Developing Leadership in the Travel Industry - Literature review Example

Developing Leadership Introduction The biggest difference between 21st century and the 20th century leadership has to do mainly with the different challenges leaders face. Some of challenges for 21st century leaders include unreasonable customer expectations, shifts in generational attitudes, the effects of the web and social media, increasingly flexible working and contracts, and sustainability challenges (Sobel & Reilly, 2010: p39). Leadership in the travel industry has been especially affected by the challenges of the 21st century, specifically as most organisations in the industry have had to switch from functional work teams to cross-functional, market-based virtual teams in order to better integrate functions that are important for customer responsiveness. ICT advances have offered new opportunities to build and lead virtual teams in the travel industry. These teams consist of workers who are located far from one another, possess unique skills, and must cooperate and collaborate to complete important tasks in the organisation. In the establishment, maintenance and support of virtual teams in this industry, leaders face various challenges including building cohesion, trust and team identity, and ensuring employees are not isolated (Sobel & Reilly, 2010: p39). They also face challenges in the selection of team members with the right interpersonal and technical abilities and skills needed work in the virtual environment, as well as in the evaluation of their performance. Leadership Challenges in Virtual Organisations in the Travel Industry Virtual organisations pose unique challenges for leaders in the travel industry, including cultural issues, setup and maintenance costs, lack of trust between team members, and isolation of team members. These challenges could result in productivity problems and communication issues. Virtual organisation leadership demands a new approach, requiring the evaluation of disadvantages and advantages of non-traditional operations, as well as leadership competencies needed to manage at a virtual level (Camarinha-Matos et al., 2012: p40). In travel organisations facing growth and resource restrictions, which involve organisational evolution to a virtual environment of a cross-functional nature, being an agent for change, and interpersonal skills are crucial leadership skills. Failure to lead the organisation through the virtual working challenges and to adopt a new structure of the organisation poses significant risk to the organisation. The complexities facing leadership in the virtual organisation are supported by research, which suggests various challenges contributing as social influences that make the leadership of virtual teas difficult (Camarinha-Matos et al., 2012: p42). Virtual organisations in the international travel industry face language barriers, which reduce the travel agents’ opportunities for information communication, as well as differences in the interpretation of context in high-context cultures such as Southern European, Arabian, and Asian cultures, against low-context cultures such as Australian, American, German, and Swiss cultures (Pauleen, 2013: p58). The leader of such an organisation also has to deal with perception differences regarding what they cannot see in virtual communications, since they can only perceive what they can see. Moreover, differences in how team members in the virtual team perceive status and the decision-making hierarchy are also a challenge to leaders of virtual organisations. Different company cultures and cultural differences when the travel organisation has to use global consultants and vendors pose a unique challenge, especially regarding negotiations (Pauleen, 2013: p58). Finally, the travel industry leader also faces a challenge with regard to time zone differences and confusion in virtual communications. Virtual teams are also more difficult to manage for leaders with communication effectiveness facing numerous hindrances, especially regarding overemphasis of information and data, unidirectional communication, and lack of sufficient face-to-face interaction (Lee, 2014: p42). Implications of the Virtual Organisation for Leading and Negotiating in the Travel Industry To meet the strategic imperatives resulting from the virtual organisation, leaders in the travel industry should seek to enhance individual empowerment, free-flowing information, organisational change, and relationship networks within the organisation (Fong, 2010: p56). In order to be effective in a virtual environment that is undergoing change, specifically regarding improvisational attention, some leadership styles should be avoided and others embraced. In the virtual travel organisation, an autocratic leadership style would be counterproductive, especially since the leader needs to feel that they have a say in the team’s circumstances and organisation, as well as in the decision-making process. Servant-led leadership styles may also prove ineffective in the location challenges facing virtual organisations, since team-building communication between leadership and team members could be unnecessary due to the leader’s approach of ‘taking care of business’ to leadership. Contingent reward leadership, while effective in managing simple organisational or administrative tasks, may not be as effective for building a cohesive team. Finally, although charismatic leadership is inspiring, virtual leaders would be at odds with realities regarding time-consuming activities of task coordination, team retention, and team administration (Fong, 2010: p56). Morrison and Cooper-Thomas (2013: p61) identify relationship-oriented leadership as effective for virtual leadership. Because relationships in the virtual travel organisation must be maintained across time and space, the situation requires an outstanding communicator and one who is willing to entertain and learn new media of