors. Contrast the expectations of transactional and transformational leaders. The four different factors associated with Bass’s theory of transformational leadership are individual consideration, intellectual stimulation, inspiration, and idealized influence. Individual consideration places an emphasis on what the group member needs, intellectual stimulation ensures that the leader seeks ideas from the group and encourages them to contribute, inspiration gives meaning to the task at hand, and idealized influence refers to the leader becoming a full-fledged role model. An example of a leader who exhibits all of these factors, and not just one or two of them was found in Steve Jobs, who worked to ensure that he and his employees transformed the business world. Transactional leaders, or managerial leaders focus instead on the role of supervision, organization, and group leadership, in which the leader works to promote compliance in their followers based on a reward/punishment system. 2. Team Leadership. Describe the role of leadership within teams. What are the primary reasons that teams fail? What can ensure team success? Give a personal example of team success. A team must always have a leader, and as such, there are certain characteristics that comprise the role of leadership within a team. The leader must keep the team to a specific purpose, they must have the knowledge to judge and act prudently, they must accept their authority over the team, use that power to make decisions, and at the same time recognize that those decisions affect all members of the team, and as such should only be used to further the shared purpose of the team itself, and finally, the leader must be trustworthy; the team must know, understand, and recognize that the decisions the leader makes are for the common goal. Teams may fail because they lack shared values, shared objectives, shared activities, a poor leader, or lack the ability to accurately gauge their progress. In order to ensure team success, the team must have a strong leader, all work must be divided equally, all members must be held accountable for their share of the work, and progress must be made in a timely fashion. One personal example of team success would be working with several other students to start and complete a group assignment for school and have it submitted before the due date. 3. Negative Leadership. This week there were two case studies: Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, Knight of the British Empire and Chuck MacKinnon. In reviewing the two cases, address the following questions: a. Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, Knight of the British Empire: What are the elements that lead to Giuliani’s miraculous transformation? What lessons could corporations with negative public reputations learn from this case? b. Chuck MacKinnon: Where might MacKinnon have gone wrong? What did he do well and what were his most significant mistakes? Was his management style to blame? What could be done to fix things now? What lessons can you take away from this case to become a better leader? The main elements that lead to former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani’s transformation from a person who was not well liked or well respected into a true leader were not the decreased crime rate that he worked to bring about, nor the implementation of budget discipline, but were through the practical application of Machiavelli’s principles to the city following the events of September 11th, 2001. Corporations with negative public images could learn that it is not whether or not the actions of the company are considered to be good, but how those good actions are portrayed to the public at large. Regardless of how much of a positive impact the company may have, if the overall perspective of that company is a poor one, all the good deeds in the world would not change that perspective. Chuck MacKinnon went wrong in first not working to resolve the conflicting expectations that both Eldon and Margaret had for him; had he sat down in a meeting with all of them in the same place, they could have worked out their initial difficulties, which were causing problems in the management of the group overall. I do not think it was necessarily his management style that was to blame, for when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail; I believe that had he had a clearer picture of exactly what was being asked of him from both parties, he would have been less likely to hammer everything in sight, and more likely to find alternate methods to work to resolve the people problems in his group. In order to fix things as they stand at the current time, he would need to have a group meeting with his higher ups, followed by a group meeting with his group in order to make sure that all parties are on the same page, and then go from there. The best lessons to take away from Chuck are first, to get clarification where clarification is needed, second to make sure that all members are on the same page, and third that if you are going to lead a group, you must lead the group, keeping its interests in mind first and foremost, instead of working to please everyone else. 4. Personality Types. Define/describe the four personality types of Freud/Fromm. Which of these personality types do you feel best describes your own personality? Describe a productive and unproductive version of your personality type. Do you know someone who is a productive narcissist? What characteristics do you find most beneficial in this type? The three personality types that Freud offered were erotic, obsessive, and narcissistic, with Fromm adding in marketing as the fourth personality type. The erotic personality seeks to love and be loved, the obsessive personality tries to live up to standards, follow rules, and obey a strict conscience, the narcissistic personality takes pride in, and will talk about, actual accomplishments, and the marketing personality is characterized by being highly adaptable. I believe that I best fit into the narcissistic personality type, for I take pride in all that I do, and I will happily boast about my accomplishments in particular fields, or with particular tasks; as such I would easily say that I do know a productive narcissist, myself. It is because the productive narcissist discusses their accomplishments and takes pride in what they do, they are always looking for other tasks in order to be able to have more things that they have completed that they are able to take pride in; as such, this is something of a self-fulfilling cycle. An unproductive narcissist would be a person who stops looking for other tasks that they complete and take pride in the finished result, content to only talk about their glory days of the past, much like an old football star who blew out his knee in college, but loves talking about how things were back before that happened. 