Leadership Styles in Contemporary Clinical Practice - Essay Example

Leadership Styles in Contemporary Clinical Practice Name: College: Course; Tutor: Date: Leadership Styles in Contemporary Clinical Practice Leadership style has been proved to be one of the major factors in determining the success of a health organization. Use of various leadership styles has been found to be more effective in various situations. Effective health care leaders are generally consistent in the mode on which they influence the behavior of a health organization or a group. Most of managers’ behavior is too complex to be elaborated by a single leadership style. Managers normally modify their leadership styles in order to match a prevailing situation. There are generally three types of leadership styles which are adopted by managers and leaders. These leadership styles include bureaucratic, participative and situational. Each of the three leadership styles has its own rationale to be applied (Cubero, 2007, p.351). Bureaucratic leadership style is where a manager or leader utilizes policies and procedures to influence the performance of his/her followers. In this regard, health leaders utilizing this leadership style must refer to organizational policies, procedures or contact other leaders in high level in order to make a decision. Such health manager is usually more of a policeman than a leader since he/she enforces rules and policies of the health organization (Cubero, 2007, p.352). The rationale of using this leadership style is that, it is more effective in various situations within a health organization. To start with, bureaucratic leadership style is more effective when health care employees are performing routine tasks. Lower level health care employees usually perform routine tasks whose policies and procedures are well established and defined. As a result, leaders in health care organizations should use this leadership style to influence lower level employees with routine tasks (Cubero, 2007, p.352). Moreover, when there is need for health care organizations to understand certain procedures or standards of operation, bureaucratic leadership style is the most effective style. In this regard, bureaucratic leadership style is suitable in influencing new health care employees. New health care employees are usually not acquainted with policies and procedures in health care organizations thus they need direct guidance. In this case, the new employees should be told by leaders on what to do and how to it and when to do it to ensure effective operation of health care business organization. Moreover, in case of introduction of new policies, procedures and technology of operation, bureaucratic leadership style is the most effective leadership style to employ (Griffin, 2009, p.7). Besides, when health care employees are dealing with dangerous or delicate apparatus that need a definite set of procedures to operate, bureaucratic leadership style becomes an effective leadership style. Since most of the apparatus and operations in a health care institution are dangerous and delicate, leaders usually use bureaucratic leadership style. Moreover, when health care employees are being trained on safety and security, bureaucratic leadership style remains to be the most effective. In other words, in any situation where a deviation to procedures and policies may lead to more harm, bureaucratic leadership style is usually advisable (Griffin, 2009, p.8). However, bureaucratic leadership style is ineffective where health care staffs lose their interests in their jobs as well as in their fellow employees. In other words, this type of leadership lowers motivation of an employee especially if it is applied for a long period of time. Moreover, this leadership styles discourages creativity and innovativeness within a health organization since health staffs only do what they are expected to know. In this regard, improvement of quality of service delivery in a health organization is not likely to be attained especially the leadership style is used for a long period of time (Griffin, 2009, p.9). Participative leadership style is whereby some or all of the health care employee or group members are involved in decision making process. In this case, the members or employees have an opportunity to put across their ideas for consideration. However, the leader maintains the final decision after collection of all the suggestions of the members. Many of the individuals or leaders in health care profession view this leadership style as a sign of weakness. However, this is a sign of strength which is highly respected by the employees (Griffin, 2009, p.7). The rationale of participative leadership is that, it is more suitable when a leader has got partial information concerning a certain issue which needs to be solved. The other part of information is to be derived from employees or group members in order to come up with an effective decision which will help to solve the issues at hand or expected problems. Health leaders usually don’t have all the information concerning all issues facing health care organizations. In this regard, seeking contributions from other health care employees is a noble aspect which leads to effective problem solving and decision making. One of the major factors which must be considered while utilizing this leadership style is knowledge and expertise of employees (Griffin, 2009, p.7). Health care employees involved in decision making must be expertise and knowledgeable in certain areas irrespective of their level in the organizational structure. This is one of the reasons why organizations normally recruit knowledgeable and skilful employees. Use of this style is of mutual benefit. This is because it gives a leader an opportunity to make effective decisions. This leadership style motivates health care employees and encourages innovation and creativity thus improving the quality of health care service delivery (Griffin, 2009, p.7). Situational leadership style involves use of different leadership styles at different situations. This leadership style is the most suitable leadership style in