communications. Indeed, effective transformational leaders should embrace innovation to lead and manage their teams. In dispersed teams faced with changes, a leadership style that balances transformational and transactional approaches may also be effective. On the transactional side, the virtual leader would work to ensure that they address administrative matters, that they deal with issues that individual team members cannot, and that they optimise tasks relative to overall efficiency and workflow (Morrison & Cooper-Thomas, 2013: p62). On the transformational side, the leader would embrace suggestions and ideas from team members for improvement, facilitate the flow and exchange of new ideas between the virtual team members, and effect the appropriate change in the team. Kisielnicki (2012: p51) notes that specific styles of leadership work best in the virtual organisation in maximising work-climate morale and organisational performance, identifying achievement-oriented leaders as people who maintain a strong focus on tasks, while setting challenging goals for the organisation. However, although this type of leader would be more effective than relationship-oriented and power-oriented leaders in the virtual organisation, lack of sound communication may still be challenging in ensuring optimum organisational performance. Combining transformational leadership and enhanced attention to design of the organisation, on the other hand, will promote and develop a set of common values and beliefs, enhancing a more effective and consistent work climate and corporate culture in the virtual organisation. As a result, they can motivate the organisation to achieve improved levels of performance within and between the teams (Kisielnicki, 2012: p52). This would set the stage for transformation to allow improved work productivity and deep structural changes without sacrificing longevity and morale. The trait leadership theory, on the other hand, would focus on identifying different personality characteristics linked to effective virtual organization leadership (Northouse, 2013: p33). In this case, there are several categories of effective skills in the leadership for virtual teams. One of them is that the leader must communicate effectively, while also using the most relevant technology required for specific situations. Moreover, the virtual leader has to possess effective leadership skills in building a community that is based on mutual respect, trust, affiliation, and trust among the different members of the virtual team. In addition, the leader should be effective in establishing inspiring and clear shared vision, purpose, expectations, and goals across the virtual team, while also collaborating or collaborating across boundaries of the virtual organization (Dessler, 2011: p29). Finally, the virtual leader should lead by example through a focus on measurable and visible results. With regard to negotiations, the virtual leader in the travel industry must appreciate cultural diversity, especially as globalisation increases the diversity of people working virtually towards the same goals (Milhauser, 2011: p33). The virtual leader must understand economic and legal differences, along with behavioural and social differences that are an inseparable part of negotiations involved in the management of a virtual organisation. International and multicultural relationships during negotiations have to be attentively managed to ensure broad success, especially if the travel organisation is involved in foreign expansion. For instance, a travel agency leader based in the UK and operating services in the Middle East should appreciate the importance of religion in how organisations negotiate and behave (Milhauser, 2011: p34). Moreover, the leader should also appreciate the importance of being timely during negotiations, as well as how gifts are perceived by the specific culture. Conclusion Organisational change as a result of virtual teams in today’s global travel industry has been revolutionary in nature, requiring leaders to institute deep structural changes that could, in turn, influence the work climate and culture of organisations. As a result, transformational leadership is the best style of leadership for leading virtual organisations, particularly since it provides the leader with mechanisms to enhance job performance, morale, and motivation that may suffer as a result of geographical separation of team members. The transformational leader can connect the team members’ sense of identity to the team and to the organisation by inspiring them to take charge of their work. Moreover, the transformational leader can align the team members with tasks that enable them to enhance performance. References Camarinha-Matos, L., Afsarmanesh, H. & Ollus, M. (2012). Virtual organizations: Systems and practices. New York: Springer. Dessler, G. (2011). Management: Leading people and organizations in the 21st century. Upper Saddle River, N.J: Prentice Hall. Fong, M. W. L. (2010). E-collaborations and virtual organizations. Hershey: IRM Press. Kisielnicki, J. (2012). Modern organizations in virtual communities. Hershey, PA: IRM Press. Lee, M. R. (2014). Leading virtual project teams: Adapting leadership theories and communications techniques to 21st century organizations. Boca Raton: Auerbach Publications. Milhauser, K. L. (2011). Distributed team collaboration in organizations: Emerging tools and practices. Hershey, PA: Business Science Reference. Morrison, R. L. & Cooper-Thomas, H. D. (2013). Relationships in organizations: A work psychology perspective. Northouse, P. G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and practice. Los Angeles: SAGE. Pauleen, D. (2013). Virtual teams: Projects, protocols and processes. Hershey, PA: Idea Group Pub. Sobel, L. K. & Reilly, R. R. (2010). Leading the virtual workforce: How great leaders transform organizations in the 21st century. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley. Read More