Resolving Leadership Problems - Assignment Example

Running Head: Resolving Leadership Problems Resolving Leadership Problems [Institute’s Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Problem Definition 3 Desired State 3 Consensus and Support 4 Possible Causes 4 Solutions 6 Means of Change 7 Course of Action 7 Constraints and Restraints 7 Plans and Schedules 8 Impacts and Consequences 8 References 10 RESOLVING LEADERSHIP PROBLEMS Problem Definition In the past, organizations were mostly proprietorships and only one or two individuals were responsible for different functions of the business. Nowadays, in this globalized world, the organizations are no longer the responsibility of a single individual and many people work in a single organization resulting in extensive diversity, different mindsets, and varying viewpoints. This has resulted in undoubted need of effective leadership in organizations today. Although leadership was needed in the past as well, however, the need that is today is unexceptional and as the result, many organizations around the world are now facing the complex problem of creating and acquiring leaders to take the most difficult decisions and ensure success of their organizations. For this report, the paper will consider case study of ABC organization that has been able to ensure its survival in the corporate world. ABC was one of the manufacturing firms until 2012; however, in June 2013, the company’s CEO resigned away, and since then, there has been a gap in terms of leadership in the company. The owners tried bringing in new CEO in the company but it is not working the way it used to be during the time of previous CEO. The employees are suddenly unhappy about their work and there have been issues regarding decision-making in the firm. Now the owners have decided to resolve this issue by June 2014 and for that, they desire the following state of the company: Desired State Analysis of company’s records has indicated that the ABC Company was making US$4 million on quarterly basis until 2012; however, since after quarter of January to March 2013, the company has been making only US$2 million on average. Owners of the company desire to bring back company sales to at least US$3.5 million by September 2014. In addition, there have been various conflicts regarding decision-making and owners would like to see satisfied employees in the company that will ensure long-term success of the company. Besides increment in sales and employee satisfaction, owners of the company have also expressed their desire to ensure sustainability of leadership in the company for the future. Consensus and Support In order to resolve any complex problem whether it be a problem related to resolving leadership problems or a problem related to reforming education, it is very imperative that change agents ensure consensus (Kaufman, Oakley-Browne, Watkins, & Leigh, 2003) at the time of problem identification, as well as at the time of deciding its solution. Unfortunately, sometimes, change agents try to employ their tested solutions at an organization without understanding differences in context and without acquiring consensus of the stakeholders and that result in chaos and failure. In this regard, in this case study, the very first step will be to bring all the stakeholders on board, which will enable the team to ensure consensus and support during this problem-solving task. For this purpose, the team has decided to involve current CEO, department heads, managers, representative of employees, owners, as well as consumers and customers that will play a crucial role in informing the team about possible causes of the problem and subsequently, contextual solutions of the problem. Possible Causes There are different ways to look at different problems (Kaufman, Oakley-Browne, Watkins, & Leigh, 2003). On one hand, team could have assumed different things and would have identified causes accordingly. On the other hand, opportunity-engineering approach (Kaufman, Oakley-Browne, Watkins, & Leigh, 2003) inclined the team to resolve this leadership problem from a different angle. For this purpose, the team firstly identified the target audience that included primarily employees and the employers, and selected targeted sample of 10%, which were involved in surveys and focus group discussions. Involvement of employees in surveys and group discussions allowed the team to acquire trust and ownership of the employees in this attempt to resolve the leadership problem at the ABC Company and this approach facilitated the team in understanding ground realities of the organization. Some of the major elements included in the survey and focus group discussions were related to factors that matter the most to employees in terms of their satisfaction. In addition, some elements were related to the behavior and attitude of previous and current leadership of the organization. Moreover, workplace environment and remuneration packages were also part of the survey that allowed the team to look at the complex problem from different perspectives. One of the most common identified causes of this leadership problem was autocratic style of the new leadership that was completely opposite to previous leadership that was more democratic and inspirational according to the employees and managers who were not satisfied with current leadership of the company. According to them, the new leadership was only imposing decisions on them and wanted perfect results; however, the previous leadership used to acquire their perception regarding an issue and then used to come up with a decision that was motivational and acceptable to the employees. Besides leadership autocracy, some of the employees complained that there has been biasness and favoritism in the company nowadays in terms of employee promotion that