Duties and Responsibilities of a Leader - Example

Being A Leader and The Role of a leader Duties and responsibilities of a leader A Leader influences people in the organization, people, and activities towards achieving the set objectives of the organization. They direct people in order to ensure they are moving in the same direction. They prioritize important activities that contribute most to the organization. They also ensure there is focus in the organization and activities are completed before starting on new ones. A leader also motivates the other employees and subordinates to increase productivity to achieve the desired goals of the organization. They achieve this by promoting teamwork and creating a team spirit among the people. The leader inspires people by involving them in the activities of the organization and increasing their self-esteem. Different people have different needs in the organization and leaders play a role in harmonizing individual needs and organizational needs. They also create a purpose; mission and vision for the organization to enable people understand where the organization intends to reach to achieve its objectives. A Leader helps to facilitate change in the organization through structuring of tasks, decision making, and solving conflicts. Leaders solve problems that arise from interaction and activities in the organization by setting a good example to the rest of the organization and resolving disputes timely. A Leader also sets standards by leading from the front. The leader also has a role of mentoring and instilling confidence in subordinates by providing guidance and being a good example. The leader has a responsibility to set and achieve the objectives of the organization. They achieve this by setting goals that are clear, measurable, realistic, and achievable within the time allocated. The leader also has a responsibility to promote creativity and innovation in the organization. Such could be through use of technology and ways to achieve activities in a cheaper way, new products, new markets, and efficient ways to carry out the activities in the organization. Knowledge and skills A leader must demonstrate teamwork through ability to work with others by providing directions. He or she could also help to solve problems, make decisions, and establish working relationship with team members. A leader should also have interpersonal skills to enable him or her deal with problems in the organization and understand the needs, feelings, and abilities of people. He or she should deal with conflicts and disagreements in a neutral way that avoids bias towards some people and control his or her feelings. The leader also deals with situations appropriately and appreciates the diversity of people in the organization. A leader should communicate effectively. He or she should clearly articulate his or her ideas to the people and in a concise manner. The leader should also listen to the input of other people and enable two-way communication between the followers and between the leader and followers. He or she should also be honest. A leader should have problem solving skills to enable him or her solve complex problems that face the organization and identify potential problems while offering their solution. He or she should also make a proper judgment of situations and decisions by analyzing and considering all factors before arriving at a decision and supporting decisions with accurate information. A leader should have adequate knowledge and competence, which enables him or her to solve problems and interpret information in the organization. He or she should also have an adequate understanding of the people and organization that he leads. A leader should be a good planner to enable him to allocate time, resource, or labor where appropriate. A leader should be charismatic to enable him direct and motivate people. A leader should be flexible in his or her behaviors and abilities to make decisions by acknowledging the impact of his or her decisions on the people and accommodating criticism or opinions of other. Difference between a leader and a manager There are exist differences between a leader and manager. A leader is a person who gets others to follow him or others follow her while a manager because of the powers he or she has and structures in an organization. A leader mainly relies on confidence and goodwill of others to follow him or her while a manager relies on his or her power for others to follow him or her. A leader achieves his or her position by virtue of acceptance by other people while a manager derives his or her authority from a position of power in an organization. Leadership is mainly found in unorganized while management is mainly in structured and formal groups. The importance of leadership is to inspire and motivate while importance of management is planning, directing, organizing and controlling. Describe the role of the leader in maintaining integrity, fairness, and consistency in action planning and decision-making The leader ensures that there is accountability and effective controls are maintained and ensures that there is transparency and integrity in the effective controls in the organization. The leader also ensures that he or she is honest and communicates new information in the organization. He or she also provides feedback and is approachable should a person want to meet him or her. He or she also maintains focus and remain persistent even when situations are difficult. Describe how the leader develops the teams understanding of its shared purpose and organisational direction It develops the team understanding of its shared purpose and organization direction through a number of ways. The leader explains advocates and supports for the ideas. It involves communication with both internal and external of the department or those being led. The leader also establishes and maintains working relationships with his or her followers and building and strengthening internal communication channels and relationships. The leader also supports the group’s activities and views and rallies the management to support them. The leader also ensures that members work as a team where meetings and cooperation from others is gained and accomplishment of goals. 