Strategy and Implementation Plan on Leadership and Competencies in Google - Literature review Example

Strategy and Implementation Plan on Leadership and Competencies in Google Student’s name: Institution: Executive summary In order for any business to succeed in this highly competitive market environment there is a need for the leaders and the stakeholders to adopt contemporary forms of leadership. This way, the business will be able to handle emerging issues, most of which are associated with increased technological knowhow among the customers, reduced barriers of entry, among other notable aspects. By adopting effective leadership methods, Google Inc., the leading internet search engine globally, has remained competitive, despite the emergence of many other firms offering similar services. However, for the firm to remain as the market leader in the next five years, there is an urgent need to employ contemporary leadership and competency model, which will ensure that the emotional welfares of the employees is deeply taken care of. To achieve this, a strategic plan and implementation will be used. For example, it is estimated that by adopting the contemporary leadership and competency model, the productivity of all Google Inc. employees will increase by 25% in the next three years. This will ultimately lead to 20% increase in profits during the similar period. In the implementation phase, keen interests will be taken to ensure that, the model operates efficiently. This will be achieved by following a well-stipulated implementation schedule. Consequently, time and resource wastage will be minimized, hence reducing the firms operating costs. Generally, the paper will show that effective leadership is a vital pillar in the development of an organization, thus, firms are supposed to be dynamic and embrace changes at all times. Companies with good leadership are always able to place themselves strategically to tackle any emerging challenge, thus being valid at all times. Successful executives spend a great deal of their time on strategy execution. They realize that executing strategy is just as important, if not more important, than formulating strategy. Introduction In the recent past, competition between businesses operating in similar fields has drastically increased. This can be attributed to increased technological knowhow, reduced barriers of entry, raised knowhow among the customers among other notable factors. Consequently, businesses have been forced to come up with more competitive methods, which will ensure that they continue to increase their customer base, thus remaining profitable in both the short and in the long run (Kouses and Posner, 2008). Robert, Stephen & Alan (2006) notes that, in the communication industry, competition has almost tripled within the last decade an aspect that has called for constant research and development within the concerned companies. It is in this light that firms, especially those operating globally, regularly develop strategic plans as well as carefully implement them all in an effort to remain marketable, locally and internationally. Robert, Stephen & Alan, (2006) argue that strategic planning, is the process by which, leaders in a given firm review the visions and values of an organization. By doing this, they are then able to design strategic paths aimed at achieving the set objectives and goals, while mitigating all the possible risks. On the other hand, strategic implementation is the process where management of a firm implements a designed strategic plan on day-to-day basis. (Caldwell, Truong, Link, Tuan, 2011). Generally, it is important for corporate leaders to constantly evaluate and look into the future of their businesses. This way they will be able to anticipate change and come-up with strategies, which will help them to successfully and proactively navigate, through these turbulences. This paper aims to develop a strategy and implementation plan on leadership and competencies for Google Inc. Background on Google Inc Google Inc. is one of the American multinational corporations, which has greatly invested in notable areas, such as cloud computing, internet search, advertising among others. Google develops and host various internet based products and services that have highly changed the lives of millions of people across the world. For instance, besides being ranked as the leading internet search engine, the firm has been able to develop a software known as Google Android. The software is used by most of the consumer electronics firms to operate communication gadgets like mobile phones, computers, and watches among others. Therefore the firm has improved on the way people communicate, thus raising their standards of living globally. The firm was initially incorporated as a private firm in 1998, though it later became a public company in 2004. Through its mission statement, which is to organize information and to make it useful and accessible across the world, the company has raised technical knowhow as most people, especially students, rely on the firm to access the much needed information (Brigid, Lester & David, 2008). At the time of inception, Larry Page and Sergey Brin acted as the business leaders, though they have since incorporated other leaders as the business continues to expand across the globe. Brigid, Lester & David (2008) indicate that the rapid growth of Google has triggered the development of chain products, mergers and acquisitions, most of which have been beyond the firms centre web search engine. Currently, Google inc. offers its customers online productivity software like Google+, Gmail email services and instant messaging applications among others. As indicated earlier, the firm has developed Android, a mobile phone operating system that runs on phones such as Samsung Galaxy, Motorola Droid and other smart phone series. It is estimated that the firm operates over a million data servers, processes more than one billion requests as well as approximately twenty-three petabytes of user-generated data on daily basis. Though the organization has faced numerous criticisms regarding the issues of censorships, copyright and privacy, its brand value continues to increase. Google brand loyalty resulting from increased brand awareness among the online users is estimated to be 89%, 13% higher than that of close competitors, such as Yahoo, among others (Kouses and Posner, 2008). Generally, the great level of innovation witnessed within the recent past from the firm can be attributed to heavy investment in the field of research and development and crowd sourcing methods. For Google Inc to remain competitive, despite the high competition faced from other emerging companies, there is need to develop and implement leadership and competencies in all its branches, globally. The main reason as to why this is much needed is to enable the firm