Carnegie’s Leadership Strategy of Inspiring Report

Executive Summary

Being a leader is a challenging task that requires a lot of flexibility and numerous skills. A leader must be able to promote relevant values to a target population so that specific goals could be accomplished. Furthermore, a leader must encourage team members to cooperate and strive to deliver consistently effective results. Maile Carnegie, a former head of the Australian division of Google and a political leader, has designed the framework that allows promoting creativity and work-life balance, as well as balancing short- and long-term results, thus, leading to a sharp rise in the efficacy of the company’s economy.

Among the characteristics that make Carnegie’s style unique, one must mention a powerful emphasis on the promotion of disruptive innovations as the basis for encouraging rapid progress. The specified aspect of the strategy is especially important in the context of the global environment where competition levels are getting increasingly high, and where making a difference is the key to developing a competitive advantage.

The leadership style used by Carnegie is linked closely to the transformational framework. Inspiring people to change their current approach to decision-making and communication to a more efficient one and reducing the chance of misunderstandings and conflicts between the team members significantly, the suggested leadership style should be used as a prime example of how to motivate people properly. Therefore, Carnegie’s concept of leadership is worth incorporating into the list of strategies for managing communication and decision-making in a team.

Introduction: The Art of Choosing the Right Leadership Style

Thousands of words have been written about being a good leader and encouraging rapid growth (Sutton, Azimi, & Steinberg, 2016). However, most of them point to the fact that there is no precise recipe and that breaking the mold is not the only challenge that a leader must face to encourage growth and encouraging people to accept suggested values (Saleh & Khine, 2014). Nevertheless, the contemporary economic and political environment is undergoing significant changes, and Australia with its current leaders in business and politics is no exception.

Maile Carnegie is one of the game-changers that have contributed to the development of the state to the greatest degree (Nott, 2017). Although it is rather difficult to put the finger on what leadership strategy she deploys, the effects are fascinating, seeing how some of the pressing issues on the Australian agenda have finally been acknowledged. By placing a very powerful emphasis on a technology-driven change, Carnegie has created the environment in which participants are encouraged to engage in the consistent acquisition of new knowledge and skills, which is crucial for promoting multiculturalism and building relationships with companies all over the world, including global leaders (Cameron, 2017).

The goals of the paper, therefore, include analyzing the leadership strategy adopted by Carnegie and defining what makes it good. The specifics of the political and economic environment of Australia will need to be taken into account in the process. Furthermore, the paper will strive to explore the challenges and opportunities that the specified leadership framework implies. Finally, options for managing identified difficulties and encouraging further progress will be discussed in the paper. Thus, a better understanding of how a leader is built will become a possibility (Harvey, 2014).

Background: Carnegie Carnegie and the Issue with Disruptive Technologies

It would not be an overstatement to claim that Carnegie has reinvented the landscape of the contemporary business relationships in Australia. The incredibly fast and glorious triumph of Carnegie becomes all the more impressive when taking the fact that there are very few female leaders in Australia into account. Indeed, a recent report indicates that the current approach toward promoting female leaders in Australia may lead to less than inspiring results as far is the influence thereof on the economic, political, and cultural landscape of the state is concerned (Trimble, 2013).

The breath of fresh air that Carnegie Carnegie’s leadership strategy allows introducing can be viewed as an impetus for change, yet more people need to assume the leadership standards promoted by Carnegie and based on creativity, efficient information management, and the ability to get priorities straight (McIntyre, 2015).

Particularly, Maile Carnegie has made a difference in the Australia environment by creating opportunities for vulnerable populations to gain more weight in Australia society. For instance, one must give Carnegie credit for placing a very powerful emphasis on the significance of technological growth. To be more accurate, Carnegie has stressed the importance of using disruptive technology as the foundation for encouraging the consistent growth and a tool for motivating team members to excel in their performance (Cornell, 2017).

Furthermore, getting the priorities in order is a crucial part of Carnegie’s strategy that makes her a perfect leader. As she stressed in her recent interview, replicating her leadership framework blindly is unlikely to lead to any substantial results since the priorities are different in each case (Arifin, 2014). What makes the approach effective, though, is the analysis of the factors affecting the performance of a team and exploring the opportunities to control the impact of these factors (Tsai, Wang, & Yuan, 2015).

Leadership Type: Transformational Framework at Its Best

Seeing that Carnegie’s approach revolves around introducing changes into the environment of the Australia society and controlling them accordingly, her leadership style can be defined as transformational (Quin, Deris, Bischoff, Johnson, 2015). Indeed, a closer look at the changes that she has made so far will show that she has not only provided extensive opportunities for vulnerable populations but also altered people’s perspective of the subject matter. The emphasis that Carnegie places on transforming people’s concept of performance quality and the acquisition of new skills and knowledge can also be deemed as proof of her deploying the transformational leadership approach (Barrett, 2014).

