Leading a Team through a Period of Change - Essay Example

Leading a Team through a Period of Change Today's firms can no longer ignore changes in the global environment. These changes have given rise to a dilemma, and business leaders are faced with a severe risk fail to meet demands and needs of customers and vendors. On the one hand, the dilemma requires understanding each change individually to adjust a firm's strategic direction relative to each change in the environment. On the other hand, if several changes in the environment occur together with changes in a firm's strategy, then piecemeal tactics implemented in the prevailing style of management will amount to less than an adequate strategic response. In order to meet challenges in business environments, leaders should adopt unique strategies and tactics managing human and material resources. Leadership, essentially a synthesis of arts, reflects individual experience, understanding, values and capabilities, interacting with situations where, realistically, there is rarely an 'ideal' solution. Success as a leader, so often results from the unique originality of individual responses, rather than by following established precepts, without sufficient thought to context and circumstances. This does not mean that today's leaders cannot learn from their predecessors or, for that matter, blithely ignore what is currently reckoned to be 'best practice' (Adair. 2002). Clearly, the distilled wisdom and experience of generations of leaders - successful and otherwise - and the lessons to be drawn from those presently operating in conditions akin to our own, are invaluable sources of learning for anyone in a leadership role, in the dramatically changing and many-sided world of business. Effective leadership must include the intellect, temperament, core values, energy and courage of the individual leader. More recently, the conveniently distorted, or logic of political correctness has also sought to exclude 'nature', by concentrating inappropriately upon 'nurture', as the predominant, if not sole, determinant of leader effectiveness (Belbin, 2004). Traditionally, future trends and events have been projected as extrapolations of past events and data. Based on the premise that the future is the product of the past, planners have developed such forecasting techniques as trend extrapolation and econometric modeling. Elegant as these methods are, their performance in the last several decades has been far from satisfactory (Bridges, 1995). The primary role of the leader, within the organization's executive structure, his or her degree of formal, positional authority, as well as the nature and dynamics of the management hierarchy itself, are all major potential influences in creating the boundaries that must be coped with. The speedy, essentially 'organic' nature of the burgeoning inter-departmental relationships, quickly lead to a series of major restructures, and the emergence of a typical flatter organization, where the informal processes become not only legitimized, but are actively stimulated and encouraged as the previous formal boundaries progressively disappeared (Chemers, 1997). Before the adoption of a certain leadership strategy or style, the company's executive or manager should analyze and evaluate the nature of change and transition stages (Chase, and Podlesni 2006). Changes are defined as allowing the emerging of a new state of being. The transition strategy is embedded in perspectives on change such as strategic choice, developmental stages, and organizational life cycle. It is also based on the traditional approach to planned change. From these perspectives, organizations eventually proceed through distinct stages, and the task of managers is to effectively manage the transition from one stable state to another. Transition seems to start where transformation ends (Chemers, 1997). The main purpose of transformation is to help organizations to accept the need for change and to generate a new vision, the main purpose of transition is to turn these into reality. Although transition may be seen as complementary to transformation, it does not automatically follow that this is the case in reality. Some managers and consultants prefer to use either one of them, while others incorporate both in their work. Moreover, in many cases managers use methods derived from the two approaches and mix them, as will be shown later. The key priorities for improvement and change are identified and talked through, initially, with the top team as a whole and then subsequently with the rest of the organization, using the team approach cross-functionally, wherever possible. Another advantage of the structured team approach is that learning itself becomes a team process, with consequent growing mutual awareness, understanding and competence between team members, on currently 'live' work issues (Whitaker, 1993; Sogunro, 1998). One of the most popular models used during transition periods is John Adair's 'Functions of Leadership' model. This model endures, because it is so pertinent - and is likely to remain so, in tomorrow's world, as a functional benchmark for leaders, whatever their working environment. In effect, it has become the classical fundamental model of what leaders have to do, in order to be effective in role (Sogunro, 1998), ie: (1) achieving the task. (2) Building and maintaining the team; (3) Developing the individual. Two of the many strengths of Adair's concept are that it is timeless and is not culture or situation-dependent. For over three decades, the now familiar 'three-circle' Action-Centered Leadership model has been integrated into company cultures, individual's leadership styles and is an established core competency hallmark of management and supervisory training doctrine, in a great number of organizations. For many years, Adair's model has been taught in the civil service, public services and the armed forces, as well as in business schools, management colleges and universities. Interestingly, HMS Excellent, the Royal Navy's School of Leadership and Management has even incorporated the three0circles motif into its official ship's badge (Robbins, 2002; Adair. 2002). Like the Adair model, the situational leadership concept of Paul Hersay and Kenneth Blanchard has stood the test of time, in providing relevant benchmarks, guidelines and criteria for leaders in management to work to. The fundamental premise of the situational leadership model is that the functioning maturity of the team members is a major determinant of the 'style' of leadership that needs to be adopted by the team leader in order to produce the most effective contributory responses from people (Hersey and Blanchard 1977). According to this model, Leaders should adapt their style to follower development style (or 'maturity'), based on how ready and willing the follower is to perform required tasks (that is, their competence and motivation) (Situational Leadership 2007). The concept of 'functioning maturity', underlying situational leadership, reflects the degree to which people can - and will - do what is expected of them, in terms of effective job performance. 