Introduction
Leadership is a process by which a person gains the support or assistance of another person or other people through social influence with an aim of attaining a common goal. A leader of a group that is pursuing a subject must therefore be part of the subject matter and have the responsibility of influencing the group towards the achievement of such goals that brings the group together.
The nature of such leadership will therefore determine the level of influence and as a result, the level of success in the objective being sought by such a group to which leadership is offered. This paper seeks to review the topic of leadership.
The paper will research into the elements of leadership and the manner in which such leadership elements affect the level of influence that is attained from the leadership. The paper will then carry out a review of the findings with respect to elements of leadership.
Materials and Methods used
Leadership is a topic that has existed in the public domain for a long period of time. Quiet a number of researches have been done into its aspects and elements and how it can be improved. This review paper sought to conduct a supplementary research on the topic of leadership. The research used available secondary sources of information that details elements of leadership.
Such sources as used in this research included books and published resources that were obtained from reliable publishers and institutions as availed in the internet. The research then applied analysis and review approach to arrive at its conclusions. The methods used in the review process were based on a collective understanding of the available information on the topic of leadership.
Results
The diversity of the topic of leadership has in itself over time led to approaches and views that are attributed to leadership. Different topics under leadership have for this reason been given a wide approach in terms of definitions and even concepts. According to Ford Jeffrey (n.d.), elements of leadership are mainly based on three features.
In his view as a professional in management, Ford argued that the key elements of leadership are “commitment, courage, and conversation” (Ford, n.d., p. 1). He further explained that leadership comes with a person’s willingness to express him or herself together with the ability to offer one’s self to the consequences of such expressions.
It is for such expressions that an individual can have influence over people and then influence them to the attainment of a given objective. Commitment refers to a person’s obligation that must be undertaken. One will be said to have committed to a particular activity if there exist to some extent, obligation that a person, in his or her opinion, must perform. In Ford’s opinion, commitment is the foundation of leadership.
To have a desire to guide a group of people to vicinity that they have not identified, a place that they have never comprehended relays the platform of leadership. Leadership goes beyond being the head of a team to enlist provision of guidance and giving to the led population what they never expected to achieve at all.
Commitment in leadership brings more that achieving an objective in the short run but into a long term plan that is continuous for the group rather than individuals. A committed leader will therefore focus on empowering his or her subjects to further have personal commitments into achieving goals or objectives of the particular group (Ford, n.d., p. 1).
The success of any group is for example identified to greatly depend on the support that the group members are getting from their leader. The level of commitment of a leader to his or her team is actually notable in terms of the level of attention and motivational support that is given to members of the team.
A leader is therefore expected to rise beyond fears in order to ensure that necessary motivations for a given success are offered to team members. The level of commitment is in this case realized with the extent to which the leader will for example be willing to risk his or her position in order to empower and support others.
In the absence of commitment to the success of a team, a leader will refrain from making steps that can threaten his or her position by raising one of the team members. Under such circumstances, some leaders will stop appreciating, supporting or even reporting successful contributions made by individual team members. The aim of the leader in this case will be to take the credit of success instead of team members.
This on the other hand has the side effect of discouraging team members from making extra efforts for the success of the team. The leader may have credits in the short run over successful undertakings which will be short lived due to lost commitments among team members.
The commitment that a leader offers to a group should therefore go beyond obligations to personal success but to the long run continuous achievements of the group to which leadership is being offered. As expressed by Mackin (2007), a committed leader can extract a sufficient amount of benefits of team work. When individuals are, for example, put to work together, a number of advantages can be derived.
Working in teams can for example “improve productivity by 15 to 20 percent in six months, and up to 30 percent in eighteen months, drive accountability and responsibility to all areas within the organization and create a highly motivated environment and better work environment” (Mackin, 2007, p. 4) for members of a team.
Team works have also been identified to sufficiently improve member’s interpersonal relations which are very important in the integration of activities of a team for a collective success. All these advantages will be dependent on the level of commitment of the team leader to ensure that his or her team is efficiently operational in line with attaining benefits of a team.
This is because such benefits are not naturally realized but initiated and influenced through mechanisms and guidance that are available in a team and for the team members through leadership. A leader’s commitment is therefore supposed to be based on ensuring that team members are adequately empowered and integrated for individual successes that will then be translated to the success of the whole group (Mackin, 2007, p. 4).
Courage is another element of leadership that allows for the pursuit to a leader’s commitment to a team. The ability of a leader to undertake his or her leadership roles in spite of challenges is what constitutes courage. Making decisions in situations of risks and uncertainties are features of courage in leadership.
As a leader, your team will be looking upon you to give them directions on how to proceed, to show them how a problem is supposed to be solved and to make decisions on their behalf. Confronted with challenges that relates to available options and risks, a leader is expected to make decisions to guide steps and actions of the leader’s team. A leader who lacks courage will for example fail to make a decision for fear of making mistakes.