compete effectively with other firms that have adopted modern forms of leaderships. Consequently, they have been able to motivate and reward their employees, hence growth of the firms. Analysis and evaluation of leadership and competencies in Google Inc John (2003) indicates effective management of the human resources is an important aspect for any organizations within the fast-paced and modern business environments. Due to this, human resources has become an integral part of any given firm as they are mostly the ones responsible for ensuring that companies survive the present harsh economic times. Through well-developed human resources departments as well as overall leadership within the company, the competencies of the employees are drastically increased. This way, they are able to raise their productivity, thus ensuring profitability, both in the short run and long term basis. Since inception, Google inc. has been following regulated functional structures with various management settings specialized by a value chain activities (Gulati, 2004). As a global diversified firm the positions of leadership and management are grouped into areas of interests, which aid the firm in managing all its operations as indicated by the flow chart below. www.google.com As indicated by Kouses and Posner (2008) the current leadership culture, which Sergey Brin and Larry Page initiated as the founders of the firm has largely influenced the leadership of the firm in all its branches. However, there is a great need for Google Inc. to come up with a more proactive leadership and competencies methods, which will ensure that the firm competes accordingly now and in the future. This is because, effective leaderships mostly results to better results, hence more profitability. It is notable that, competencies may be measured, improved and enhanced via learning and coaching opportunities. In the 2010, the critical success factor of Google Inc. can be attributed to an employee development by the firm’s human resources department (Robert, Wolcott and Michael, 2007).This highly improved the firm’s competency skills, as it has been able to attract and retain the brightest and skilled human capital. However, strategic HRM scholars propose that the rarity of human capital is derived from their skill and competency level, and based on the assumption that skills, competencies, and capabilities are normally distributed through the population, high quality and ability workers/resources are thus rare (Wright et al., 1994). In Google Inc. some of the competencies that have been clearly indentified include: Functional and technical expertise Customer services Result focus Teamwork Personal effectiveness Interpersonal communication Leadership Adoption of contemporary leadership and competencies in Google Inc What is a contemporary leadership? This is a new paradigm of leadership that focuses on more complex concepts, which reach beyond the individual leader. This form of leadership carefully evaluates the leaders’ behaviors, ability, charisma, style among other notable factors. There are three main characteristics of contemporary leadership. Leadership is highly based on influence, and multidirectional. This indicates that, the influence can take any direction, must not be coercive, thus based on persuasion. Follower as and leaders are the main players in this relationship as they seek for mutually beneficial real changes. The changes intended by the followers and leaders indicate their mutual purpose. The vision By changing the leadership and competencies used by Google inc. the firm, will remain competitive and a global leader as an internet search engine. The firm will also be able to encourage innovations and inventions in other notable fields of communication, thus continuing to change the livelihoods of many people across the globe. Mission The firm will have to invest in modern leadership and competency, which will enhance the growth of the firm in all its branches. Objectives By adopting contemporary leadership competency model, Google Inc. will improve leadership on all it branches by at least 35% in the next five years By adopting contemporary leadership competency model, the productivity of all employees will increase by 25% in the next three years. By adopting contemporary leadership competency model, the profitability level of Google Inc. will increase by at least 20% in the next three years. To strengthen the company and technology as well as creating new groups, where it is required in order to support diverse interests of all the employees To intensively develop innovative new services of products and services based on the web-based technologies. The goals One of the main strengths of this model is its ability to properly combine leadership skills with the current global businesses trends. For example, the emotional, social and economic wellbeing of both the employees and the organization is put in place. Unlike the other old leadership models, which do not allow for dynamic ideas the contemporary leadership competency model allows leaders and staffs to venture into challenging environments that previously was impossible (Kouses and Posner, 2008). In this model, staff members are allowed to follow their opinion to achieve the set target by the leaders. This promotes self-reliance, discipline and cultivates the spirit of hard work in the staff. The strategies There are many challenges that hinder effective achievement of the goals and vision of Google inc. Brigid, Lester & David (2008) indicate that most of these challenges arises due to ineffective leadership and competencies models that has been adopted by the firm in most of its branches globally. In the recent past, there has been the need for leaders to emotional attach to their employees, hence improve their productivity. For instance, the rapid growth of Apple Inc., a global leader in consumer electronic products, can be attributed to the emotional attachment between the employee and the leaders. As a result of this, there is need for Google Inc. to adopt a contemporary leadership and competency model that will ensure the emotional attachment between the leaders and employees is enhanced (Brigid, Lester & David, 2008). It is worth noting that up to now there has not been any generally agreed definition of leadership nor the most effective leadership theory to be used in any organization for maximum output. (Brigid, Lester & David, 2008) indicates that this has necessitated the need of coming up with contemporary leadership models that incorporates social, political, and economical, philosophical along with other virtues to help employees achieve their set goals. Most of the existing leadership and competencies theories are not able to accommodate the very dynamic working environments being faced by many organizations. Table in Attachment 2 provides an example of the kinds