Leadership and Communication - Research Paper Example

? Leadership & Communication Leadership and communication are s, which are interlinked each other. Leaders often guide a group of people (followers) to a particular target. It is difficult for an effective leader to lead such group of people silently. Followers need instructions from the leader to act properly and to attain the targets or objectives. Leaders often use verbal and nonverbal communication channels to convey their ideas to the followers. This paper analyses the importance of communication in effective leadership. Leadership & Communication Leadership is a term which has lot of dimensions. Many people interpret leadership in different ways and because of that; different leadership styles are prevailing in the current world. Some leaders are autocratic in nature whereas some others are democratic in nature. Some leaders use power frequently whereas others use rewards or complements to motivate the followers or subordinates. In any case, leadership is necessary in our personal and professional lives. According to Dr. Northouse (2009), “Leadership is a process by which an individual influence a group of individuals to achieve a common goal” (Dr. Northouse, 2009, p.3). In the absence of a centralized control, it is difficult to manage a group of people to accomplish certain missions. Leaders or managers provide this centralized control in organizational world to lead or manage the employees to reach the objectives of the organization. Hackman (2008) has pointed out that “Leadership is first and foremost a communication based activity” (Hackman, 2008, p.20). Effective communication ability is most important quality required for a leader. The leader should convey his visions and missions to the subordinates through different communication channels in order to guide the subordinates in the right direction. Based on the nature of functioning leaders can be classified as active and passive. Active leaders always try to communicate with the subordinates whereas passive leaders may not do so. A leader, who conveys nothing to the employees, may not become a successful leader under any circumstances. It is not necessary that the leader should always use verbal or written means to communicate his ideas to the employees. In fact, nonverbal communication channels such as body language, facial expressions, gestures, etc can be used judiciously by the leader to communicate more effectively with the subordinates. Role/importance of communication in effective leadership According to Matha et al, (2008), “Effective leadership communication could address the roots of many of the employee problems. Leaders needed to explain to the employees that they understand their difficulties; then outline processes to overcome them” (Matha et al, 2008, p.12). Employees often look towards the leaders when they face some problems. It is the duty of the leader to realize such employee problems and take necessary actions to solve it. Employees will reveal their problems only to a democratic manager or leader. If the leader follows an autocratic style of functioning, employees may not approach him with their problems. Thus employees forced to work with unsolved problems and therefore their productivity could be drastically reduced. On the other hand, a democratic manager can realize the problems of the employees because of his constant interaction and better relations with the employees. Employees will speak out their problems to the manager or leader, if they have confidence in the listening abilities of the leader. Thus, better communication helps a leader to realize the employee problems and to solve it immediately before it affects the organization. Managers spend most of their day engaged in communication; in fact, older studies of how much time managers spend on various activities show that communication occupies 70 to 90 percent of their time every day. With cell phones, e-mail, text messaging, if that same study were done today, it would yield even higher percentages. The sheer amount of time managers spend communicating underscores how important strong communication skills can be for the manager desiring to advance to leadership positions; thus, mastering leadership communication should be a priority for managers wanting their organizations or the broader business community to consider them leaders. (Barrett, Ph. D, 2006, p.1) Good communication skills are the most vital qualification required for most of the vacancies in the professional world at present. In leadership professions or management professions, good communication abilities are necessary and essential. The primary responsibility of a leader or manager is to get the job done through others. Managers always get vital information from the top about a particular job or project which should be shared to the employees in time in order to execute it in an effective manner. For example, in a hospital, the doctor is the leader whereas the nursing staffs are the subordinates. If the doctor fails to communicate effectively with the nursing staff about the medications and treatment options for the patients, it is impossible for the nursing professionals to provide effective care to the patients. The doctor should inform the nursing professional either verbally or in writing about the particular treatments needed for a particular patient; then only the nursing staffs can act positively and save the life of the patient. In other words, communication is the most vital element in leader-subordinate relationships. In fact, being able to communicate effectively is what allows a manager to move into a leadership position. An early Harvard Business School study on what it takes to achieve success and be promoted in an organization says that the individual who gets ahead in business is the person who “is able to communicate, to make sound decisions, and to get things done with and through people” (Barrett, Ph. D, 2006, p.2) Many complaints often come out from the professional world about the employee promotions. Some organizations give promotions to less experienced employees to managerial positions based on their communication abilities. Experienced employees often take such promotions as biases, prejudices or discriminations from the part of the organization. They don’t know how vital the communication skills are for managers. An experienced employee with less communication skills will become a passive manager whereas a fresh employee with good communication skills may become an active manager. Organizations always like active leaders or mangers rather than passive leaders or managers. Leadership and different types of communication “Leadership shares all the features of human communication such as language, stories, symbols to create reality, rituals to create distinctive group culture etc” (Hackman, 2008, p.5). Usually, different channels were used by the humans for communicating each other. Language, symbols etc are some of them. Since communication is a vital part of leadership, all the features associated with communication are associated