2. Leadership Styles Discuss situational and transformational leadership styles and say how they build on Lewin’s original Democratic, Autocratic, Laissez Faire theory; give 2 examples of when a leader might need to adapt their usual style. The situational leadership style Situational leadership style proposes that ability of a leader depends upon various situational factors that include the preferred style by the leader, the ability, and behaviors of followers and various situational factors. The leader’s styles include directing, coaching, supporting, and delegating. Directing refers to the ability of a leader to provide instructions and closely supervise a task. Coaching refers to the ability to supervise jobs and decisions, suggestions and praises progress. Supporting style refers to the ability of leader to facilitate and support efforts towards completion of a task and to share the responsibilities of the decision-making (Hersey, Blanchard, and Natemeyer, 1979) The skills required in this theory include flexibility, diagnosis, and communication. Flexibility refers to the ability to change leadership style depending on the situation to fit the needs of followers, diagnosis refers to accurately assessing needs of a follower while communication refers to the ability to reach a decision with each follower. Transformational Theory of Leadership Transformational leadership style depends on the ability of the leader to inspire followers to rise above their self-interest and satisfy the interests of the organization. The leaders are held in high regard by the followers and are visionary, articulate and followers have confidence in them and are, therefore, motivated by the leader beyond their own personal goals (Schwarzwald, 2001, p 277). The leaders try to stimulate the dormant needs of the subordinates (Chan, 2005). The leaders seek for creative and innovative views on the way to create a vision for the team. Leaders enhance performance, set a high expectation, and are always available to assist in the challenges (Bass and Avolia, 1997). The leaders are flexible and show concern for the needs of subordinates. Followers end up performing better because they have an internal motivation. Lewin (1939) identified 3 leadersip styles: Autocrat leadership styles The autocrat leadership style has a leader who uses unilateralism and controls members to achieve a task or objective. The leader tells the team members what to do, and there is no teamwork. This style mainly leads to resistance from members of the team and leader has to put a lot of pressure to achieve a task and may not lead to achievement of goals. However, it is appropriate for some situations that require fast action and people require less time to adapt to it. Examples of when a leader might adopt his or her usual style are where teamwork is needed to achieve a task and where members have some skills. Democrat leadership style The democratic leadership style makes decision by consulting with members of the team while the leader still keeps the control of the group. This style allows members to decide how to accomplish tasks and advocates for participation and delegation of authority or decision. However, the leader still maintains responsibilities of leadership. Examples of when a leader might adopt his or her usual style are when there is low interdependence in the team, members have low skills, and members expect what to be told. The laissez-faire leadership style The laissez-faire leadership style is a style where the leader excises little control over the team and leaves them to perform their tasks without his or her interference. This approach is applicable when the team is highly motivated, and skilled who require little supervision and motivation (Eagly, Johannesen-Schmidt, and Van Engen, 2003, p.569). Example of when a leader should use his or her usual style is if group is unmotivated, have low skills, or there is high conflict in a team. Discuss how and why leadership styles need to be adapted in different situations  Different situations require the use of different leadership styles (Yuki, 2002, p.186). For example, a very urgent and critical problem requires autocratic leadership while, in a situation requiring input of others such as teamwork, a democratic leadership is more appropriate. The impact of a decision on the team also matters on use of a leadership style. The issues also influence on the leadership style adopted, political issues such as budget allocation have a major impact on team members. In such political issues, leaders should apply autocratic leadership style. Leaders may apply different situation because of knowledge and skills of team members. When members are not well skilled, autocratic leadership could be applied while laisser-faire style can be applied where members are highly skilled. Different styles may also be applied because of policies of the organization. An organization that limits interaction of leaders and followers insist on autocratic leadership style while an organization without limitation may apply democratic leadership. Adair’s Action-centered leadership Adair explains that for a leader to be effective, he or she must ensure that three distinct areas of need are satisfied. These needs include task needs, team needs and individual needs. None of the needs should be ignored because they have an impact on other areas. Task needs are needs to succeed in achieving set goals by getting the job done. Leadership skills required to address these needs include planning, monitoring, and acquiring resources. Team needs are needs for the group to work well together. Leadership skills to satisfy these needs include coordination of the work of the team, setting and monitoring team standards and resolving team problems. Individual needs are important for personal satisfaction with an individual’s work (Middlehurst, 2007). 