the 21st century since a health care organization is able to reap the benefits of all leadership styles. An effective leader utilizes different leadership style depending on what forces are involved between the followers, the situation and the leader. Autocratic leadership should be used by leaders while addressing new employees who are in the process of learning on how the task is carried out. In this case, the leader needs to be competent and an effective coacher in order to achieve the desired outcomes. New employees are always motivated to learn new skills. As a result, application of autocratic leadership style on new employees can be more productive as compared to other leadership styles (Cubero, 2007, p.351). Participative style can be applied in situations whereby, the followers know their job. In this case, the leader has knowledge on the problem but does not have adequate information to solve the problem effectively. In this case, the employees have adequate knowledge on their jobs and have desire to become part of the productive team of the organization. Besides, free reign leadership style is used by leaders on health care employees who posses adequate and reliable knowledge and skills on a certain area. Moreover, the leaders are normally posed with various tasks which may require more and direct attention. As a result, delegation of task to knowledgeable and highly skilled members remains the best option for the leader (Silverthorne, 2007, p.399). There are various forces which determine the best leadership style which need to be employed within a health organization. Time available is one of the major forces which affect the leadership styles. For instance, if the time period available to make a certain decision is very short, autocratic and bureaucratic leadership styles stands to be the best option. However, if the time available to solve a certain issue is adequate, participative leadership style may be productive. This is because in autocratic style the leader is not required to hold meetings in order to discuss course of action (Silverthorne, 2007, p.400). However, in participative style, various meeting have to be held in order to come up with an effective solution concerning a certain issue prevailing. Another major force which determines the leadership style which should be applied is amount of respect and trust prevailing between a leader and his followers. If a health care leader has high trust and respect on his/her employees concerning their knowledge and skills in certain fields, free reign leadership style remains to be the most preferable leadership styles (Silverthorne, 2007, p.402) Availability and possession of information is also another factor which influenced the style of leadership to be employed. In many times you find that a leader understands existence of a certain issue within a health care organization but does not posses adequate information to solve such issues. Normally, employees possess information concerning certain issues facing an organization hence their participation in decision making could be of great help. In such a situation, use of participative leadership style is highly recommendable in order to attain organizational goals and objectives. Professionalism of employees and leaders also affects the type of leadership style which needs to be used. If employees are well trained on certain profession, use of free reign style is highly advocated. In this case, the leader does not possess enough knowledge on certain field but his/her followers have adequate knowledge (Michael, 2008, p.120) Type of task can also determine the leadership style which should be effective in a certain health care organization. Some of the tasks within health care organization are normally structured, unstructured, simple or complicated. In structured and simple tasks, use of participative and free reign leadership styles can be effective. However, autocratic leadership style and bureaucratic leadership style should be used in tasks which are unstructured and complicated. Moreover, laws prevailing in a certain state or country concerning the type of leadership which need to be applied also influence the type of leadership which should be used. Certain laws in certain states prohibit use of certain leadership styles in certain types of organization. For instance, in a healthcare industry, autocratic leadership style is highly advocated since quick decisions are required in order to save lives of patients (Michael, 2008, p.120). The rationale of situational leadership style is that, it allows a leader to utilize different leadership styles at different situations in order to reap full benefits. Unlike other leadership styles, situational leadership styles advocates use of each leadership style but at most appropriate situation. This makes the leadership more flexible thus motivating and effective in influencing followers (Michael, 2008, p.121). Effective leaders normally utilize situational leadership style since it requires application of all leadership styles at appropriate situations. Each leadership style is suitable in certain situations. Health care organizations are normally posed with various issues under different situations. In this regard, it is upon the leader to decide which leadership style is effectively applicable depending on the situation. There is no leadership style which is effective in all situations. As a result, leadership style in a health care organization should be chosen depending on the situation prevailing (Paraschiv, 2007, p.428). References Cubero, G. (2007). Situational leadership and persons with disability. Reading Mass, 29(4), p.351-356 Griffin, F. (2009). What’s your leadership style? Woman Advocate, 14(3), p.7-15. Michael, N. (2008). When participative management leads to garbled communication. Healthcare Financial Management Journal, 62(2), 118-120. Paraschiv, V. (2007). New trends in leadership development. Management Horizons, 12(1), 425-431. Silverthorne, C. (2007). Situational leadership style as a predictor of success and productivity. The Journal of Psychology, 135(4), p.399-412. . Read More