The success of an organization, whether in medical care services industry or otherwise, is determined by the decisions and strategies that leaders or managers in the company make.
Leaders are the strategists and the decision makers of an organization; they have the role of managing, controlling and enacting policies that lead an organization to its attainment of corporate goals and objectives. This paper discusses the role of leader and their characteristics.
Who is a leader?
A leader is defined as the people mandated with the task of overseeing the attainment of corporate goals and objectives, by their own nature, they are supposed to lead their organization in pathways that can be adapted and lead success in competitive environments.
Some scholars have defined leaders as the think tanks of their companies, the difference between an effective leader and ineffective leader is the acceptability and quality of their decisions, effective leaders make timely and situation responsive decisions, they involve their subordinates in decision making.
Leaders have some powers vested in them by their positions within the organization and the role they play; they use the power to combine the resources available in the best most way that can benefit the entire organization.
Leadership is an art of managing and developing strategies to be followed in an organization: the success of an organization depends on the quality of leaders; managerial decisions are the driving force of an organization. Leaders have the role of shaping and guiding a health care facility to its path to success.
Characteristics of a leader
There are a number of characteristics that a leader need to have, however they emerge in different situation, there are some characters that are more needed in sometimes than others, the following are the main characteristics of leaders:
Decisiveness
Leaders must have the power to make appropriate choices and choose the best alternative in a situation; they have the role of coming up with the right, timely and problem responsive decision to a situation that is facing an organization. To make decisions, effective leaders consult their surbodinate and use a scientific management approach to decision making.
Strategist
Health care facilities must have strategies that guide it to the corporate goals and objectives, leaders have the mandate of coming up with the most appropriate strategy to be followed within their organization. The strategy is both the overall strategy as well as the individual operating strategy; when implementing strategy, managers should aim at developing a positive organizational culture that supports other functions with the organization.
Change agents
In contemporary health care environments, managers have the role of pioneering and overseeing the implementation of change within their organization. They have the role of seeing the direction that can yield maximum results to the company and lead their companies to the direction.
As change agents, they have the mandate of ensuring the company adopts a new system of working within a minimal time and the change is embraced with the organization.
Has a vision and is futuristic
Organizations operate in perpetuity; leaders have the mandate of ensuring they have a vision for the future, with a clear vision of where their firm is heading to, staffs and stakeholder’s confidence with the organization is boosted. Having blue print vision alone is not enough; effective leaders have the structure they will use to see the strategies succeed.
Conclusion
Team leaders have the role of developing orchestrate teams from groups in an organization; their decisions and the way they exercise their leadership power determines the success of the team. They need to make effective, timely and acceptable decisions if their organization has to succeed in contemporary competitive health care services industry.