Leadership as the Process of Manipulating Other People - Essay Example

? Management How managers can apply their interpersonal, informational and decisional roles to influence the successful performance of their organization. Introduction In recent years, well publicized business failures have pointed to the important role that managerial roles play in an organization’s success or failure. In individual success and excellent organization performance, the effectiveness of the leader’s behavior determines the fate of the organization. For retention and employee recruitment, the leaders must maintain a strong leadership mentality throughout the entire organization. Leadership is the process of manipulating other people to achieve specified objectives or goals. From a business point of view, a manager is a person, who has been given the mandate to influence the employees of a given organization in order to achieve the organization goals. Therefore, leadership roles are to communicate ideas, motivating employees, and gaining their commitment, enthusiasm, and acceptance so that they can support and implement the organizational goals and objectives. A manager should be a person who can perform the following roles; 1. Interpersonal roles: Should be able to perform, symbolic and ceremonial skills. Should also be one who can direct and monitor the subordinates, through communication and counsel, and be one who can maintain links in information through mail, meetings, and phone calls. 2. Informational roles: Can seek and receives information by maintaining personal contact with stakeholders and scanning periodicals and reports, transmits the information to employees through reports, speeches and memos. 3. Decisional roles: An excellent manager is one who can come up with new ideas and delegate the idea responsibility to other persons. He should be one who can take the necessary action during crisis and disputes among his subordinates, a skilled negotiator who can represent his unit in budget, sales, purchases, and union contracts. Thematically, this paper seeks to show, by use of relevant case examples, how managers can influence successful performance of their organization through the application of the managerial skills discussed above. The three managerial roles will be discussed separately, in order to analyze each of them critically. Interpersonal roles Interpersonal skills are required, in order, for the manager to perform as a figurehead role in the organization, and this is considered to be a leading management function. An organization cannot succeed if the managers cannot direct and monitor their subordinates. In a case example; Intermatic Inc, a company located in spring Grove, Illinois was on the verge of bankruptcy. Jim miller, a former employee, was asked to return as president of the firm. He applied his interpersonal roles that enabled him to restructure the whole firm; he directed his staff and managed to bring the firm back from the edge of bankruptcy to its growth, profitability and survival (Lussier & Achua, 2010). For a manager to have strong interpersonal skills he should be capable of performing the following roles; 1. The figurehead role: Any manager or leader in an organization is capable of performing this role; it includes the caring out of basic tasks such as, presiding at meetings, and signing important documents (Davis, 2006). 2. The leader role: This is the role that influences how most leaders perform all other roles, the tasks that are preformed in this role include tasks like; evaluation of employee performance, coaching and giving instructions, training and hiring new employees (Davis, 2006). 3. The liaison role: The liaison role is involved with the interacting and communicating with people outside the organization, and several tasks that include the developing of relationships, attending of professional meetings, maintaining contact with organizations and other people, and networking (Davis, 2006). Interpersonal skill is an individual’s capability to perform the above roles. In another case example, British airways hired a new board member, and when he started working for the organization, he noted that the company was inefficient, and was wasting a lot of resources. In order to make the organization more profitable, he had to device a way in, which the resources would be used more efficiently. He decided to restructure the whole organization. To begin with, he used his interpersonal skills, and started reducing their workforce by evaluating the employees. To prepare his subordinates mentally, he organized and chaired meetings where he explained the reasons for the restructuring. His skills directed the company through a difficult time that could have been disastrous, had it not been for his skills (Lussier & Achua, 2010). Informational roles These roles involve the acquisition and distribution of information by the manager, and it can be divided into the three basic roles, which manager must play. These include; 1. The monitor role: A good manager with informational skills can perform well in information gathering, and analyzing of the information to discover possible opportunities and problems (Davis, 2006). Information gathering can be done by, reading publications, reports and memos, attending meetings, taking to other people to get updates on the current issues. Other sources of information include the careful observation of competitors. 2. The disseminator role-Once a leader has received all necessary information, he should send the information to the right people he can do this through any of the following methods, telephone, discussions and meetings. He can also choose to use the written media where information can be passed using Email, printed documents or use-handwritten notes (Davis, 2006). 3. The spokesperson role-It is the role of the manger to provide information to people outside the organization. This people include the shareholders who want to be kept updated with the performance of the business among others. It also involves the answering of letters and giving of information to the necessary government authorities when need arises (Davis, 2006). In a case example, of information roles, the managers of Google Company, an organization that owns and manages one of the most popular search engines called Google, obtained and analyzed information about the organization’s employees. Through the use of this information, they were able to decide on how to motivate employees effectively, by adopting a structure where employees can streamline creative ideas, which produce blockbuster new products. They have also started rewarding employees with benefits like allowing them to bring their pets to work, providing a relaxed environment where group thinking is elevated. These organization managers have raised the bar on how the organization can achieve real, raw results (Bryant, 2011). Decisional roles Managers have to make decisions several times in the day; these small decisions can have a significant impact on the organization’s development. Poor decision making can raise chaos in the organization. Hence, the manager has to display skills to prove that he is a principled decision maker, often this is observed in the profitability and development of the organization. Like, in the other roles, the decision-making role can also be fragmented into the following three roles; 1. The disturbance handling role: A skilled manager is capable of taking corrective action during conflict situations or during a crisis. His reaction to unexpected results should be one that reflects positively. 