has been another reason of lack of employee satisfaction in the organization. Briefly, the team identified a major communication gap between employers and the employee during the problem assessment and evaluation phase of this problem-solving task. The team carried out a few sittings with the chief executive officer of the organization and came to know several surprising factors that were the causes of the great communication gap between employer and the employees. The team came to know that the CEO was an Asian whereas majority of employees were either Americans or Europeans. In addition, the CEO was only working based on his pre-conceptions given to him by past members of the organization and therefore, he was running the organization on trial and error basis. Solutions One of the easier solutions to resolve this problem was to bring a new CEO in the company and allow him/her to take on the company from now on; however, this could have resolved the problem on short-term basis and might have resulted in similar problem in a more complicated manner in the future. For this purpose, the team decided to find out the solution from the inside rather than going outside the organization to resolve it. Moreover, the team carried out a system analysis, and particularly, methods-means analysis (Kaufman, Oakley-Browne, Watkins, & Leigh, 2003) that allowed evaluation of different alternatives in terms of their advantages and disadvantages, and this enabled a comparative evaluation on macro and micro level. After evaluating various alternatives, the team along with the organization’s stakeholders came to an understanding that although the previous CEO had inspirational and charismatic leadership qualities; however, he was managing the organization based on his personal skills. In addition, there was no efforts made for second-line leadership as well as there was an absence of any performance management system that came out to be the perfect solution. Means of Change This called for a needs assessment and readiness assessment in the organization that allowed the team to identify the technological and human resource expertise required for the introduction of performance management system in the organization. The team also identified need of trainings for the employees, as well as for the managers and the employers to understand different aspects of the performance management system. Every technical, human resource, as well as cultural aspect was considered before introduction of the new system in the company. Course of Action A supervision team involving managers and employees was formed that was responsible for ensuring coordination and collaboration during the planning, testing, and implementation phases of the solution. A company with an expertise in performance management systems was given the contract to train the employees and carry out the process along with the supervision team. Constraints and Restraints One of the major constraints was the financial one as the new performance management system called for a major investment in the organization and that was not supported earlier by one of the owners of the organization. Another restraint was lack of technological expertise of a few employees of the company that lengthened duration of the whole process. As the result, a few employees did not like the idea of introducing a new system and were not able to understand the relevance of the solution with their initial complaint regarding leadership problem in the organization. Some of them complained that we as a team were not able to understand their real problem that was of the leadership and not anything else. However, it took time to make them understand that today, leadership has not remained a personality trait only but it has become a paradigm that can be learnt by anyone with the help of few tools and strategies. The solution in the form of an effective performance management system will allow the CEO to monitor performance of each and every member of the organization just by few clicks and that will also help me in identifying and resolving issues at the very moment. Plans and Schedules # Task Name Date Date Date Date Date Date Date Date Date Date 1 Consultation with Owners Jan 2014 2 Problem identification & consultation with company employees Jan 2014 3 Survey & Focus Group Discussions Jan 2014 4 Data Analysis Feb 2014 5 Contract to the IT firm Feb 2014 6 Training of Employees Feb 2014 7 System Testing period Mar 2014 8 Feedback and implementation phase Mar 2014 9 Post-solution survey and focus group discussions Apr 2014 10 Overall Analysis Apr 2014 Impacts and Consequences Although few members of the organization were unable to understand the direct relevance of the solution with the identified problem, however, only after a month of system implementation, there was evident alteration in perspective of employees and managers regarding benefit of the solution. Nowadays, employers are not able to monitor the performance of every employee due to larger size of the organizations. As the result, such technologies help good managers in becoming good leaders and that is what happened in the ABC organization. The CEO was able to track performance of the employees and consequently, he was confidently remaining in contact with them. Moreover, the solution also enabled the company to document performances and sales of the organization in detail and that helped decision-makers in taking effective and efficient decisions with consensus. Conclusively, the team was able to resolve the complex problem of leadership in the ABC Company. References Kaufman, R., Oakley-Browne, H., Watkins, R., & Leigh, D. (2003). Strategic Planning for Success: Aligning people, performance, and payoffs. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley. ISBN: 978-0-787-96503-7. Read More