3. Leadership and motivation How an organisation’s structure affect communications and ‘span of control Organizational structure has an effect on communication. It affects communication through decision-making, coordination of activities and rewards mechanism. In a simple structure, the manager makes majority of decisions. It also allows informal communication (Hage, Aiken, and Marrett, 1971, p.861). A functional structure has communication in the department and communication with other departments is formal. A geographical structure has different branches of the organization in different locations, which allows managers to make decisions concerning their location and adopt communication for its location. A matrix structure allows communication between the project team and when reporting to two managers (. Answering to two managers may lead to conflict that lead to a breakdown of communication. Organization structure also affects span of control. An organization structure that allows only a manager to supervise a limited number of employees has a narrow span of control while a wide span of control exists where manager supervises a high number of employees (Jablin, 1987).Organizational structure also affects span of control depending on whether an organizational structure is centralized, or there is delegated. A geographical organization structure leads to a narrow span of control. Identify the organisational requirements for respecting the cultures, values and ethics of others  Understanding and appreciating the differences that exist and the people and providing support to all individuals about different cultures, values, and ethics of people. Each person in the organization should be encouraged to do the same. Policies that protect people with different cultures, values, and ethics. It can be achieved through disciplinary measures for those who do not respect culture, values, and ethics of others. It also involves preventing tendencies such as gossips relating to other people’s cultures, values, and ethics of others. Have tolerance. It is achieved through accepting differences that exist between the people in the organization and empathize them even if one does not like or accept the differences. This also involves putting up with the differences. There should be communication to remove the negative perception that is seen in the differences. Communication should also be friendly and positive because it neutralizes the negative perceptions. What are the potential benefits of a diverse team? Diversity brings different experiences. People who have different knowledge and skills bring new and different experiences to a team. People from different cultures have different ways in which activities and problems are solved that helps a team. Diversity also means that each member possess different strength and weakness that are shared through interactions with other members of group. It also provides a new opportunity for growth and development of team members. Members are able to interact and create new growth for them. Team members are able to interact with different cultures and provide them with opportunity to learn new cultures and ideas. Diversity in teams helps to create communication among themselves and other cultures. Members from different culture help to provide new opportunity to learn new languages and overcome communication barriers. Staff can better respond to customer issues in different demographic areas. It increases production. Diversity brings different talent and skills that helps organization to improve its current workforce. Different people have different talents that ultimately shared leads to increases in production. Diversity also leads to increased creativity and innovation. When individuals are of different diversity, they meet and share knowledge that helps to increase level of creativity and innovation in an organization. Describe how to establish a culture of mutual trust and respect with the team Practice openness. Practising openness enables followers to have confidence and trust in the leader. It also includes informing people, engaging them in decision-making, explain the basis for making a decision and providing candid feedback. A leader should also exercise fairness in actions. A leader can maintain trust by exercising fairness when making decisions and weighing the impact of the decision before finally making it or taking action. The leader should also be fair in performance appraisal and rewarding people. Ensure honesty at all times. A leader should always practice telling the truth to earn the trust from the followers and gain credibility. A leader should be ready to tell them the truth even when the information is negative. A leader should demonstrate consistency and predictability in his or her behaviour. A leader should always fulfil his or her promises to ensure that he or she is trustworthy. A leader can also express to the group his or her feelings so that followers view the leader as like them, and this makes them trust in the leader. He or she should also demonstrate trust by not revealing confidential information or revealing secrets. A leader should show ability to perform tasks. Performing of tasks helps to develop admiration and respect by peoples. The leader should also ensure effective communication with followers and interpersonal skills. Identify techniques to motivate and encourage the development of team members Recognize individual differences. Members are not identical and have different needs and personalities. Members of the team should be included in tasks that best fits them to achieve the maximum output. Members should be treated equality and fairly because it motivates them and encourages their development (Dirks, 2000). Establishment of goals. The team should have goals and members should have individual goals. The goals should be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and within a given period. Each should be given assistance to attain his or her goals. Members should also be encouraged and given opportunity to participate