As a result, the team will be stuck at the middle of its operations because the leader can not find a way forward. Lack of courage can also make a person to shy away from making decisions for fear of possible outcomes of such decisions. A leader who lacks courage will with this respect fail to make a decision or even ignore a valuable option only on the basis that the option has possible risks.
Daft and Lane (2007) argued that a good leader should have the courage to make decisions for the solution of even difficult problems. A leader is expected to embrace risks and ensure decisions with critical consideration of all the risks involved. The leader must also be brave enough to face consequences of decisions made.
Just as success is enjoyed after a technical decision, the leader should as well be ready to admit failure over a poor decision. Leadership therefore requires a high level of courage to make decisions and also face the consequences of such decisions.
A good leader is also expected to out of courage shun all forms of influence that compromises moral, legal and other requirements that are professionally essential for such leadership (Daft and Lane, 2007, pp. 179- 183).
Cottrell and Harvey (2004) described courage as the quality of “having guts, nerve, and the heart to do things that fosters and support progress” (Cottrell and Harvey, 2004, p. 8). They also attributed courage with the ability to “face danger or fear with confidence and resolution; bravery; valor” (Cottrell and Harvey, 2004, p. 7).
It is the level of courage in a person that will enable him or her to do the right thing or the wrong thing in leadership. Circumstances such as people subjecting a leader to challenges, whether willingly or by mistake, whether within the team being led or from outside, will always require courage on the part of the leader.
Courage therefore helps a leader to make progress through challenges and instituting appropriate changes for improvements in an organization. Cottrell and Harvey (2004) with this respect claimed that “leadership and courage must be viewed as synonymous concepts” (Cottrell and Harvey, 2004, p. 8).
Another considerable element of leadership is conversation, an aspect of a dual way communication. In the process of providing directions in leadership, a person has to communicate information to his or her team on steps to be taken for the implementation of a measure. The essence of leadership is to conceptualize and cultivate an idea that is to be implemented in members.
Communication of such ideas is therefore a necessity. The way in which a leader communicates information is also critical to the success of the implementation of the ideas being communicated. Since leadership is about influence, communication from a leader is supposed to have such qualities that will consider motivating team members into the ideas to be implemented.
A leader should therefore deliberate on the way in which information is to be passed to his or her team members and even how any other form of direct communications between the leader an the team members should be handled (Ambler, 2009, p. 1).
Researches have indicated that there is a significant degree of correlation between leadership and communication techniques. According to research, elements of speech such as fluency, tone with which a person communicates, extent to which a person talks and the level of limitations applied by a person in a conversation plays important roles in influencing the person’s leadership abilities.
All these aspects of communications together with the level of intelligence exhibited by a person bear direct correlation with leadership ability.
A person who can for example effectively communicate with team members with a considerably good combination of high level of these identified features of communication can more easily influence team members into success that a leader who poorly integrate the features of communication or one who lacks the features at all.
For easier conversations and understandings between a leader and members of his or her team members, it is suggested that the leader should be relatively more intelligent as compared to the average level of intelligence that is exhibited by team members.
A person who is less intelligent as compared to the group that he or she is leading is most likely to be ineffective in leadership for reasons such as lack of respect from the team members. The absence of respect for the leader will consequently counter efforts by the leader to influence members of the team resulting in stagnation of steps that are initiated by the leader.
A leader whose intelligence level is too high as compared to the average intelligence of his or her team is also faced with a danger poor understanding. Without proper understanding with respect to conversations, the necessary influence in leadership will be limited thereby discrediting the leader’s abilities (Bass and Bass, 2008, p. 84).
Since leadership is associated with influencing the people who are being led, it involves some sense of people’s emotions. The more a leader can move his or her subjects emotionally, the more the people will be influenced by the leader. Great essence has therefore been put forth by leadership experts regarding aspects of conversations and communication that can trigger emotional response of team members.
Elements such as story telling in interactive communications have been identified to be effective in this respect especially if the narrations are triggered from group members. A leaders can therefore improve the influenced over team members by organizing for general forums in which such informal conversations can be achieved (Liu, 2010, p. 12).
Halpern and Lubar (2003) on the other hand gives the analysis of elements of leadership in terms of a leader’s attributes such as “being present, reaching out, expressiveness and self knowing” (Halpern and Lubar, 2003, p. 9). A leader is supposed to be readily available to provide required solutions to his team members.
A level of flexibility is also necessary to create a bonding relationship between the leader and team members for better understanding. The elements such as self identification of the leader together with features of effective communication are also identified by the authors to facilitate leadership abilities (Halpern and Lubar, 2003, p. 9).
Leadership skills
Leadership skills refer to a person’s ability to lead others. Skills are exhibited by people in terms of features that allow a leader to effectively carry out mandates. One of the skills that are essential to leadership is communication. The communication skill in leadership is especially important in cases where the leader is a link between the group being led and another party.