of metrics that might be used to assess outcomes in each of the key result areas as well as examples of competencies that could specifically support the accomplishment of such results. As a result, the contemporary leadership models have emerged to counter this problem. These contemporary leadership model includes people oriented and task oriented leadership models (Kouses and Posner, 2008). Task oriented model is where by the leaders is mandated to achieve a certain goal. The leaders allocate resources to workers to carry a certain job within a specified duration. One of the contemporary leadership and competencies model, which can be adopted by Google Inc. is the people oriented leadership (Robert, Wolcott and Michael 2007). In this model, the leader is emotionally attached to the employee’s with the basic aim of increasing organization productivity. The emotional attachment brings job satisfaction, loyalty and working harmony. Leaderships, especially to the multinational companies, such as Google Inc. have been highly affected by external factors such as corporate cultures, personal values and globalization (Robert, Wolcott and Michael, 2007). For example, due to globalization competition, markets, employee transfers, increased opportunity and customer base have increased. Earlier on company management only concentrated on the markets of country of origin. Further, international markets have opened up forcing organizations leaders to possess knowledge and customs of different countries they do business with. Leadership is also affected by the corporate culture. This is because, many companies have a certain culture that is followed right from inception. Leaders are required to change in order to fit to the companies increased productivity culture form. Leaders are also affected by their personal believes especially if they have an idea that they will positively change the society they are working in. The table below shows the key drivers and the contemporary leadership trends. Drivers Leadership trend Organizational designs Developing organizational networks Volume of disbursement of information Knowledge management Increasing distrust of organizational leaders Business ethics and accountability Retirement-new generations Systematic leadership development Maximizing organizational performances Aligning the leadership strategy business strategies Globalization Globalization agility Complexity of the problem organization face Complex problem solving tools It is also important to note that, leadership is a vital pillar in the development of an organization, thus they are supposed to be dynamic and embrace changes at all times. Companies with good leadership are always able to place themselves strategically for changes thus being valid at all times. Discussion of implementation issues Implementation is the method in which, strategic plans are turned into actions, with the basic aim of accomplishing the strategic goals and objectives (Gulati,2004).It is notable that the implementation of the strategic plan is crucial, or even more crucial, than the strategic plan. The critical actions shift the strategic plan from being just a mere document, which sits on the shelves, to actions resulting to business growth. However, there are many pitfalls that have for a long time hindered the attainment of an effective implementation plan, thus hindering business from attaining its goals. Preparing the implementation strategy plan for leadership and competencies for Google Inc For Google Inc. to have an effective leadership and competencies plan in place there is need to avoid pitfalls, which arises due to time and energy wasting by the plan implementation committee. Although, the issue of implementation may not be exciting to most of the leaders in the organization, it is a fundamental business practice, which is critical for the success of any strategic plan. Robert, Wolcott and Michael (2007) indicates that the strategic plan addresses why and what of activities, while the implementation plan addresses the where, how, when and who, that is why both strategies highly complements each other. In fact, firms can gain competitive advantages via the implementation phase, if it is effectively carried out. For Google Inc. to have an effective leadership and competencies implementation plan, there is need to come up with an implementation schedule, which ensure that goals are attained at specific duration (Brigid, Lester & David, 2008). Further, the implementation schedule will reduce on time wastage; promote common focus as well as reducing on wastage of resources for Google Inc. The flow diagram below summarizes the schedule and primary activities. Flow Diagram Factors resulting to implementation failure There are many factors can lead to failure of Google Inc. leadership and competencies plan. Some of them include lack of communication, drawing an overwhelming plan, reduced accountability, having no process report, lack of effective plan empowerment among others. Recommendations There are numerous recommendations, which are pertinent to the Google Inc. senior management. There is need to build up change capabilities through values and vision with the local, emergent, participative and social leadership. There is need to manage change. This can be attained by maximizing stakeholder’s value through the system and structural changes using top-down technical programs. Google should align its leadership strategies with the business strategies. Goggles senior management should realize their responsibilities for creating value at firm’s level and contributing to broader general good, both locally and internationally. Conclusion From the above study, one can clearly see that, Google Inc. is one of the most successful companies in the 21st century. This can be attributed to the firm’s ability to invest heavily on the area of research and development a key factor for ensuring innovation and inventions. In the last five years, the firm has come up with world-class services and products, such as Google+ and android software’s, which has drastically changed the lives of many people across the globe. However, for the firm to remain competitive there is need for the senior management to adopt the contemporary leadership and competency model that will ensure that it competes accordingly with other upcoming firms across the globe. In my own, opinion, Google’s senior management should be aware of the need to effectively implementation plan, a factor that will ensure that the firm’s leadership can be deal with emerging issues. References Air Force Leadership Development Model. Retrieved October 6, 2003 from http://leadership.au.af.mil/af/afldm.htm. Brigid, C. Lester, L. & David R. 2008. Leadership aPractice: Challenging the Competency Paradigm. Leadership, Vol. 4 No.4 pp. 363-379. 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