Target Areas for Further Professional Development - Essay Example

People and leadership - Individual learning and reflection report & Individual Assignment Table of contents Part A - Individual learning and reflection report 1.0 Competency Achievement Report 3 1.1 Competency development summary 3 1.2 Competency development per Knowledge Area 3 1.2.1 Stakeholder Management 3 1.2.2 Business awareness 3 1.2.3 Develop business relationships 4 1.2.4 Motivating others 4 1.2.5 Build the team 5 1.3 Target areas for further professional development 5 1.4 Summary 5 2.0 Reflective Learning Report 6 2.1 Status before the course 6 2.2 Status after the course 6 2.3 Material of learning 6 3.0 Commentary on team performance 7 4.0 Personal Professional Improvements 7 Part B – Individual Assignment – Future and Future trend of the Leadership 7 References 13 Part A - Individual learning and reflection report 1.0 Competency Achievement Report 1.1 Competency development summary Through the semester my competency in relation to this unit has been highly developed. Reference should be made primarily to my ability to manage stakeholders and my potential to be creative and to communicate. In addition, the course has gave me the chance to test my self in regard to the arrangement and the monitoring of teams the members of which have been relied on me in order to develop specific tasks and to check performance. In the future the above competencies could be further developed under the terms that lessons learned so far are carefully reviewed, as of their implications, so that mistakes are avoided and appropriate criteria are used when having to take emergent decisions. 1.2 Competency development per Knowledge Area 1.2.1 Stakeholder Management In the context of business environment, stakeholders are considered as those persons who are able ‘to affect an organization’s strategic direction’ (Phillips 2011, p.2). The above description of stakeholders is incorporated in the stakeholder theory of Freeman (Phillips 2011). Through my participation in the course I was able to review different aspects of stakeholder management, including ‘the market and non-market forces of a business’ (Weiss 2008, p.41); the ethical framework and the political environment in which a business operates are examples of issues incorporating in stakeholder management, as part of the particular course. 1.2.2 Business awareness During the course I had the chance to review and face common business problems, such as funding, risk management and, especially, human resource management. In this way I understood the challenges that each business has to face in real market terms and the solutions that could be possibly available for covering the relevant business needs. 1.2.3 Develop business relationships When referring to business environment, a series of relationships need to be carefully managed; the employee relations, i.e. the relationship between the employer and the employees but also the relationship between employees, as members of the organization, are the most critical example of business relationships (Davies and Brundrett 2010). By understanding these relations, through my participation in the course, I have been able to realize the role of employees in the achievement of business objectives and the strategies that an employer could use for improving his leadership skills. 1.2.4 Motivating others During the course I had the chance to learn critical theories used for increasing motivation in businesses. Reference can be made, as for example, to the ‘X and Y theories of McGregor but also to the Expectancy theory on motivation’ (Beel 2007, p.17). So far, my experience on motivating others was limited to the provision of personal views/ suggestions for increasing performance. Because of the course I realized the criteria on which such suggestions should be based, so that they are feasible and able to attract the interest of others. Within a business motivating others can be quite difficult since each employee has different perceptions on organizational needs while his skills can be highly differentiated from those of other employees (Thompson 2013). 1.2.5 Build the team The learning of important theories for building and managing teams has been a key part of the course. Reference can be made in particular to the Belbin theory in the context of which team roles can be distinguished in eight categories (Bess 2009, p.17). By learning the characteristics of these roles I was able to understand the approaches that would be most appropriate for building effective teams and the criteria on which the assignment of tasks to the members of each team should be based. I also realized that the management of a team can be related to a series of issues, such as the understanding of the cultural background of team members (Halverson and Tirmizi 2008) and the identification of effective methods for assessing the performance of the team, at personal and at group level (Basu 2009). Through the course I made practice both on self-assessment, i.e. the personal assessment using a questionnaire, and the team assessment, when the members of a team are asked to evaluate the performance of other team members (Basu 2009, p.301). 1.3 Target areas for further professional development In addition to the above competencies I would still need help in regard to my communication skills, especially in regard to business environment, and creativity, as this personal competence is quite valuable when having to deal with plans that need to enhance the uniqueness of the business, so that business competitiveness in its industry is secured. 1.4 Summary By practicing on the application of business – related theories, as this practice was extensive during the course, I have been able to increase my awareness of daily business problems. Improving certain skills, such as communication and creativity, would be necessary for ensuring effectiveness if having to work in a real business environment where the time available for responding to emergent problems can be quite limited. 