The party could be a higher management level in the case of an organizational team or a party in contract with the team. In such cases, a leader is supposed to be able to complete the link between the group and the other party. Such a link can only be effectively formed if the leader has sufficient skills regarding communications.
Getting information from one party and delivering the information to the other party is for example an important aspect in achieving what is required by the higher authority. The leader must thus be able to obtain such information, ensure safe custody of the information and deliver the information to the relevant recipient at the appropriate time and in the most appropriate manner.
Another skill in leadership is the ability to understand the people that you work with. Such understanding helps in improving the relationship between the leader and individual team members. As a result, the leader can easily know how to handle and influence individual team members under his or her leadership.
An understanding of the necessities of a team is also important to a leader to help the leader in providing guidance to team members. Ignorance over elements facilities used by a team can create a negative impression to team members leading to their loss of interest in the operations of the team.
According to white stag leadership development for youth by youth, a leader is also supposed to have the ability to control the group under leadership. Elements of control of members of a group include the ability of the leader to lead by example.
The leader must be able to make contributions as requested by team members. Ability to give instructions, to guide team members as well as ability to supervise activities of the team, identifying any mistake made and making any necessary corrections using a responsible approach are also inclusive (White, 2011, p. 1).
Leadership skills also include elements such as understanding the roles that is supposed to be played in the given position and the features of the position in order to help in identifying the responsibilities of the leadership post.
The leader is also expected to be able to plan for the activities of his or her team and to make evaluations into performance of the team. This helps the leader in conducting analysis into the performance level of the team so as to determine whether or not goals have been achieved and to identify the efficiency of the team (Learning, n.d., pp. 2- 3).
Leadership strategy
A strategy refers to a plan that is adopted for the accomplishment an objective. In the case of a team leadership or an organizational leadership, strategy formulates the criteria that is used to source for and nurture leadership in an entity.
A leadership strategy therefore illustrates “qualities, quantities, skills, collective capabilities, and leadership culture” that is desired for a particular project or organization. The elements of leadership are thus integrated in the formulation of leadership strategy (Centre, 2009, pp. 4- 9).
Different styles have similarly been developed under leadership. According to Mercino (2007), there exist a number of leadership styles that includes “visionary, coaching, affiliative, democratic, pacesetting and commanding” (Mersino, 2007, 211).
These styles are each applicable in different environments (Mersino, 2007, 210- 216). According to Cameron and Green (2009), the different styles of leadership are used to integrate a team in one way or another depending on the needs of the team (Cameron and Green, 2009, p.161).
Discussion
Leadership is a feature that is common though not always realized in most cases in life. Any activity or action that requires guidance or approval in one way or the other is associated with leadership. Elements of leadership cover aspects that are related to leadership such as what constitutes leadership, how leadership can be made effective and how a leader can effectively contribute to a team.
Research as conducted by this paper illustrates a level of correlation between the highlighted aspects of leadership and the outcome of such leadership with respect to the level of influence that a leader can have over his or her subjects whenever such elements are put under consideration.
Courage for instance will determine whether or not a leader will make a decision or a step that will then call for response from the people under the leader. A leader who lacks the courage to make decisions will have no course of influencing the people under him. Decisions that are made under fear can also cause team members to loose their confidence and hence record poor performance.
The same applies to commitment and conversation. The better these elements can be employed by a leader, the better the leadership will be felt and as a result a better performance will be realized under such leadership. Elements of leadership are diverse but they all either have a negative or positive impact on leadership with respect to the trait of a leader in relation to these elements.
A person who is in a leadership position and yet cannot properly communicate will for example distort information along the management chain leading to wrong undertakings. Poor communication skills as well have the potential of negatively influencing team members from the objectives of the team. These elements of leadership are applied as either leadership skills or leadership strategy.
Owing to the fact that leadership styles are varied depending on the circumstances and the environment in which a team is operating, all the styles are identified to be effective in their respective specialized environment.
The level of success obtained by a team is therefore not entirely dependent on the leadership style but on the identification of the environmental factors around the operation and the way in which the appropriate style is applied.
This is because one style will be successful under one environment and fail in another environment. Leadership style therefore does not determine the final result of a team. This is in line with Fredmund Malik’s idea that there is no correlation between leadership style and results obtained from team activity.
Conclusion
Leadership is an important tool to the attainment of any undertaking by a group of people. The quality of a leader as portrayed with respect to elements of leadership is key determinants to whether a particular leadership will yield successful result or not depending on the traits of the leader.
Such opinion is however not one hundred percent supported as there are some people who can independently work effectively without relying on leadership.
Others can also fail to yield result even if subjected to the best form of leadership; consequently and in line with the opinion that leadership styles do not reflect on the result of a project, further research has been recommended into the correlative factors between leadership and the final results yielded by such leaderships.
References
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