Furthermore, the fact that Carnegie focuses extensively on inspiring her followers and encouraging them to grow can be a sign of her incorporating the elements of the inspirational elements of the transformational leadership style into the mixture. Indeed, Barrett points to the fact that a transformational leader must “communicate to bring about positive results for themselves and their organizations or communities” (Barrett, 2014, p. 24). Much to her credit, Carnegie does exactly that; she galvanizes the process of positive change by stimulating innovations and challenging the norms that have grown stiff and worn out their welcome (Soliman, 2015).

It should be noted, though, that the choice of a leadership style should not be viewed as the final decision that must not be altered. Quite on the contrary, it is paramount to encourage flexibility as the foundation for meeting the ever-changing needs of diverse audiences (Weining, Jingyu, & Yuan, 2015). Therefore, the framework adopted by Carnegie, as well as the philosophy that she has been building and promoting as a leader, needs to be viewed as an example of what a proper leader should be like and how they must approach a decision-making process (Khani & Khaledi, 2016).

Ethos: Focus on Allowing People to Fulfill Their Potential

Carnegie’s framework may have flaws, yet it should be recognized for projecting a very positive ethos onto all those involved in the change process. The ethical underpinnings of Carnegie’s approach are rather basic yet very compelling since they revolve around equality and justice (Yeates, 2016). By choosing to encourage mutual respect and reinforce the idea of collaboration and equality, Carnegie sets an example for employing a set of rigid ethical standards in leadership. Particularly, her approach implies that the needs of all stakeholders should be taken into account and that possible damages should be reduced to a minimum. In other words, the well-being of the participants is at the top of Carnegie’s leadership priorities (Elliott, Carnegie, Gonski, 2016).

Furthermore, the active promotion of inspiration as the basis for engaging participants can be interpreted as an essential part of the ethos of Carnegie’s leadership framework. Making sure that every single participant should remain satisfied, be aware of their role and function, and be enthusiastic about contributing to the efforts of the team is an important step toward building the ethical foundation for the leadership approach.

A closer look at the principles of ethics that Carnegie deploys will reveal that the concepts of the common good and the cohesion within a team constitute the foundation of her leadership philosophy and the foundation for her ethical approach (Dugdale, 2015). While seemingly simple, the framework in question allows navigating between the needs of an organization and employees. As a result, a flexible policy based on compromise and cooperation can be built (Girma, 2016).

Key Elements of the Leadership Approach: Confidence and Enthusiasm

Even though Carnegie’s leadership framework is rooted deeply in the strategy that has been in existence for decades, the approach designed by the Australia leader also incorporates its unique characteristics and stands out of the rest of the strategies (Nur, 2016). Moreover, Carnegie pays special attention to maintaining enthusiasm levels high among the stakeholders. The identified element of the leadership approach aligns with the concept of inspiration that Carnegie views as central to the framework that she has designed (DuBrin, 2015).

The fact that Carnegie strives to motivate team members when adopting her leadership framework shows that her concept of leadership borrows heavily from the transformational one (Nongard, 2014). Indeed, according to the key tenets of the transformational leadership framework, a leader must exert authority and promote credibility at all levels so that every single member of the team could be provided with an opportunity to develop the necessary skills, contribute to the development of a project, and feel a valued and important part of the team (Barrett, 2014).

Furthermore, the fact that Carnegie seeks the ways of meeting the need of all stakeholders should be listed as one of the characteristics that allow defining her approach as transformational. According to Barrett (2014), transformational leaders are the ones “who are seeking the greatest good for the greatest number without violating individual rights and are concerned about doing what is right and honest” (Barrett, 2014, p. 36). Seeing that Carnegie strives to create an environment in which all participants benefit, it can be assumed that she is a transformational leader (Carroll, ‎Ford, ‎& Taylor, 2015).

Speech Analysis: Taxes and Staying Competitive

In her recent speech on taxes, Carnegie addressed an important concern for global companies directly and efficiently. Intended for the government, the speech was aimed at changing the taxation system, including both implied and expressed goals. Carnegie deploys a very direct and straightforward approach in her argumentation, therefore, using mostly an appeal to logic as the primary rhetorical tool. For instance, she mentions that it is not taxable to which Google is opposed but, instead, uncompetitive taxes (SkyNewsAustralia, 2015). The style can be defined by clarity and concision: “Google globally pays a tax right 19.3%” (SkyNewsAustralia, 2015).

The visual strategies are minimalistic; for example, Carnegie uses hand gestures to emphasize certain parts of her speech. Similarly, the oral strategies are limited to a confident voice and a rise-fall intonation, which adds certainty to her speech.

