What Leaders Really Do - Essay Example

Title: According to Warren Bennis "managing people is like herding cats and cats won't allow themselves to be herded". Do you think this is a helpful approach to management? In your answer discuss how different management theories might support or refute Bennis' view Name: Student Number: Course: Lecture: Date: Introduction The leadership in a great number of organizations is similar to herding cats. The herding of cats can be seen as a colloquial saying that attempts to organize or take control of entities which are chaotic and uncontrollable. It in a way implies that the task is impossible to do or it is difficult and this is mainly due to the chaotic factors that are in play. All organizations irrespective of the industry they operate in are composed of people that are the people who work in the organizations that is the men and women. The people in an organization offer followership, leadership and stewardship in their respective organizations. The employees in all organizations come up with new and innovative ideas that play an essential role in transforming the organizations to greatness. Employees need not be herded but they need to be lead. This essay sets out to discuss the statement made by Warren Bennis that managing people is like herding cats and cats won't allow themselves to be herded. This will be done by discussing whether the stated approach to management is a helpful one or not this will be done by discussing how different management theories might support or refute the view stated by Bennis. Discussion Bennis (1997) in his book with the same title states that managing people is like herding cats. Certainly, as Warren points out, cats will never allow themselves to be herded but instead they can be influenced, persuaded and lead toward a similar goal. The message being portrayed here is based on the fact that management is over time becoming less relevant and mostly in the new and advanced organizational order which is characterized by increased level of autonomy, diversity and cross boundary work which calls for more focus on leadership as opposed to management. Warrens approach to management seems to be a helpful approach. This is based on the fact that it offers new and innovative ways of leading people in an organization (Deresky, 2006). With the increased level of autonomy and diversity in the boundary less and networked organizational structure, the employees are likely to drift of as the cats so and mainly in pursuit of their values and self interest. This is likely to lead to higher risks in the organizations since the increased diversity is likely to lead to a clash of the identity values. Kotter (1990) points out that leadership and management are two divergent, nevertheless opposite systems of actions in the organizations. Based on these, Kotter states that leadership should always entail coping with change while managing on the other hand deals with complexity. The leadership process entails the motivation of people, development of a vision in the organizations and aligning employees with the vision through communication. The management process on the other hand entails planning, staffing, controlling, problem solving, budgeting and organizing. Based on these, organizations are need of leaders rather than managers. This is based on the fact that through leadership employees in an organization will not be herded they will be coaxed, influenced, persuaded and lead. Through this the organization can achieve the best out of the employees (Bruton & White, 2010). Bennis (1997) also notes that for organizations to survive in the ever changing business world a new set of leaders will be needed as opposed to managers. This is based on the distinction leaders conquer the context the turbulent, volatile and ambiguous surroundings that are likely to conspire against us and they may even suffocate the employees with the chance is available the managers on the other hand are more likely to surrender to it. The leaders need to make use of leadership styles such as democratic leadership style and laissez-faire leadership style as opposed to autocratic leadership style and bureaucratic leadership style. These kinds of leadership styles are likely to work for the benefit of the organizations since employees will feel valued and will now view themselves as being herded by the managers and leaders (Probst, 2005). Leaders are bound to be innovative while the mangers are administrators. These aspects of managers make them treat their employees as cats being herded. The leaders in this case come up with new and innovative ideas that will move the whole organization into the forward thinking phase (Bruton & White, 2010). The leaders do so by being on the outlook always and coming up with new tactics and strategies. In doing so they will need to have knowledge on the new trends and skills to enable them tackle their employees in the most possible way. Bennis 1997, further stated that a great number of managers that are in the organizations rely heavily on control and thus he recommends the advantage of having leaders since they inspire trust in their employees. Leaders in respect to this inspire their employees in achieving the best and they know how they can effectively set their own pace and tempo to be followed by the others. This is mainly informed by the leaders being good examples to their employees. In instances when the employee jump on board it means that they have being inspired and thus a bond of trust has being formed within the organization. This is mainly essential and most especially in the rapidly changing business world and the employees need to believe in their mission. The management style that leaders and managers adopt in managing people is greatly influenced by their assumption and believes of what is likely to motivate people (Northouse, 2007). Managers in most cases assume that a great number of the employees are naturally unmotivated and that they dislike their work, and his is a way encourages the use of the authoritarian management style. This management style assumes that employees avoid their responsibilities and thus the need for direction, the employees dislike working, needs to be supervised always and they need some form of enticement to deliver results. This theory supports the notion that Bennis offers in regard to managing people. The other theory is theory Y and this seems to be against the notion of Bennis. It aims at expounding a participative style in management and it is more decentralized (Sagie, 1997). The basic assumption of this theory is that a great number of the employees are self motivated, happy and creative and they enjoy greater responsibilities. The theory assumes that the employees accept and seek responsibility and not much direction is called for, views work as a natural aspect and work challenges are solved in an imaginative manner and they take responsibility (Day & Halpin, 2001). Additionally, leaders in all organizations needs to make use of theories such as