2.0 Reflective Learning Report 2.1 Status before the course Before the course my problem solving skills have been at rather low level. In fact, I had difficulties in locating the key causes of a problem so that an appropriate solution is retrieved. In addition, I had no experience on workplace-related issues. The course included a Work-based learning scheme (Alderman and Milne 2005) through which students were given the chance to face problems that tend to appear in daily business operations. 2.2 Status after the course After the course my competences in regard to people management have been significantly increased. Emphasis should be given on my potentials to understand and value the needs of others, to motivate them and the build teams that can enhance business performance. My awareness of the challenges and the actual needs of businesses has been also increased, a fact that has made me more competent in managing business relations, such as the stakeholder relations and the employee relations, as developed in a real business environment. 2.3 Material of Learning During the course I learned critical business theories, especially those related to people management, such as the ‘performance mentoring’ (Brockbank and Mcgill 2012, p.14) which focuses on setting goals that are feasible, based on the skills of each individual, and the ‘systemic approach’ (Brockbank and Mcgill 2012, p.16) which sets the basis for the alignment of business needs with the social environment in which the business operates. Most important, through the course I had access to experiential learning, in the context of which material related to business, such as business journals and reports, is used as a core part of the learning process (Moon 2013). 3.0 Commentary on team performance At this point, it would be quite important to explain my experiences as a member of a team. In total, they were parts of team working that could be characterized as successful, such as: the understanding of the level of each member’s powers, the exchange of information/ knowledge and the participation in common activities, such as the preparing of time schedule and the distribution of tasks. However, there were also problems, especially in regard to communication and trust. Team performance would be higher if the members were given the chance to take initiatives and to be creative instead of following strictly the guidelines of the team leader. 4.0 Personal Professional Improvements In regard to the issues discussed above my personal needs for professional improvements would be described as follows: I would need more practice in managing teams and in developing plans for improving business relations, meaning especially the employee relations but also the relations of a business with its stakeholders. The involvement in more schemes based on experiential learning and on Work-based learning could significantly help me to increase my competences in the above fields. Part B – Individual Assignment - Future and Future trend of the Leadership In the context of the modern market leadership has a critical role: it controls all forces developed in the macro and micro organizational environment so that the performance of businesses is kept at high levels. Moreover, through effective leadership the resources required for all business operations are secured and conflicts between the members of each organization are resolved early without severely affecting the performance of the organization. However, current business environment is characterized by strong turbulences; at the same time, technological advances are quite rapid while customer trends tend to change periodically, under the pressure of strong competition. Under such conditions leadership needs to be transformed. The literature developed in this field has revealed the need for the development of new leadership approaches so that the achievement of business objectives, in all industries, is made easier. The future of leadership is discussed in this paper. Emphasis is given to critical trends of leadership as these trends could be highly expanded in the future. Reference is made, for example, to the promotion of vertical development and the potential use of leadership for responding to the needs of groups of people, rather than for serving the interests of the leader. The involvement of leadership in the vertical development of a business is considered as one of the most important trends of leadership; this trend is considered to become stronger in the future (Petrie 2014). Within an organization, the use of leadership for enhancing vertical development should be based on an appropriately customized plan; the vertical integration model is commonly used in the above case for covering the relevant organizational needs (Rothwell et al. 2010). The specific model aims to help managers to identify plans that can respond to the needs of a series of trends in the business environment; these trends can vary and can be effectively addressed if specific HR practices are introduced (Rothwell et al. 2010). The HR plans that could be suggested for responding to specific trends within the business environment can very, covering many HR functions of the organization, including ‘staffing, development and rewardings’ (Rothwell et al. 2010, p.128). In any case, the vertical development of a business is expected to be gradual, depending on the competence of the leader involved, and to be based on particular rules, according to the type of organizational activities (Rothwell et al. 2010). An example of a vertical development plan, as supported by leadership, is presented in the graph in Figure 1 below. Figure 1 – Vertical development & Leadership (source: RQ Genesis 2014) According to Scala et al. (2013) not all leaders are able to respond to the needs of vertical development; rather, only the leaders who are appropriately skilled and who can identify solutions in difficult organizational problems are more able to support a vertical development scheme (Scala et al. 2013). The potential of the individual to secure his development in the workplace is considered as another major trend of modern leadership (Petrie 2014). By offering to its leader ‘increased development ownership’ (Fulmer and Conger 2013, p.9) a business can secure growth, even in the long term. In the context of the above practice, a leader is able ‘to control the terms of his succession’ (Fulmer and Conger 2013, p.9), a fact that allows him, also, to monitor the effects of his strategic options. In this