Concept of Leadership

Concept of Leadership

• Leadership involves driving people to achieve goals and is vital for subordinate success and efficiency.
• It's a process in which an individual influences others to guide an organization.
• A leader's skills and knowledge, and traits like beliefs, values, and ethics, influence leadership style and uniqueness.

Four Primary Factors of Leadership (U.S. Army, 1983)

• Leader: A leader needs self-understanding.
  • Successful leaders are deemed so by followers' trust and confidence.
  • Leaders must persuade followers of their worthiness.
• Followers: Different people need different leadership styles.
  • A leader needs to understand the needs, feelings, and motivation of their people.
  • Leaders must have "be, know, and do" qualities.
• Communication: Leadership entails bidirectional communication, much of it nonverbal.
  • Leader actions display what they want their people to do.
  • Interaction strengthens or destroys the leader-follower relationship.
• Situation: Every situation varies and requires discretion in determining the best course of action and leadership style.
  • Confrontations that are poorly timed or executed can be ineffective.

Theories of Leadership

• Trait Theory: Certain personality traits can lead people into leadership positions naturally.
• Great Events Theory: Crises or important events can bring out extraordinary leadership qualities.
• Transnational or Process Leadership Theory: It is a widely accepted theory that suggests leadership can be learned.

The Leader and Roles

• A leader's roles include vision setting, motivating employees, guiding work, and creating morale.
• Good leadership grows through self-study, education, training, and experience.
• Good leaders study and research constantly to develop leadership skills

Boss versus Leader

• A manager's authority comes from their position in an organization designated as Assigned Leadership
• Leadership is distinct, as it inspires followers to achieve high goals, which represents Emerging Leadership

Total Leadership

• People desire feedback from leaders they respect and see as ethical and who provide a clear vision of the future.
• Leaders are assessed by their actions, which determines trustworthiness.

Keys to Effective Leadership (Lamb, McKee, 2004)

• Trust and Confidence
• Effective Communication

Leadership Principles

• Aim to Know Yourself and seek Self-Improvement.
• Be Technically and Tactically Proficient
• Seek and Take Responsibility for actions.
• Aim to Make Sound and Timely Decisions.
• Practice to Set the Example
• Know Your People and Look Out for their Welfare.
• Keep Subordinates Informed.
• Develop a Sense of Responsibility in Your Subordinates.
• Aim to Ensure that Tasks are Understood, Supervised, and Accomplished.
• Practice to Train as a Team
• Aim to Employ command in Accordance with capabilities.

Supervision for Leaders

• Supervision involves understanding the situation and ensuring proper implementation of plans and policies.
• Over-supervision stifles initiative and decreases morale, while under-supervision causes miscommunication.
• Monitoring by seniors with more knowledge and experience is beneficial.

Evaluation

• Evaluation assesses the quality or significance of people, ideas, or things.
• Feedback is necessary for judging performance, and checklists can help prioritize tasks (A, B, C).
• Double-checking helps correct errors and mitigate damage.

Inspiring Subordinates

• Show Passion
• Involve subordinates in decision making.
• Know your organization

Training and Coaching

• Training: Structured to teach the knowledge and skills to perform a task.
• Coaching: Helps employees develop expertise and overcome obstacles.

Common points of both Coaching and Training

• Testing to gauge knowledge, capacity, and trust.
• Setting targets that can be calculated to break into step-by-step actions
• Clarifying course, goals, and responsibility.
• Encouraging peer coaching.
• Coaching includes giving guidance, building skills, removing obstacles, and learning through discovery.
• Helping with emotional challenges by encouragement.
• Providing solutions-based rather than critical feedback.
• Coaching can be from two viewpoints: coaching to lead others, and being coached to achieve self-improvement.

Learning

• The person must be motivated to learn.
• Involve subordinates in the learning process

Six Points of Leadership Power (French & Raven, 1959)

• Power is control over actions.
  • It may not need to be exercised to be effective.
• Leadership is more than force. It encourages others to WANT a goal.
• Six Points of Leader Power aid in negotiating skills:
  • Coercive Power
  • Reward Power
  • Legitimate Power
  • Expert Power
  • Referent Power
  • Informational Power

Significance of Self-Control

• Self-control is compared to the calm center of a cyclone, that is, something is in a state of complete serenity.
• Proverbs 16:32: "He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules his spirit, than he who captures a city."

Leadership Traits (John C. Maxwell)

• Honesty and Integrity
• Confidence
• Inspire Others
• Commitment and Passion
• Good Communicator
• Decision Making Capabilities
• Accountability
• Delegation and Empowerment
• Creativity and Innovation
• Empathy

Leadership Styles

• Transactional: Disciplinary with incentives and punishments.
  • Transactional leaders may use threats of having to stay late or brainstorming clever ways to knowledge solid work.
• Transformational: Leaders empower workers by encouraging change and finding new ways to improve, motivating them to strive for improvemnent .
• Servant: Leaders serve first and prioritize others' needs, as Simon Sinek states, “Leaders are the ones who are willing to give up something of their own for us...leaders choose to eat last”.
• Democratic: Participatory leadership involves collaboratively managing organizations and programs.
  • They prioritize working together and respect feedback.
• Autocratic: Autocratic leaders believe they have absolute power and make decisions alone and hate it when workers challenge the decisions.
• Bureaucratic: Leadership follows the book" with clear rules and procedures to check.
• Laissez-faire: Leaders provide tools and step back to allow team members to make decisions.
• Charismatic: Charismatic leaders use eloquent communication and persuasion to unite others.

Ethics in Leadership

• Ethical leaders are role models that promote ethical standards, keep people accountable, and create environments where others can thrive.
• Ethical leadership is linked to values like honesty, sincerity, care, beauty, and fairness (Watts, 2008; Brown, M. et al, 2005).
• Heather R. Younger: “An ethical leader is someone who lives and dies for integrity. Doing the right thing, even when it hurts, is the ethical leader’s mantra”.

How to become an ethical leader

• Define and Align Values: Base them on the morals instilled from childhood.
• Champion Ethics: Focus on the significance of ethics.
• Hire People with Like Values: Views not needing to be identical.
• Promote communication: Making the environment safe for staff.
• Beware of Bias: Admit to shortcomings and be open minded.
• Lead by Example: By practicing and demonstrating ethical, truthful, and unselfish conduct.
• Find Role Models: incorporate their style .
• Care for Yourself: Cornerstore of strong leadership id to have calm and competent disposition.

Impacts of Ethical Leadership

• Ethical leadership in organizations improves relationships, energy, , and the health of the organization.

The 4-V Model of Ethical Leadership

• Reconciles internal beliefs, and values with external behaviors.
• The Four Vs:
  • Values
  • Vision
  • Voice
  • Virtue

Values Formation in Leadership

• Values are personal, and play an important role in acts and performance
• It is most important to understand the values

Why Values Matter

• Guide the decisions
• Strengthen Ability to Influence
• Create clarity,
• Reduce Stress
• Guide Actions
• Increase success