with leadership also. Mullins (2007) has pointed out that “leadership is not about being a wonder woman or man; but it about valuing individuality” (Mullins, 2007, p.155). Some people have the illusion that leadership qualities are innate rather than acquired. Even though genetic factors contribute heavily to the behavior of a person, most of his personality characteristics are shaped by the environment in which he lives. In other words, leadership qualities can be considered as acquired qualities rather than innate qualities. It should be noted that neither the children of Abraham Lincoln nor the children of Mahatma Gandhi became effective leaders even though their fathers were charismatic leaders of all time. It should be noted that Abraham Lincoln was a great orator whereas Mahatma Gandhi was not so good in public speeches. In other words, Lincoln used verbal channels effectively whereas Gandhi used nonverbal channels effectively to communicate with the followers. In any case, the importance thing is that both of them were successful in communicating their ideas and visions to the followers through verbal or nonverbal channels of communication. Charismatic and human-oriented leadership are mainly communicative, while task-oriented leadership is significantly less communicative (Reinout, et al, 2010). As mentioned the earlier, both Lincoln and Mahatma Gandhi were charismatic and human oriented leaders and they used verbal and nonverbal communication channels effectively to persuade the people to act in a particular manner. On the other hand, task oriented leaders often give more emphasize for getting the job done rather than respecting the feelings and emotions of the workers. For example, Hitler tried to conquer the world during Second World War. He never bothered much to realize the feelings of others. His mission was only to be successful in the war. Such leaders will never give much importance to know the feeling of the followers and therefore they will become less communicative with the followers. During the transmitting of the message, two elements will be received: content and context. Content is the actual words or symbols of the message that is known as language — the spoken and written words combined into phrases that make grammatical and semantic sense. We all use and interpret the meanings of words differently, so even simple messages can be misunderstood. And many words have different meanings to confuse the issue even more. Context is the way the message is delivered and is known as paralanguage — it is the nonverbal elements in speech such as the tone of voice, the look in the sender's eyes, body language, hand gestures, and state of emotions (anger, fear, uncertainty, confidence, etc.) that can be detected (Communication and Leadership, 2010) Some studies have shown that more than 60% of information is communicated through nonverbal means. In other words, the body language of the leader can communicate more things than what actually he verbally delivered. For example, if a leader delivers his message in a humorous manner, the subordinates may not consider it seriously. On the other hand, if the leader’s body language or facial expressions are serious, the listeners or the subordinates will take it seriously. Some leaders use specific tones while speaking to the subordinates. The subordinates watch the body languages of the leader curiously before reaching a conclusion about the seriousness of the message passed by the leader. Maxwell, (2007) has argued that the “the measure of leadership is influence; nothing more nothing less” (Maxwell, 2007, p.11). The leader influences the followers with the help of different communication channel. While rewarding or punishing, leader is communicating or influencing the subordinates in one way or other. Subordinates respect only the influential leaders. They don’t like a leader who is keeping a distance with the employees. You haven't communicated anything until you have been heard by your audiences. Understand your audience. Take a lesson from the marketers — know the demographics and psychographics of your various audiences and tailor communication messages, content, style, and channels to them (Gandossy, 2010) Many leaders have the illusion that communication is all about passing some information either in written or verbal form to the subordinates. In fact effective communication is a two way activity. Listening employees is as important as telling or informing something to the employees. In other words effective communication is a two way activity rather than a one way activity. In order to receive the responses of the employees, the leader should listen to them. Most of the leaders like to adopt a one way communication channel of reading, writing, and speaking to the employees. In fact some studies have shown that more than 50% of the information can be conveyed effectively to the employees through listening. Even though communication is the flow of information from one person to another, effective communication occurs only when the receiver understands the information received by him. In order to understand information, the receiver may sometimes ask his doubts to the information transmitter. The leader or the transmitter should have enough patients to listen all such questions from the followers and they should have the ability to clear all such doubts and concerns. Conclusions Good communication ability is necessary for effective leaders to manage the subordinates well. Communication has many facets such as verbal, nonverbal, written, listen etc. Nonverbal communication channels and listening abilities are as important as verbal abilities in a communication process. Effective leaders always hear more than what they deliver to the subordinates. Since communication is an inseparable part of leadership, all the elements of effective communication are applicable to effective leadership also. References 1. Barrett, D.J. Ph. D, (2006). Leadership Communication: A Communication Approach for Senior-Level Managers. Handbook of Business Strategy. Emerald Group Publishing. Retrieved from http://scholarship.rice.edu/bitstream/handle/1911/27037/Leadership%20Communication%20-%20A%20Communication%20Approach%20for%20Senior-Level%20Managers%20-%20Barrett.pdf?sequence=2 2. Communication and Leadership (2010). Retrieved from http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/leader/leadcom.html 3. Dr. Northouse, P.G. (2009). Leadership: Theory and Practice Publisher: Sage Publications, Inc; Fifth Edition (October 6, 2009) 4. Gandossy R.P. (2010). Ten Principles for Leadership Communication, Retrieved from http://www2.hewittassociates.com/Intl/NA/en-US/KnowledgeCenter/ArticlesReports/ArticleDetail.aspx?cid=1642 5. Hackman, M.Z. (2008). 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(2010). Leadership = Communication? The Relations of Leaders’ Communication Styles with Leadership Styles, Knowledge Sharing and Leadership Outcomes. Journal of Business & Psychology; Sep2010, Vol. 25 Issue 3, p367-380, DOI:10.1007/s10869-009-9140-2, Academic Search Premier Read More