'Can' is essentially a matter of possessing (or not possessing) the requisite knowledge, understanding and skill to do the job. The final stage on the functional maturity continuum 'high' is whether the individual or team can - and will - do the job effectively. Here, much of the art of leadership is about knowing when to stop being a manager and allowing people to get on with the job (Greer2001). Clear-cut unambiguous delegation needs to proceed hand-in-hand with comparably clarified empowerment boundaries. Hersey and Blanchard explain the role of 'readiness', in relation to one's job: (1) the readiness factor (innate ability, education, training, and experience), which reflects a person's capability for performing the job; and (2) the psychological maturity factor, which is associated with an individual's self-confidence, desire for achievement, and willingness to accept responsibility" (Einstein and Humphreys 2001, p. 48). The change strategy takes into account human as well as formal structural needs of the system as the implementation proceeds. The change process is not unlike that of organizational development, but has a greater emphasis on the entire system, on elaborating the desired state, on the impact of the desired state on the present state, and on planning, implementing, and managing the change (Greenleaf, 1982). The transition strategy is future-oriented. It does not focus on a thorough, all-embracing diagnosis and search for causes; the energy and attention are focused on practical issues related to implementing the desired state. Transition is an analytical, rational, and pragmatic strategy. Its main focus is on analyzing and evaluating the impact of the future state on the present state, and deducing what action steps need to be taken. In order to cope with multidimensional changes, to evaluate and to plan for implementing them, transition often utilizes computer programs and a manual. The change typically starts with a new vision that represents a new world view. However, Greer (2001) emphasizes the importance of what subsystems are needed to be changed in order for the desired future to be realized. He argues that in order to implement a desired state or a new mission, managers should assess its impact and implication on three basic subsystems: the cultural, the political, and the technical. From this point of view, the transition strategy aims to help managers change those three subsystems so as to be consistent with the desired future (Griffin and Stacey 2005). Leadership strategies have a great impact on team behavior team dynamics. Transition is a rational and analytical strategy aimed at helping managers to implement second-order change in their organizations. The strategy typically starts with dominant coalitions having a basic idea about the desired future. The approach includes analytical models and methods guiding specific phases, operations, and change targets to be achieved in order to implement the change successfully (Griffin and Stacey 2005). The transition strategy was developed by experienced consultants out of their own experiences in facilitating large-scale, complex changes in large organizations. From this perspective, second-order planned change appears to be a very complex process. It involves managing two contradictory processes at the same time (stability and change); it involves assessing, planning, and implementing a multitude of very different (Freiberg and Freiberg 2003). In a multicultural environment, the roles of 'Manager' and 'Leader' are complementary, and serve to fulfill differing, but related functions in bringing about the development and success of an enterprise, project, department, or work team. Another indicator of team effectiveness is the team's 'culture', frequently defined as 'The way we do things, around here' (Freiberg and Freiberg 2003). Within the scope of that definition are principally three distinct, but related, factors. People's behavioral - and, therefore - work styles evolve and develop over many years, as the result of learning - often from a rich variety of job and role experiences, which may be positive or negative. However, at the root of anyone's style of working and their behavior in work roles there are many psychological influences which stem from that individual's early life (Hoyle and Wilmore 2002). Multicultural environment is marked by cultural differences and unique values, traditions and individual values of each employee. In contrast to traditional management, in multicultural setting, the growth behaviors and, therefore, are more characteristic of successful, high-achieving work teams (Pedler, 2004). Survival behavior, by contrast, is much more concerned with boundary, goal and structure preservation, not expansion, transformation and development. Teams in a state of transformation and growth cut through and extend their boundaries and show high confidence both in integrating newcomers and in spawning new groups, or sub-groups, without losing their core values, and sense of identity. What is more, high achieving groups, generally, demonstrate both greater capacity, and increased willingness to pass on their learning in intelligible form to others (Hoyle and Wilmore 2002). Team development, transformation and growth - and consistent high achievement - are not matters of happenchance, or conditions which arise automatically. Rather, they come about as the result of effectively managed, wellled individuals who are, in turn, capable of personal growth and who commit to the development and success of the team. What represents 'success', or 'high achievement', always needs to be viewed in the context of the operational environment and climate (Pedler, 2004). It is only by understanding something of the imperatives of the wider, external arena, for example, competitive pressure, socio-economic changes and technical developments - that one can begin to make sense of, and therefore influence, what pushes, pulls and drives a team to become successful (Segriovanni and Glickman 2006). This contextual role represents one of the key areas of learning, interpretation and intervention of the leader. It is here, especially, that the process of defining vision - as a shift from the current to the requisite state of affairs - really takes place. It is where, too, the effective leader begins to clarify, articulate and share the goals of necessary transformation with his or her team, and so commence and build upon the tasks of integrating and mobilizing talent, ambition, energy and aspiration in the collective pursuit (Price, 