Characteristics of a Good Leader and Measurement of Leadership Skills in Workplaces - Literature review Example

Leadership at Workplace Student’s Name: Instructor’s Name: Course Code and Name: Institution: Date Assignment is due: Contents Contents 2 Abstract 2 1.0 Introduction 3 2.0 Characteristics of a good leader 4 2.1 Leadership styles at workplace. 6 2.2 E-leadership in work places. 7 2.3 Leadership and workplace interaction 7 2.4 Leadership approaches in work places 8 2.5 Measurement of leadership skills in workplaces 9 2.6 Poor leadership 10 3.0 Conclusion 11 List of References 14 Abstract There has been increased competition between organizations recently than in the past. The organizations now need leaders to guide and motivate workers in the workplace than in the past. The organizations are hiring leaders to achieve organizational success. There are many reviews that have been carried on the theory of leadership. A number of studies have gone beyond the defining and analyzing the qualities of a leader to more complex details about leadership. 1.0 Introduction The need for strong leaders is one of the most discussed topics at workplace today. There have been a lot of controversies surrounding whether leadership is the same as management. Some people argue that leadership is different from management. Others have gone further and analyzed the difference between leaders and managers (Moment 2007, p.37). According to Moment (2007) argue that managers are task oriented and that there work is only to supervise and direct the work process to obtain the required out come without caring about the workers and their needs. On the other hand, they argue that a leader is fully involved in the whole process (P.37) Different arguments have been put forward on what traits that a leader should have. The literature review discusses the various concepts about leadership at work and gives insight on how these factors affect leadership at work. The study discusses how employees view various aspect of leadership at work. 2.0 Characteristics of a good leader Effective leadership is crucial to an organization success. Whereas different leaders use different approaches when acting in the organization, there are character traits that are similar among the leaders. Leaders should always be aware about how their actions are perceived by their juniors (Moment 2007, p.37). Those people that a leader controls are sometime a reflection of the character traits of the manager. In Aghedei (2008) explains about the “shadow of a leader effect” on how a leader expresses good behavior (p 16). He also shows that if a leader shows positive behavior his juniors are always willing to follow him. Good leaders should mould their followers to be hard working (Weiss, 2000). This improves the productivity at workplaces. Another character trait of good leaders is showing accountability and responsibility. A good leader should be accountable for all actions and out comes that he supervises within the organization (Newcomb 2005, p.36). An organization should have objectives that are measurable and on which a person can be held responsible. This is because there is no accountability and responsibility programs can’t be executed (Hrebianik 2005, p.25) Another quality of a leader is handling failure professionally. Good work place leaders need to know how to handle failure. Newcomb states that “Failure should be a learning experience” and should not be punished as this may cause stress in employees reducing their creativeness (Newcomb 2005, p.25). a good leader should also be able to cope with change. According to Moment (2007) “an organization needs a leader who is able to change with circumstances” in the business environment (p.34). Other characteristics of good leaders include self confidence, energy and persistence, knowledge of his the task, Sociability, need for achievement and charisma (Moment, 2007). These traits are important for leaders to give guidance to the employees. 2.1 Leadership styles at workplace. The style used by the leader in an organization has a great impact on the culture of that organization. It affects the employee behavior, image of the organization and its growth. Cheney & Stohl (2001) suggest that specific leadership styles affect employees differently (p. 354). Dictatorial leadership yields a different response when compared with task oriented style. Bad leadership styles affect the organization negatively by increasing cost through reduced productivity, reducing employee’s motivation and contributing to miscommunication in addition to polluting the working climate (Stohl & Cheney 2001, p. 375) Organizations mostly use e three different leadership styles (Casimir, 2001). These styles are autocratic, transactional and transformational leadership styles. Most of the leaders will combine the three depending on the circumstances in their organization. Autocratic style seeks coercion from the subordinates. These styles prompt that employees should be obedient to the directives given by the leader. This type of style is not ethical and produces negative reactions from the followers (Northouse 2001, p.8). Transactional style of leadership rewards the performance of directives at work. Transactional leadership mostly uses feedback to reward for the good work done (Northouse 2001, p.132). Transformational leadership uses motivation to influence subordinates to perform their duties. Leaders using this style coach and improve the capacity of the employees. According to Northouse (2001) this method shares knowledge and power to improve the subordinates (p. 257). 2.2 E-leadership in work places. Many organizations and the government are using information technology in there day to day operations. These developments started as early as in the year 2003. This is being used to deliver high quality service to customers. Study suggests that E-leadership is very important in the workplace (Drucker 2001, 34). The major issue how people take the opportunity of employees to learn new technology. This is very critical for implementation of organizational goals. Given that most organizations are governed from a top down pattern it is obvious that the organization can only adopt new technology if there leaders in management are tech savvy. E-leadership should combine existing leadership with technology skills. E-leaders will be able to take new opportunities that emerge in technology developments (Drucker 2001, 49). Many leaders in organizations are now tech savvy and do not understand the technology they use to give directions to subordinates. Good leaders should be able to influence their subordinates by providing work place training. An intelligent leader can be able to use the common tools of communication like email and social media. 2.3 Leadership and workplace interaction How a leader communicates with the subordinates is very crucial for smooth running of the workplace. This is because employees view the work according to how the leaders view it. Individuals work differently under leaders who have differing characteristics (Rai & sinha, 2000) according to Rai et.al. Individuals prefer to work under leaders with similar traits as themselves (p. 35). There are many issues that affect how each individual chooses the leader that he wants to work under. The main factors that determine how subordinates interact with the leader are personal characteristics, gender and emotional intelligence. Most subordinates will tend to look at the leadership style of the leader to understand their character traits. Under gender people will tend to favor females as they have transformational leadership style compared to male counter parts. Many leadership roles are also defined as either masculine or feminine task. Gender affects how people interact in terms of how the employees and the leader are judged. Emotional intelligence deals with how leaders are able to manage subordinate with lower emotional intelligence than them. This mostly deals with transformational leadership. 