Leadership Challenge: Using Sources of Power Ethically - Research Paper Example

? “Leadership Challenge: Using Sources of Power Ethically” Case Study Analysis By 7th Dec Leadership Challenge: Using Sources of Power Ethically The domain of leadership is vast and multi dimensional. Many studies and researches have been conducted in this area in order to understand the traits and personality of leaders and the power invested in them. ‘Leadership is a complex process that results from the interaction among a leader, followers, and the situation.’ (Nahavandi, 2000) Thus leadership is a group phenomenon, in which the leader exercises this power though actions and the group observe hierarchy either formal or informal within the group. An effective leader exhibits a combination of both in-born traits and skills acquired through experience and biological background. “Leadership style is the combination of traits, skills and behaviours leaders use as they interact with the followers.” (Lussier and Archua, 2010) thus the individual characteristics and traits of the leader depend on two factors: Heredity and Environment. The heredity factor includes the generic composition of the leader along with his biological background. However environment includes the culture, religion, family, location and education etc. The interaction between heredity genes and the environmental forces help build up the leadership characters. The differences in the traits possessed by the leaders arise from the demographics, values, personality and aptitude. ‘Individual behaviour is determined to a great extent by internal elements such as attitudes, personality, perceptions, and ability.’ (Lewis & Goodman et al., 2007) The demographics of the leader includes his background, age and other physical attributes and whereabouts, the values are the long lasting preferences and beliefs, and personality is what makes the leader unique showcasing the different physical and psychological characteristics. Lastly the important individual characteristic is the aptitude of the leader, the natural talent of doing something both mentally and physically. ‘Executives who can effectively focus on others emerge as natural leaders regardless of organizational or social rank.’ (Goleman, 2013) This aptitude cannot be enforced on anyone however skills can be acquired through training. A leader cannot be made through training however new skills can be taught for better and effective leadership. Thus the conventional theories of leadership involve the trait and behavioural theories that focus on the traits as well as the acquired behaviour of the leader also mentioned in the above discussion. The contingency theory brings in the situation and its characteristics into the leadership equation. The test of leadership depends upon the nature of the situation and the success depends upon how well the leader manages the situation at hand. The power and influence theory that will become the main focus of this discussion, focus on the different ways the leaders use their power in order to get things done. All these believes and theories are reflected in the leadership model where the leader has to deal with the personal front involving his set of his abilities and traits, the group where he manages the organization and lastly the public involving the environment and the stakeholders of the leader’s organization. The power of the leader in an organization is vast (see Appendix). A CEO of a large organization has the power to influence the board of directors. He is the sole figure that can change the philosophy of the entire organization. The power of the CEO is to decide how much input he wants from the subordinates and how stringent or relaxed the work hierarchy should be. His expertise in the organization is supposedly more enriched as compared to other employees in the organization. It is this knowledge and official responsibility that gives the CEO the power to control. He is the one who can turn a bad situation to a positive through his influence tactics. For example, Proctor and Gamble (P&G) the consumer giant spent $2bn a year on research and development, as the CEO believes that innovation is the sole force for solving the world’s sustainability challenges. In this case the CEO has used his legitimate power to upgrade the budget of research and development and come up with innovative techniques that will not only solve P&G’s short-term but also long term productivity issues and environmental problems. Another example shows the expert power used by the CEO to solve the company’s problem. The GE Aviation was facing cracks in shafts on its innovative GEnx jet engines. The CEO used the expert knowledge in the aviation engineering and resolved the issue of leaks and cracks in the shaft thus saving a big burden on the company’s budget and image. Exxon Mobile used its CEO’s referent power when he declared that in order to fight the climate changes the use of engineering techniques should be used rather than trying to remove the use of fossil oil. The government and other higher officials took notice of the CEO’s analysis thus proving to be a positive influence for the company. Thus a CEO has to monitor the environmental, ethical and the business environment through the powers he possesses. The corporate scandals can also be resolved though the proactive decision making of the leader. For example, in a pharmaceutical company, the reps are often faced with challenging demands of the company in order to get orders from the doctors regarding their medicines. They are required to send doctors on holidays, conventions and other such events in order to generate sales for their medicine. But all this comes under the umbrella of ethics. How ethical is gifting and influencing the doctors to prescribe the medicine? Many medical reps take it as a part of business and business norm but in reality it comes under the realm of bribery. In this situation the CEO should come as the whole sole in eradicating this norm of the pharmaceutical business culture. Firstly making quality medicines through a higher research and development budget can come through the legitimate power of CEO in increasing the research and development budget of the organization. Secondly the CEO can use his referent power in order to get the medicine noticed in the required social circle. In this the quality of the product and the charisma of the leader i.e. the CEO will do wonders to the sales figures and remove any allegations resulting from corporate scandals. Thus a CEO is the authority and when he used his powers wise and effectively he can save the company from scandals and bring the profit figures and the image of the company to a higher level every year. References: Goleman, D. (2013). The Focused Leader: How Effective Organizations Direct Their Own - & Their Organizations' - Attention. Harvard Business Review, Iss. Dec 2013 54. Lewis, P., Goodman, S., Fandt, P. & Michlitsch, J. (2007). Management. 5th ed. Mason, OH: Thomson/South-Western. Lussier, R. N., & Archua, R. F. (2010). Leadership: Theory, application and skill development. (4 ed., pp. 70-71). Mason: South Western Cengage Learning. Lunenburg, F. (2012). Power and Leadership: An Influence Process. International Journal of Management, Business and Administration, 15 (1), 5. Nahavandi, A. (2000). The art and science of leadership. 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Appendix: (Lunenburg, 2012) Read More