way, improvements/ alterations could be suggested, where necessary, for eliminating phenomena of unfairness among employees/ followers (Fulmer and Conger 2013). In the past, leadership was characterized by the participation of a particular individual, the leader, in all the critical decisions of an organization (Holbeche 2010). Today, this trend has been differentiated: emphasis is given to the potential of all people within an organization to take part in the decision making process (Holbeche 2010). Such leadership, being characterized as collective, could be described as ‘the capacity of all organizational members to respond to the needs of their critical tasks’ (Holbeche 2010, p.119). From a similar point of view Wu (2013) noted that collective leadership serves a particular organizational need: the need for leadership decisions to be appropriately checked and verified, as of their appropriateness for a particular organizational problem, by all members of the organization, i.e. not just by the leader of the organization. However, in order for collective leadership to be an important business tool it is necessary for the organizational staff to be adequately skilled in order to respond to the needs of such practice (Wu 2013). It is implied that only in organizations were staffing is carefully monitored in all its phases collective leadership would be feasible. It should be noted that collective leadership cannot be based on part of the organizational staff, meaning that it requires the participation of all employees (Scala et al. 2013). However, in this case, the following risk exists: those members of the organization who are not able to meet the challenges of their position they could not support a collective leadership scheme; instead, they could cause severe organizational damages, if they would pursue other organizational members to come to a decision which is inappropriate for a specific organizational issue (Scala et al. 2013). In any case, the collective leadership verifies the importance of leadership decisions for the performance of each organization: because of their role in organizational survival and development leadership decisions should not be based exclusively on the view of one person, the leader, but they should be rather taken after considering the view of several members of each organization (Wu 2013). In this way, two, key targets are achieved: a) Equality and fairness is promoted within the organization and b) the accuracy of leadership decisions is increased at the level that the decision has been taken based on the views on a series of persons; in this way the chances for severe failures are minimized (Wu 2013). On the other hand, even if efforts are made in an organization for stabilizing the level of organizational performance, it is possible for the relevant plan to be led to a failure. This implication could possibly appear in cases that the organizational leader refuses to participate in programs and schemes for developing his existing skills or for acquiring additional skills (Mobley et al. 2011). The refusal of leaders to participate in such schemes has been often related to the lack of an interest theme or the lack of mechanisms/ equipment to transfer the relevant knowledge instantly; the emphasis on innovation when designing and implementing these plans could attract more leaders, especially if the features/ benefits added are unique or of exceptional value (Mobley et al. 2011). From a similar point of view Bush (2012) supported that innovation in leadership developed can be secured only if emphasis is given to three aspects of leadership: ‘knowledge, experiences and evaluation’ (Bush 2012, p.94). In addition, the promotion of innovation in regard to leadership should be secured using different approaches, such as the use of notebooks, for keeping notes on processes, the use of specific phrases/ words, the continuous update of IT systems so that they are able to support the new features of IS systems and so on (Bush 2012, p.142). At this point, reference should be made to the following fact: in regard to leadership innovation is not standardized; leadership practices that would be considered as appropriate for a particular organizational problem could be differentiated among firms according to the conditions in the business environment, the leadership style and the past experiences of leaders, as of a similar organizational issue (Bush 2012). At the same time, the promotion of innovation in regard to leadership development may require the involvement of stakeholders, such as the community, or the retrieval of additional resources for one or more organizational departments (Bush 2012). Also, innovation, if supported for a leadership development scheme, may not produce its results instantly but it may takes a long period of time, depending on the business environment, especially the level of competition and the availability of resources (Morse and Bush 2008). The future trends of leadership, as presented above, cannot secure the quality of leadership decisions. However, these trends can help leaders to realize their weaknesses and to proceed to update/ change of their decisions in case that unexpected conditions appear in the business environment. It should be also noted that additional trends, as related to leadership, can always appear in the future since leadership, as a framework, is quite vague and cannot be limited as of its elements or role (Morse and Bush 2008). Moreover, if a leader is now willing to support one or more trends of leadership, as described earlier, then the involvement of the leader in critical business decisions should be reviewed. In such cases, a collective leadership approach would be rather use for securing the credibility and appropriateness of a critical leadership decision and for eliminating the chances for severe organizational damages. References Alderman, B. and Milne, P. (2005) A Model for Work-Based Learning. Lanham: Scarecrow Press. Basu, R. (2009) Implementing Six Sigma and Lean. London: Routledge. Beel, J. (2007) Project Team Rewards: Rewarding and Motivating Your Project Team. Scotts Valley: Jöran Beel. Bess, T. (2009) Characteristics of an Effective Administrative Leadership Team. 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