5. Glass Ceiling. Define and describe the glass ceiling. Summarize the reports/research results of the glass ceiling’s impact on women. Have you faced barriers similar to those described or observed others’ experiences with any of these barriers? Give an example to illustrate. The glass ceiling metaphor implies that everyone has equal access to lower positions until all women hit this single, invisible, and impassible barrier that may not be passed due to the virtue of their gender. Although women receive a higher percentage of the degrees conferred to graduates, 97% of CEOs in Fortune 500 companies are men, and 84.8% of the board seats at those companies are men; men likewise comprise the majority of members of congress, taking 83.2%5 of the available seats. As shown in one of the case studies, I have seen instances where women, after notifying their company that they are pregnant and will be taking maternity leave at such and such a date, in spite of the Family Medical Leave Act are forced out of their positions, or their jobs are made so difficult and so hassle filled that they are pressured into quitting rather than keeping their job available, as is required by law. 6. Metropole Services. This week there was one case study; Anita Jairam at Metropole Services. In reviewing the case, address the following questions. What are the key issues within this case? Why might Jairam’s team be excluding her from important client meetings? What steps could she take to correct this situation? One of the key issues with the Metropole Services case comes from the traditional gender roles present in Indian society, and as a result of these traditional roles, Jairam’s team feels that she has certain set duties to perform as a woman, which do not fall into the business spectrum, it is for these reasons that the delegate the supplying of food to her, and choose to go around her in order to work with the clients themselves. In order to correct this issue, Jairam must first sit down with her team and assert her authority. She believed that she was assisting the team in anticipating their needs, but instead of assisting, she was conforming to the role that they felt she belonged in. To correct this viewpoint, she must sit down with her team, assert her status as project manager, and explain to them what her role is, and what their roles are in relation to hers. While this may cause some resentment at first, as their viewpoints shift, their manner of thinking will shift, and they will start treating her as a person in that position, rather than as a woman who happens to be in the office. 3. Culture. Define culture and explain the terms related to culture. Define and describe ethnocentrisms and prejudice. Give personal examples to support your descriptions. Explain the dimension of culture that research has focused on in the past thirty years. Culture refers to the cumulative deposit of knowledge, experience, beliefs, values, attitudes, meanings, hierarchies, religion, notions of time, roles, spatial relations, concepts of the universe and material objects and possessions acquired by a group of people in the course of generations through individual and group striving. Ethnocentrism is defined as the belief in the inherent superiority of one’s own ethnic group or culture. Prejudice is defined as an unfavorable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason. A personal example of the culture of my generation could be said to be lolcats; while these are perhaps the opposite of everything intelligent, they refer to a part of the cumulative experience. An example of ethnocentrism may be seen in Hitler’s beliefs that Aryans were superior. An example of prejudice would be to state that those who fail to keep their pants at their waist, and instead choose to waddle about like penguins are perceived to have a lower intelligence. Hofstede started studying work related cultural dimensions over thirty years ago, looking into cultural values, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, masculinity-femininity, individualism-collectivism, and Confucian work dynamics. 3. Ethical Leadership. Define and describe the principles of ethical leadership. Which two of the five covered in Chapter 16 do you think are the most important? Why? The five principles of ethical leadership are respect for others, service to others, justice for others, honesty toward others, and building a community with others. In ethical leadership, others must be treated with dignity and respect, being treated as people rather than a means to an end; justice and fairness must be central to the decision making process, never showing differential treatment unless there is a clear reason for doing so, but in all else treating all as equal. Ethical leaders should behave in an altruistic manner, rather than an egotistical one, and they must remain honest in all things with those above and below them, so that trust is not destroyed; in addition, they must work to build their team into a community, working to influence others to achieve a common goal. Of the five covered, I believe that justice for others and honesty towards others are the most important aspects, first because favoritism breeds contempt, which destroys a team quickly, and secondly because if a person is not bluntly honest about what needs to get done, and what the exact status of everything is in the business relationship, than it is far too easy for things to go awry. 4. Leadership Decisions. This week there were two case studies; Intel in China and Pembina Pipeline Corporation. In reviewing the two case studies this week address the following questions. A. Intel in China: how would you have handled the situation with Li? Should Tang fire Li? Should Tang allow Li to finish the project? Should he demand that he finish, thereby asserting his authority and attend to (more pressing?) management issues? B. Pembina Pipeline Corporation: as Patrick Walsh, what would you do next? How would you structure your media release? What other steps should you take? I would have handled the situation with Li in a similar manner; I would have halted his work on the project, feeling that writing a book of that magnitude would take up too much of his time, and take him away from his professional duties, however I would have offered a smaller scale project at the same time, instead of just stating he should halt his work, that way he could see the type of project, the size and magnitude, that he should be working on, as opposed to a project of that size. In addition, I would have instructed Chen to handle the matter directly, as by bringing it up in a three way meeting, it implies weakness on her part, proving that she could not deal with that particular situation, and calling into question her abilities in that job position. If I were Patrick Walsh, I would first look at the situation rationally; see how many more people are needed to work to contain the issue, and see if a press release could be structured that not only notified the public of the situation, ensured the public that my company was already working to address the issue, but put out a call for volunteers as well to assist in the matter. In this manner, I would show concern for the issue at hand, keep public face in the fact that though this was not an anticipated or expected event, the company is already on the ball and working to resolve this instead of attempting to cover it up, and show public service interest by setting up a volunteer assistance in order to work with the community and appeal to the community, showing that big business is not infallible, and would gladly choose to work with the community itself. I would also coordinate with local environmental groups to find out other possible ways to mitigate damage to the ecosystem, and contact the Red Cross to see about getting volunteers down there to assist in keeping the cleanup crews taken care of. In addition, I would offer to supply all those who are diligently working on the issue with as much additional assistance as they needed, and get a man on the ground at the location in order to keep me appraised of the situation, immediate developments with the issue, and what changes can be expected or need to be made in order to ensure that the whole cleanup operation is flowing effectively and smoothly. Read More