2. Resource allocation rule: A skilled manager should be one who can perform proper budget allocation that aims at increasing the productivity of the organization. 3. Negotiator role: In this context, a skilled manager can be one who can represent the organization in transactions that do not have set boundaries. These three roles make a manager with ethical decision making skills. In all the case examples discussed in the other roles, they all show some form of decision making; in Intermatic Inc Joe miller had some decent decision making skills that enabled him to make all the required changes and uplifted the organization from a downfall. The board member in British airways also had principled decision-making skills that enabled him make the decision, which restructure the whole organization, as well the Google’s managers, who have also displayed ethical decision making skills awarding their employees incentives (Lussier & Achua, 2010). Top leading entrepreneurs have always displayed considerable managerial skills in running their businesses. A skilful leader is always seeking for varied methods of improving the standards and productions of the organization. A manager should always provide consistent support and motivation to the employees this will ensure that the organization gets maximum quality in the performance of the organization (Lussier & Achua, 2010). A manager aims at providing an excellent working environment to the employees. He can only do this if he can observe the employees closely so that he can notice the areas that are demanding improvement. Leader gains credibility if the leader can be seen to have knowledge on the ongoing at the work place in this he displays his informational skills. Having analyzed the roles that a manager has to play in the organization, a manager must apply these skills to the benefit of the organization; the qualities of a skilful manager must correspond to the four functions of management. These functions include planning, influencing, organizing and controlling. In planning and organizing, the manager exercises his interpersonal roles, and in controlling this combines his interpersonal roles with his decision-making roles. The manager of a reputable organization should be a potent planner and all the plans should reflect the goals and objectives of the organization (Davis, 2006). When employing his decisional roles the manager should be ready to face any repercussions that may arise due to the making of a poor decision. The manager should be willing to take calculated risk decisions, in which he can visualize a potential development opportunity, or an opening that could help the organization in attaining their goal. A manager should be able to seek help and advice from people who have sufficient knowledge in a field that is in not acquainted with, this will help the manager make informed decisions. Many are the organizations that have failed in to fulfill their goals because there was the lack of consultation by the managers where consultation was needed (Bryant, 2011). When a manager is applying his informational role, he should ensure that the employees are supplied with current organization information that will enable them do their work correctly. Obtaining of correct information should also be a point of concern for a good manager. The manager should unsure that his sources are trustworthy so that he may not use or act on information that may cause the downfall of the organization. A manger should at last make sure that he communicates and relates to his employees efficiently. A potent manager should be available to attend social gatherings, meetings, and other organizational functions so that he may keep in touch with the outside world (Lussier&Achua, 2010). The manager should be able to head meetings and counsel the employees when the need arises, this will make sure that problems with the employees are addressed swiftly, the manager should always consider the needs, capabilities, and feelings of others, and this ensures the smooth running of the organization to accomplish its targeted goals (Bryant, 2011). Having looked at the three managerial roles in detail, we find out that the fields where a manager should apply them is broad. This case examples, tell us of previous and current situations, which mangers have developed their skills, and apply them in a manner that is helping their organization. Attaining maximum benefits and reducing their expenditure is one of the major goals of most organizations. To attain such goals, an organization has to seek individuals who display excellent interpersonal skills, strong decision making skills, and superb information obtaining skills. This is because, through them, the organization will place their aspirations on and, the same individuals will lead the employees of this organization from the different departments to attain the mission of the organization (Davis, 2006). The race to obtain reliable managers has heated up lately with different organizations forming their own training schools for their manager. The organizations train their managers on how to be excellent managers by gradually instilling the management skills on them; this tactic has ensured that organizations only employ managers in whom the stakeholders of the organization have discovered management skills in. The current economic sensitivity that is evident around the globe has taken many organizations back to the drawing board. These organizations need to re-strategize their management, and ensure that the managers, who are running their departments ape leaders who are charitable to manage the available resources, while at the same time maintaining, or improving the organizations productivity (Lussier & Achua, 2010). Managers should utilize their managerial roles so that the organization’s future may be secure. For superb performance to tale place, resulting in the organization’s success, organizations have to go beyond educational qualifications, industrial experience or technical skills. The recruiters need to identify the situational personality skills that are needed to completer the relevant tasks, and identification of gaps has to be done by comparing what is present in the individual with what is required. From this, the organization can develop appropriate programs that help in reducing the negative effects of the gaps and facilitate suitable performance. Therefore, for an organization to become successful or for it to get on the road to success the organization has to form acceptable recruitment programs, which can hire skilled managers, people who can perform their roles with results that will propel the organization to greater heights. References Bryant A. (March 12, 2011). Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss. Business Day , 1. Davis B. L. (2006). Successful manager's handbook: development suggestions for today's managers. Minneapolis: Personnel Decisions International. Lussier R. N, Achua C. F. (2010). LEADERSHIP:Theory, Aplication, Skill Development. California: cengage Learning. . Read More