The Concept of Leadership and Effectiveness in Organizations - Essay Example

Running head: LEADERSHIP Topic Affiliation The concept of leadership is relevant to any aspect of ensuring effectiveness in organizations and in managing change. Where as management must deal with the ongoing, day-to-day complexities of organizations, true leadership includes effectively orchestrating important change. While managing requires planning and budgeting routines, leading includes setting the direction (creating a vision) for the firm Management requires structuring the organization, staffing it with capable people, and monitoring activities; leadership goes beyond these functions by inspiring people to attain the vision. Great leaders keep people focused on moving the organization toward its ideal future, motivating them to over come whatever obstacles lie in the way. Leadership is a process by which a person influences others to accomplish an objective and directs the organization in a way that makes it more cohesive and coherent. Leaders carry out this process by applying their leadership attributes, such as beliefs, values, ethics, character, knowledge, and skills. Although your position as a manager, supervisor, lead, etc. gives you the authority to accomplish certain tasks and objectives in the organization, this power does not make you a leader, it simply makes you the boss. Leadership differs in that it makes the followers want to achieve high goals, rather than simply bossing people around. Leadership is doing the right things; management is doing things right. In other words, leadership - doing the right things—is deciding the best course of action to take. What are the things we should be doing to get us to where we want to go? What direction or course of action should we take? Where do we want to be in the end? There are many factors that contribute to effective leadership. The first characteristic of effective leadership is empathy, an understanding and identification with another persons feelings, situation and goals. In the event of a conflict, a good leader will be able to empathize with both sides, while being able to negotiate an amicable solution. Secondly, an effective leader shows a tenacious determination and resolve, never wavering in spite of obstacles. Thirdly, one must be able to detach themselves from the situation and analyze it from a distance. The effective leader is calm and composed in the face of turmoil and uncertainty. Fourthly, a leader must have excellent communication skills. He must be comfortable running meetings and making presentations. His presentation skills have to be excellent, and be able to convey accurately the essence of the subject at hand and be able to address any ambiguities before they come up. Effective leader has to be resourceful enough to find the resources that are needed. Not every leader will have an intimate knowledge of the subject, but he will be able to turn to the people in the know and gather any necessary resources as required. Ethical behavior is also an important quality for a leader to possess followed by sound judgment. These characteristics can be learnt by anyone as put by John F. Kennedy "Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other." Transactional vs. Transformational Leadership James McGregor Burns compared these two types of leadership: Transactional Leaders use rewards to motivate and focus on routine performance that is agreed upon by manager and subordinate; management in this model is generally by expectation (i.e., when people deviate from expectation). Contrast this to transformational leadership where leaders broaden and elevate the interests of their followers, generate awareness and acceptance of the purposes and mission of the group or stir followers to look beyond their own self interest for the good of others. These leaders use charisma, vision, courage, inspiration, intellectual stimulation, and concern for individual. These leaders cope with complexity, ambiguity and uncertainty. Various authors have subsequently refined and expanded Burns basic concepts of leadership. Transactional leadership is generally defined as emphasizing the transactions or exchanges that occur among leaders, colleagues and followers. Transformational leadership deals with transformation or change in an organization (Bass, 1996). Bass and others emphasize that transformational leadership is an expansion of transactional leadership. It does not replace it. Transformational concepts have been applied to such diverse fields as the military (Bass, 1996), community colleges (Gilbert, 1997), business (Kotter, 1995), nursing (Marriner-Tomey, 1993), and cooperative extension (Moyer, 1996). Transactional leaders tend to think more about specific goals, work skills and knowledge needed to accomplish those goals, work assignments, and various reward relationships. On the other hand, transformational leadership places greater emphasis upon intellectual capability and creativity. It tends to be more abstract, and emphasizes vision over goals. Transactional leaders tend to be "contingent rewarding" through providing rewards for followers if they meet performance standards set jointly or by the leader (or controlling/punishing followers who do not). They all also tend to be active in "managing by exception," whereby they monitor followers performance, and take any needed corrective action when output falls below, or exceeds, expected "norms." Transformational leaders, on the other hand, tend to be idealized, and oriented to change. They place greater attention on organizational transformation and behavioral change of individuals. Now coming to the gender roles, men and women operate in the work environment in somewhat different ways based upon genetic/biological differences, cultivation, communication styles and to some extent, the characteristics of the particular career field chosen. According to a study men and women tend to lead in different ways and make different contributions to the organization. Each style contributes to diversity offering unique capabilities essential to holistic organizational effectiveness. Women’s leadership styles tend to employ a partnership model, a way to structure human relationships based upon linking. If men and women face essentially the same challenges, as these personal experiences suggest, are there really any gender issues that still come into play? Often it depends on the company culture. Some cultures may make it more difficult for women, but if a company genuinely values and is committed to diversity, there may be no difference. On the other hand, no two people are alike. There are always degrees of difference based on personality and chemistry, and when you throw gender into the mix, again depending on the corporate environment, there could be issues. According to an observation the difference between men and women executives may have more to do with management style than directly with gender. By properly preparing executives to manage their challenges, the new executives and the company have everything to gain. And that applies to men as well as women. Read More