the Maslow hierarchy of needs and this will allow them to deal with the employees in a simpler manner. The theory is based on the assumption that the individual needs of people are grouped in a hierarchy of the physiological needs, security, belongings needs, esteem needs as well as self actualization. The basic human needs such as water, food and all other factors that are essential for the human survival are grouped under the physiological needs. The other is the need for safety in the physical environment that one is living in. the belonging needs entails aspects such as love, friendship and acceptance within the society. Despite dealing with all the needs the theory fails to take into account the effect of the PESTEL aspects in a business (Lewis 2011). These aspects are mainly to lead to an increase in the cost of motivation. The self actualization needs are referred to the needs that correspond to a person’s achievement. This subject looks at the ability to be creative and developing employees to be the best they can become. This theory needs to be applied in the management of people in the organization. At the same time the lower level needs in the hierarchy needs to be fulfilled first before the employees are motivated by giving their more challenging assignments and increasing their responsibilities. Through the application of the theory managing people can become a simple task since the people will be motivated to work on their own as opposed to being forced to work (Lall 2011). For leaders to be effective in the modern day business environment they need to portray a number of qualities. The qualities act as the human connection to the led, the leaders and the organization. A major quality relates to integrity. This means that there should be an alignment between the actions and words with ones inner values. This means that the leaders ought to always stick to these values even in situations when alternative path may seem advantageous or easier. Through this the employees in the organization are more likely to trust and admire the leaders who stick always to their values. The leaders will therefore be role model to other employees in the organization and thus an organizational with effective and power cultural values will be developed (Day & Halpin, 2001). The other quality relates to dedication and humility. Dedication means that the leaders need to spend energy and time on a task so as to get the work done; this is opposed to the notion of allocating whatever time is available to a task. Leadership is not about finding time it means that one need to dedicate the whole self to the task, dedicating oneself to success and leading others in the organizations. In regard to humility, leaders need to understand that they are not superior to the other employees and consequently the employees are not also inferior to them. Thus they should not diminish themselves or exalt themselves. Based on these and to effectively manage people in an organization leaders need to accept the fact that all people in an organization are equal when it comes to their value. The leaders also need to be creative and open to new ideas (McGowan and Miller, 2004). Employees in the modern workplaces are innovative and they need to be given the room to point out new ideas that they think may be applicable in their business environment. Leaders need to listen to their employees and should never try to shut them down and that is likely to lead to more trust and care. Through creativity leaders can understand the future and lead the followers towards it. Their creative minds offer them with the ability to see things and think differently and thus offer a reason for the followers to follow them. Proper management of the employees in an organization has a number of benefits with the major one being equal opportunities as well as diversity. The employees, other partner in the organization are aware of the fact that all people have equal opportunities and diversity is celebrated. Additional through proper management and leadership the right people are hired to fill vacant positions in the organizations and this is mainly done in an open and transparent process. There is also proper performance management in the organization. There are already clearly set principles in regard to individual performance and all employees are aware of review process, how disagreements in the organizations will be managed and how to handle and resolve poor performance in the organizations (Hersey, Blanchard & Jonshon, 2001). The employees are also motivated to always seek more knowledge. This will be essential since they will do away with strategies and theories that are not working to their advantage and adapt new ones which may seem to be of benefit to them. Conclusion Based on the above discussion, it is clearly evident that the approach proposed by Bennis is an appropriate one and modern day organizations need to adopt it for them to reap the benefits associated with it. Instead of relying heavily on managers, there seems to be an urgent need to leaders to take the business to the next level. Based on the theories discussed, employees need to be motivated if organizations are to achieve the best from them. Organizations therefore need to come up with clear policies to ensure that the most valuable resources in their possession that is the people are managed well; this is likely to lead to highly motivated workforce and enhance creativity. References Bennis, W. (1997). Managing People is like Herding Cats. US: Covey Leadership Center. Bruton, G., & White, M. (2010).The Management of Technology and Innovation: A Strategic Approach. United Kingdom: Cengage Learning. Day, D., & Halpin, S. M. (2001). Leadership Development: A Review of Industry Best Practices. Virginia: U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences. Deresky, H. (2006). International Management: Managing Across Borders and Cultures. England: Pearson’s. Hersey, P., Blanchard, K.H &Jonshon, D. E. (2001). Management of Organizational behavior: Leading Human resources. New Jersey: Prentice Hall International. Kotter, J. P. (1990). What leaders really do? Harvard Business Review, 68, 103-111. Lall, U. (2011). Visionary Reflections from a Crystal Clear Pool of Water Scientists. Journal of Contemporary Water Research and Education, 4. Lewis, L. (2011). Organizational Change: Creating Change through Strategic Communication. New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons. McGowan, L., & Miller, P. (2004). Shared Leadership. Refraining the how’s and why of leadership. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Northouse, P.G (2007) Leadership Theory and practice. New Delhi: Sage Publishing Inc. Probst, T. (2005) Countering the negative effects of job Insecurity through participation, Decision making. Journal of occupation Health Psychology, 10, 320-329. Sagie, A. (1997) Leader direction and employee participation in decision making: contradictory or compatible practices? 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