Conclusion: Carnegie and Her Leadership Approach

Carnegie has created the leadership approach based on inspiring the participants and encouraging them to develop the skills necessary for balancing between creativity and the ability to manage routine activities, which helps promote enthusiasm and increase engagement levels among the participants. Carnegie’s leadership approach can be defined as based on the transformational framework, yet she has placed a very powerful emphasis on the importance of getting one’s priorities in order, therefore, setting her strategy aside from similar ones.

Carnegie has built the leadership strategy that encourages equality and unity, reinforces the communication process, and contributes to successful problem-solving. Therefore, she can be considered a decent role model that one may need to follow when designing a leadership approach rooted deeply in the idea of inspiring people. Carnegie has created a tool for addressing interpersonal issues and encouraging cross-cultural communication. Serving as the platform for fostering values such as responsibility, the ability to negotiate, etc., in participants, the leadership framework created by Carnegie is bound to transform people’s attitudes by inspiring them to excel in their performance and achieve stellar success.

References

Arifin, F. (2014). Organizational culture, transformational leadership, work engagement and teacher’s performance: Test of a model. International Journal of Education and Research, 2(1), 1-14.

Barrett, D. J. (2014). Leadership communication (4th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Education.

Cameron, N. (2017). ANZ digital chief: Tackle the ‘frozen middle’ of your organisation or face irrelevancy. CMO. Web.

Carroll, ‎B., Ford, J., ‎& Taylor, S. (2015). Leadership: Contemporary critical perspectives. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

Cornell, A. (2017). Maile Carnegie named ANZ head of digital. Bluenotes. Web.

Day, D. V. (2014). The Oxford handbook of leadership and organizations. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

DuBrin, A. J. (2015). Leadership: Research findings, practice, and skills. Boston, MA: Cengage Learning.

Dugdale, L. (2015). Google Australia’s boss wants Australia to get its act together – now. In the Black. Web.

Elliott, S., Carnegie, M., Gonski, D. (2016). Summer content stocking: Elliott, Carnegie, Gonski. Bluenotes. Web.

Girma, S. (2016). The relationship between leadership style and employee job satisfaction study of federal and Addis Ababa sport organizational management setting in Ethiopia. International Journal of Applied Research, 2(3), 92-96.

Harvey, M. (2014). Interactional leadership and how to coach it: The art of the choice-focused leader. New York, NY: Routledge.

Khani, A. H. A., & Khaledi, M. (2016). The relationship between personality traits NEO and managers’ transformational leadership of Tehran east social security organization. Research Journal of Management Reviews, 2(1), 32-41.

McIntyre, P. (2015). Google Australia managing director Maile Carnegie takes aim at television. Financial Review. Web.

Nongard, R. (2014). Transformational leadership: How to lead from your strengths and maximize your impact. New York, NY: Lulu.com.

Nott, G. (2017). Agile demands sophisticated leadership says ANZ’s Maile Carnegie. CIO. Web.

Nur, N. (2016). Google’s Maile Carnegie to lead ANZ’s digital banking efforts. CIO Asia. Web.

Quin, J., Deris, A., Bischoff, G., Johnson, A. T. (2015). Comparison of transformational leadership practices: Implications for school districts and principal preparation programs. Journal of Leadership Education, 14(3), 71-85.

Saleh, I. M., & Khine, M. S. (2014). Reframing transformational leadership: New school culture and effectiveness. New York, NY: Springer.

SkyNewsAustralia. (2015). Google’s Maile Carnegie talks tax and staying competitive. Web.

Soliman, F. (2015). From knowledge management to learning organisation to innovation: The way ahead. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Sutton, B., Azimi, V., & Steinberg, H. (2016). Information technology issues in customer service, cultural differences, & the Big 5 in Australia, Columbia, New Zealand, & South Korea. Proceedings of the Academy of Management Information and Decision Sciences, 20(2), 19-23.

Trimble, L. (2013). Melodrama and gendered mediation. Feminist Media Studies, 14(4), 663-678.

Tsai, Y. C., Wang, H. M., & Yuan, C. C. (2015). Transformational leadership and job performance: The case of SMEs in Taiwan. International Journal of Arts and Commerce, 4(8), 57-71.

Weining, L., Jingyu, Z., & Yuan, L. (2015). A study of transformational leadership, strategic flexibility and firm performance: The moderating role of environmental dynamism. International Interdisciplinary Business-Economics Advancement, 23(72), 334-346.

Yeates, C. (2016). ANZ’s Maile Carnegie says banks face ‘world of hurt’ if they don’t innovate. Namoi Valley Independent. Web.