Organizational Behavior and Leadership - Essay Example

Organizational behavior and leadership February 18, Organizational behavior and leadership Human resources, unlike other resources in organizations, have psychological characteristics that require motivation towards efficiency and effectiveness. Leadership scope involve influencing people to achieving objectives and therefore play a significant role in organizational set ups. Different leadership styles exist with distinct characteristics that offer diversified potential of influence. A corporation has undergone a transition under its current Chief Executive Officer, Executive A, who is about to retire. The officer has improved the organization’s profitability and stock prices the corporation’s attained success is attributed to his leadership traits. Leader B and leader C are senior members of the organization with chances of succeeding Executive A. Leadership styles of the three leaders Executive A Executive A is a level five leader. The leadership style integrates features of transformational and transactional leadership styles and focuses on an organization’s long term objectives while shifting focus from the leader. The leader therefore motivates and empowers people to achievement of collective objectives and defines rules to guide people in their designated roles. Rewards or penalty may follow this and integration of features of transformational and transactional leadership may be situational of hybrid. Executive A’s driven and ambitious state identifies transformational features towards inspiration and motivation of followers while his high level focus indicates transactional trait of adherence to guidelines. The leader also shifts focus from him to the organization by attributing success to other leaders. His ability to accept responsibility for mistakes and his role in developing leaders further identifies transformational trait. The executive therefore has the traits of a level five leader (Phillips and Gully, 2011). Leader B Leader B identifies with transactional leadership style. One of the features of the style is a contingent reward system in which the leaders establishes standards for followers and uses the standard for appraisal and reward. Employees who meet the set standards receive reward while those who do not may either not be rewarded or may be penalized for failure. The leaders also believed in routine operation and does not emphasize on employees’ innovation and growth. From this perspective, performance is based on set instructions and not on an organization’s overall objectives. The leader therefore becomes active when employees deviate from expectations. In leader B’s approach to leadership, clarification of roles to be performed and goal definition are the pillars and means that employees should operate under their stipulated roles. Guiding followers along the outlined roles and goals also identifies with the restrictive scope of transactional leadership style. The leader also focuses on bureaucracy, a scope that restricts employees to their positions in an organization and their delegated duties. His follower is also personally liable for a delegated task and is rewarded for success in the task but may be punished for failure. These beliefs and approaches emanate from transactional leadership theory (Phillips and Gully, 2011). Leader C Leader C is a transformational leader. Transformational leadership style focuses empowerment and motivation of followers towards desired objectives. The leader’s interest is to generate followers’ potentials beyond the perceived level by the followers. In the leadership scope, a leader creates an environment in which people can grow and assume responsibilities. The style allows for deviation from status quo into challenging initiatives for followers with the leader playing a mentor role. Values and approaches of leader C identify him with the transformational leadership style. The leader values visions and goals but allows followers a level of freedom in which they can pursue self interest towards the organization’ objectives. The leader’s idea that inspiring people can improve their output is also consistent with transformational leadership’s motivational aspects. In addition, the leader believes in the influence of developed and acculturated vision among employees as opposed to enforcement of rules for performance. Setting of high standards and associating it with pride also identifies focus on inspiration on employees. The leader also engages in activities with the followers and his role in problem solving illustrates this (Phillips and Gully, 2011). Possible effects of the leadership style of leader B Leader B has a transactional leadership style whose features have benefits and limitations on the organization, should the leader succeed Executive A. The leader would introduce a more bureaucratic system in the organization that will ensure accurate implementation of plans. Establishing standards with rewards and punishment provision is also likely to ensure that employees meet the organizations’ set objectives and standards. Employees would most likely limit their input to placed standards but work to achieve the minimum levels. Employees’ level of satisfaction and creativity may however reduce. Consequently, the organization’s performance would be limited to set objectives. Focus on shirt term objectives may also threaten the organization’s long-term objectives. Strict punishment on employees for failing to achieve set standards, even when organizational factors, such as management and operational inefficiencies, may also demoralize employees, cause turnover and threaten the organization’s output level (Phillips and Gully, 2011). Possible effects of the leadership style of leader B Leader C has transformational leadership style and his appointment to succeed the Executive A has great potentials for the organization and its employees. The leader is likely to create an environment that facilitates creativity and innovation and while this would improve employee’s self worth in the organization, the organization would be more productive through product diversification and product quality that would improve its unit profit margin and cumulative profits. The leader would also facilitate personal growth among employees, a factor than would establish the organization’s sustainability because of developed leaders through mentorship roles of the transformational leader. Leader C is also likely to improve efficiency among employees and the organization’s structure through his participation in problem identification and resolution. This would save time and resources that would otherwise be lost if employees were to identify and resolve the problems. The leader’s wider scope of knowledge than those of employees, as well as ability to involve experts in problem identification and solution explains this (Phillips and Gully, 2011). Conclusion Executive A has level 5 leadership style while leader B has transactional leadership style and leader C has transformational leadership style. Appointing leader C, to succeed Executive A would be the better option for the organization because the leader offers many benefits to the organization and its employees that the benefits that leader B promises. Further, leader B may induce limitations in the organization, unlike leader A. Reference Phillips, J. and Gully, S. (2011). Organizational behavior: Tools for success. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning. Read More