2.4 Leadership approaches in work places There has been a lot of research which has been carried out regarding approaches to leadership and management. The main approach used in workplaces is situational approach. This approach says that the characteristics of a leader cannot be separated from the situation and the subordinates. Many people who have studied leadership attach it to a situation or a context. Edwin Holland was the original reviewer of situational approach and he said that situations require certain thing which may only be fulfilled by various individuals (Moment 2007, p. 38) According to moment (2007) under situation leadership approach a person can be both a follower and a leader depending on his leadership characteristics and the situation. The situational approach underpins the fact that people vary across cultures, regions and companies (p.39). Under the situational approach to leadership we get to more approaches which are consultative and autocratic. Other approaches used by leaders include directive leadership where ground rules are established according to various guidelines, supportive leadership where needs of subordinates are supported, participative leadership where consultations are made and achievement based leadership where goals are set and performance rewarded. The role of a leader is to choose the most appropriate approach depending on the situation, ability of his subordinates and the environment. The ability to choose properly is the foundation of leadership at work places (moment 2007). 2.5 Measurement of leadership skills in workplaces The business environment is changing with time and innovations are developing daily. Increasing the performance of the organization is necessary to be successful. Few organizations have the skill to develop innovations. Therefore, leaders are always to maximize performance of their followers. Various studies have indicated the positive effects of good leadership on productivity, job satisfaction and team work (Avolio & Yammarino 2002 p. 37). its therefore clear that good leadership skills are required to remain relevant in the market. By fact that many organizations invest a lot in the development of their own leaders show that the leaders are very important to the organization. According to Avalio (2002) identification of leader and the manner in which they fit in the organization is a good discovery for the organization. Many organizations consider organizational leadership competency an important part of leadership development process and is used to gauge the level of leadership development. There have been questions that have been raised that the qualities used in measuring the quality of the lack bearing on what is needed in the organization. Another issue that has been raised is that is that there is possibility of selecting leaders from those people with similar qualities as current leaders and leaving others who might be good leaders as well. The third concern is that there is no enough information from research on leadership within the organization. Avalio (2002) argues that there is a lot of concern only on the in ut and output but not the process itself of developing leaders 2.6 Poor leadership Poor leadership has negative impacts on employees. Poor leadership impacts negatively on the interaction of workers and stress levels of an organizations employee (Townsend 2006). Generally employees are who have abusive supervisors do not have job satisfaction and have increased conflicts due to their aggressiveness to supervisors. Poor leadership results from abusive leaders or leaders with little appropriate leadership skills. Abusive leadership occurs in the form of aggression towards employees. According to Townsend (2006) the aggression may be either physical violence for example overworking or non physical in the form of ubiquity of the job (p.460). Passive leadership or lack of leadership may be a source of stress for workers. Passive income is considered to be ineffective. Frost (2003) concluded that Poor leadership results in the stress of employees which affects organization negatively. 3.0 Conclusion This review gives some of the concept of the leadership framework in the context of work place. The review begins with the concept on the characteristics of good leaders it gives insights on some of the basic character traits and behaviors of good workplaces leaders. The conclusion is that these traits are important to be a good leader. The second section gives a range of leadership styles used by leaders in the workplace. There is an agreement that transformation leadership is the best style of leadership. The third concept offers an insight into the new field of E-leadership. The view on e leadership is that leaders need to understand technology to take advantage of new developments. The following section discusses the issue of discussions and interaction in the workplace. The interaction of people in workplaces is based on a number of issues. The section on leadership approaches concludes that consultative approach of leadership is the best. The section on measurement of leadership skills shows that good leadership has a positive impact on organization growth. The review concludes by showing that poor leadership is stressful to workers of an organization and affects them negatively. There have been thinking that a leader is an individual with many skills Personal characteristics of large social conscience. Personal traits are important but they are not enough to exercise good leadership. List of References Avolio, B. J & Yammarino, F. J 2002, Transformational and charismatic leadership: The road ahead. Elsevier Science. Oxford, UK Drucker, P. F 2001, Electronic Governance on Context. In Commonwealth Centre for Electronic Governance 2001, Living and working in the connected world. http://www.electronicgov.net/pubs/research_papers/eged/summary.shtml (Retrieved in august, 2011) Hrebiniak, L. G 2005, Making Strategy Wor, Wharton School Publishing, New Jersey Moment, R 2007, Top 7 Leadership Skills for Business Success http: Top 7 Business: Retrieved 18 august, 2011 http://top7business.com/?Top-7-Leadership-Skills-for-Business- Success&id=3632. Newcomb, K 2005, Transformational Leadership: Four Keys to Help You and You’re Organization, Retrieved 20, August, 2011 from http://www.uregina.ca/cce/assets/docs/pdf/sihl/2008-Becoming-Transformational-Leaders.pdf. Northouse, P. G 2001, Leadership: Theory and practice, Sage.Thousand Oaks, California Rai, S & Sinha, A 2000, Transformational leadership, organizational commitment, and facilitating climate. Psychological Studies, journal on leadership Australia 45(1), 33-42. Stohl, C. Cheney, G 2001, Participatory paradoxical practices: Communication and the dilemmas of organizational democracy. USA:Management Communication Quarterly. Townsend, J 2000, Employee retaliation: The neglected consequence of poor leader-member exchange relations, Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 5 (4), 457–463. Weiss, W 2000, Effective Leadership: What are the Requisites? Supervision, 16(8) Read More