in the teams. This creates harmony and each feels part of the team. Matching of members to tasks. Each member should be assigned a task that he or she is best matched to avoid boredom from having to perform something they do not like. Use rewards. There should be rewards to encourage members to improve their performance. It is achieved by identifying the needs of members because they are not all motivated by the same rewards. They should, therefore, entail rewards such as monetary benefits, promotion, improved work environment, ability to make decisions and added responsibilities. Rewards should also be based on performance to encourage members to strive for improvements. Explain the impact of the leader on personal objectives and team achievement The leader communicates to the team members. Therefore, all matters are solved in advance and feedback is given. It helps to avoid conflict in the group leading to success. Communication involves exchange of ideas and suggestions of new or better ways to solve problems as they occur. This leads to improved knowledge and skills among the group members. There is also decision making in the group. The leader empowers the group members through motivation. Members improve their knowledge and have confidence. They develop a sense of belonging and achievement to the team. Teamwork is also promoted in the team. Members gain a sense of security in the team. Members mature in their group and develop psychological contact with team members. Locke and Lathan Theory This theory of motivation is applied in goal setting in relation to complicated business activities with an aim of improving performance. Goals are defined as the aims for a particular action. Individuals direct effort and persistence to achieve their goals. The theory suggests that individuals must set goals to achieve an action. They must also ensure that the goals are clear, committed, receive adequate feedback and management support. Hard goals also motivate more than simple goals. Goal setting must involve objectives, standards, priority of goals, time framework, and ensuring coordination. Managers have to ensure that organizational needs do not conflict with individual needs. In a group or team, each member should have his or her own goals. Mahen Tampoe Theory Mahen Tampoe theory is mainly based on the application of both technical and theoretical knowledge. He identifies ways of rewarding the knowledge employees through four ways. They include personal growth, autonomy, creative achievement, and financial rewards. Personal growth involves self-development instead of managerial or professional growth. Autonomy refers to independence in carrying out their activities. Creating achievement involves intellectual development rather than work geared towards achievement of targets. Financial rewards are based on salaries and bonuses. Such employees are motivated by career progression in the organization. Financial rewards are also not very important because most of them earn good salaries but they can be motivated by sharing profits made by the organization (Lenz, 2002, p.20) Comparing Locke and Lathan Theory and Mohan Tampoe Theory Both theories insist on improved individual performance. They motivate the individual involved. In both theories, there is internal motivation. In Locke and Lathan theory, motivation is from goals set while individual performance motivates those in Mohan Tampoe theory. However, there is some difference. In the Locke and Lathan theory, there is emphasis of managers in setting objectives and ensuring employees goals do not interfere with organization goals. In Mohan Tompoe theory, managers do not interfere and employees are highly autonomous. In Locke and Lathan theory, there is no financial reward motivation while it is present in Mohen Tampoe theory. Achievement of target is a real motivator in Locke and Lathan theory while it is not a motivator in Mohen Tampoe theory. There is setting of goals in Locke and Lathan theory which is absent in Mohen Tampoe theory. Mohen Tampoe theory is mainly for knowledge management employees while goal setting is in all employees. Motivators in the two theories are different, in Locke and Lathan theory, it is mainly goals setting but personal growth, achievement, financial rewards, and autonomy are main motivators for Mohen Tampoe theory. Bibliography Bass, B. M., & Avolio, B. J., 1997. Full range leadership development: Manual for the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire. Redwood City, CA: Mind Garden. Chan, Donna Suk-Hing, 2005.  Relationship between generation-responsive leadership behaviors and job satisfaction of generations X and Y professionals. D.M. dissertation, University of Phoenix, United States - Arizona. Dirks, K. T. , 2000. Trust in leadership and team performance: evidence from NCAA basketball. Journal of applied psychology, 85(6). Eagly, A. H., Johannesen-Schmidt, M. C., & Van Engen, M. L., 2003. Transformational, transactional, and laissez-faire leadership styles: a meta-analysis comparing women and men. Psychological bulletin, 129(4), p. 569. Hage, J., Aiken, M., & Marrett, C. B., 1971. Organization structure and communications. American Sociological Review, pp. 860-872. Hersey, P., Blanchard, K. H., & Natemeyer, W. E., 1979. Situational leadership, perception, and the impact of power. Group & Organization Management, 4(4), pp. 418-428. Jablin, F. M., 1987. Formal organization structure. Handbook of organizational communication: An interdisciplinary perspective, pp. 389-419. Lenz, K., 2002. Managing Knowledge: How to implement a management knowledge concept. diplom.de. p.20 Middlehurst, R., 2007. A challenging journey: From leadership courses to leadership foundation for higher education. New Directions for Higher Education,2007(137), pp. 45-57. Schwarzwald, J., Koslowsky, M., & Agassi, V., 2001. Captains leadership type and police officers compliance to power bases. European Journal of Work & Organizational Psychology, 10(3), p. 273. Yukl, G. A., & Heaton, H. (2002). Leadership in organizations.186 Read More