2004). Teams and team-working have been fundamental social and work phenomena, throughout the history of human enterprise. Not only are teams an essential means of optimizing talent and energy, in the pursuit of task objectives they are also a primary source of support, succor and psychological nourishment to people - especially the team members. The current emphasis upon flatter, less hierarchical organization structures, with the increasing tendency for cross-functional and project group working, is seeing the development of teamwork - and especially inter-team working, on a scale not previously experienced in traditionally structured companies (Schien, 1996). Currently, too, there is growing widespread concern to use people's talents more, through the medium of team-working but, at the same time, develop individual competence in fulfilling an increasing number of different roles within widening spheres of team activity, e.g. leader of this project; head of that task group; member of this team and/or coordinator of that working party (Belbin, 2004). As the scope of team working expands - with emerging forms of organization structure and companies' needs to deploy talented people more flexibly, to retain competitive advantage - so the need for more versatile team leadership will similarly grow. Leading teams effectively involves recognizing the signals and indications of teams' distinctive cultures and also the expectations and aspirations of team members in their behavioral arenas that constitute team culture. Highly successful teams don't just 'happen' (Belbin, 2004). Success comes about as a result of managing, teaching, stimulating and encouraging. These are the conscious activities that stimulate people's motivation, sense of ownership and personal accountability for success (Bridges, 1995). It is the leader's insight, perceptiveness, 'power competence', energy and communicated confidence in the team, that act as triggers to members' preparedness to develop, grow and perform as an effective, high achieving team. High achievement is not the exclusive prerogative - and result - of 'top down' interventions. It comes about as the result of the interplay of both 'top down' and 'bottom up' initiatives, commitment and focused energy, interacting together in the leadership-followership relationship, within the team (Belbin, 2004). 'Inputs' might be, for example, castings while the consequent 'outputs', following the processes of 'conversion' could well be, therefore, machined components. Yet again, 'inputs' could be a collection of different parts and subunits which after 'conversion' could be complex assemblies such as a bicycle, electric cooker or motor car. Frequently, however, 'inputs' represent data or information in one form while the 'outputs' are facts, figures and information in another, 'converted' form (Bridges, 1995). The most obvious 'boundaries' to be managed are those that exist between the 'conversion unit' - be it a small section, major function, division or even entire business - and its environment. For example, 'inputs' come from suppliers, which may be internal, further up the line, within the company, or multi-sourced external providers. 'Outputs' involve relationships with customers, clients - internal and/or external - as well as regulatory bodies, environmental and ecological monitors, and agents, or subcontractors (Griffin and Stacey 2005; Einstein and Humphreys 2001). Equally, the results would seem to suggest that it is encouraging, supportive leadership styles - where there is a shift from authoritarianism to authoritative competence, on the part of the leader - that lead to maximum commitment and initiative on the part of those being managed (Greer, 2001). Achieving and maintaining competitive edge are phenomena which, necessarily, depend upon a growing multiplicity of contributive talents, and have long ceased to be the prerogative, or role, of one or two high performing 'solo players'. Undoubtedly, 'stars' are always likely to add necessary value to enterprise, but stardom, in today's business environment, is increasingly about know-how in deploying, coordinating and mobilizing the diverse talents of so many other people, at different levels and across diverse disciplines, in the collective pursuit of success (Einstein and Humphreys 2001). Time and again, despite this need, consultancy assignments and experience in so many organizations, confirm that, while there is rarely a dearth of talent - or potential - within businesses, there is still a disturbing lack of ability or real concern, to develop, use and effectively manage that potential. As with so many issues in management and leadership, there is no one 'right' answer, and team working is not a cure-all for all the problems, challenges and paradox that companies face - and will continue to have to cope with - as a matter of course, in the pursuit of success in today's markets (Pedler, 2004). Taking into account androgogy approach, it is possible to say that the main task of the manager or consultant is to help the organization's members to be aware of the existence of the processes of evolution in their organization and of its stages, its characteristics, and its impact, so that they will be able to consciously and deliberately participate, effectuate, and manage the process. There are various definitions and descriptions for explaining what transformation is. Boehnke and Bontis (2003) describe transformation by its key components. They say that transformation is a process aimed at helping members to explore and address key aspects of processes, such as awareness of purpose and vision, and the role of belief systems. Corporate cultures, which contain consensual views of the future, change neither quickly nor easily in large firms. Changes in the fundamentals, surprises, and discontinuities can all be perceived as very threatening, destabilizing, and costly. The purpose of strategic planning is to force managers and planners to wrestle with realistic alternative futures in advance; to think of contingencies and alternative responses early. To achieve this goal, creative scenarios are needed, backed with plausible analyses of the propagation of change. In addition to having a central theme that involves their potential users early on, scenarios must be anchored into a methodologically sound and productive approach to strategy design. In sum, the transition process and change process every organization should select leadership style in accordance with its needs and demands. The aim is to enhance strategy design toward accomplishing a favorable strategic posture consistent with a firm's long-term goals. The success of change process depends upon a team of top managers who refine and jointly formulate the firm's strategy or strategic decision situation. 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