Leadership, Teambuilding and Communication Research Paper

Leadership theories

A number of leadership styles and theoretical approaches have been suggested. However, other theories are still being developed. Scholars have identified three categories of leadership theories- traditional, contemporary and emerging theories (Nelson & Quick, 2013).

Traditional theories of leadership

Trait theories

Trait theories of leadership aim at identifying specific personal traits believed to distinguish leaders from non-leaders. These theories are based on the belief that leaders are “born and not made”. In other words, they assume that the capacity to be a good leader is “inbuilt” and acquired from birth rather than being developed through knowledge acquisition and experience.

Early researchers emphasized on the relationship between leadership and personality. However, little evidence was given from these studies. Nonetheless, recent studies by scholars such as Lord and Maher (2003) have shown some significant correlations between the perceptions of leadership and some personal traits such as intelligence, dominance and masculinity.

Leadership style theories

Studies indicated that leaders could be recognised based on their styles of leadership (behavioural style) rather than mere personality traits. In this case, two different styles were recognised- task oriented style and relationship oriented style. In task-oriented style, the leader is concerned with activities related to tasks.

Such activities include allocation of functions and setting of deadlines. On the other hand, relationship-oriented leaders focus on their subjects. They focus on issues such as being approachable, friendly and developing effective communication protocols.

Based on these theoretical approaches, some leadership styles are recognised. For instance, autocratic leaders are task-oriented while democratic leaders tend to be relationship-oriented. In addition, using Likert’s typology, four types of leadership styles are recognized- exploitive, consultative, benevolent and participative leadership styles.

Contemporary leadership theories

Contemporary or new theories of leadership include two main styles- charismatic and transformational leadership. A charismatic leader is the one who possess the ability to inspire his or her subordinates through demonstration and communication of his or her visions and initiatives.

On the other hand, transformational theory of leadership is based on the tenet that leadership is an interactive process that transforms leaders and their followers, resulting into positive outcomes of an organization. Transformational theory of leadership encompasses four components of leadership- having idealistic influence, intellectual stimulation, inspirational motivation and individualised consideration.

Leadership profile for a company manager at the University of Texas

In this case, the president of the University of Texas at Houston has been chosen as an example of a desirable leader. The University is a public institution with the mandate to generate, organize and distribute knowledge through teaching and research. In addition, the organization has a large diversity of members such as students, non-teaching employees, teaching staff, departmental leaders and other parties to the institution.

In addition, every member has the responsibility to perform to the best possible level for the best of the organization. As such, the president must have the relevant leadership characteristics as described by leadership styles and interpersonal forms of power. For instance, the president must be able to lead by example through expressing his ideas.

To do this, the president must have motivational characteristics that allow him to appeal to the values and ideas of the subordinate groups. In turn, it encourages subordinates to perform.

For instance, the president’s ability to focus on technological development in every department will encourage employees to learn and apply these technologies. In addition, challenging students and teaching staff will encourage them to design and carry out more research studies.

Secondly, the leaders must have focus on employee development. This allows him to encourage employee development by focusing on certain initiatives that increase employee capacity to perform. For instance, encouraging and facilitating employees and teaching staff to seek additional knowledge through workshops, scholarships and other awards will increase the value of education and research at the University of Texas.

Organizational Stressors

The term “Role demands” is used to define organizational conflicts that occur due to inconsistencies or difficulties in the expectations of an individual. For instance, difficulties in examining two or more expectations or separate roles may lead to “inter-role” conflict. In addition, “intra-role” conflict may result from a situation with a number of expectations from one role.

Person-role conflict occurs in cases where ethics are challenged while role ambiguity results from a state of confusion about the individual experiences in relation with the expectation of other individuals.

Interpersonal demands are organizational stressors because they involve individuals and affect them physically or psychologically. For instance, emotional issues such as offensive colleagues and abrasive personalities, sexual harassment, poor leadership and other issues affect employees.

Finally, physical demands are types of organizational stressor caused by environmental aspects such strenuous activities, travelling, noise, cold weather and hazardous materials.

The likely impact of these stressors is a reduction of employee performance, impact on decision-making and development of poor attitude towards tasks or organization in general.

To address such situations, communication plays a fundamental role in any organization. Organizational leaders should encourage and motivate their subordinates to communicate freely with their leaders and colleagues and discuss problems to find possible solutions.

Critical elements for effective group and work team performance

A number of elements are considered critical in managing the performance of teams in organizations. For instance, diversity among the members of work teams, effective collaboration and productive management of conflicts play an important role in enhancing work team performance.

Conflict management is an imperative part of organizational management. According to Weingart and Jehn (2000), effective management of task conflicts can improve team or group performance. The cause of conflicts in an organization is based on differences that arise when people come together in groups or teams.

Such differences may be in terms of power, attitudes or values, which combine to form conflicts. Conflicts can be negative to a team or organization in general if not well management. Otherwise, conflicts lead to a better understanding of an organization and improve performance.

The task of building and managing diverse teams in an organization is similarly critical to the process of organizational leadership. Organizational performance can be strengthened by a focus on differences resulting from individual differences in terms of ethnicity, gender and age. Collaboration is another critical element of building effective work teams.

Conflicts and conflict management styles

Although conflicts are likely to occur at any time and within any level of management, there are some potential causes of conflicts in most organizations. Eight potential causes of conflicts are recognized:

Perceived breach of trust and faith is a common source of conflict in organizations. It is due to the breaking of confidence in cases where trust and faith are put in another person. Secondly, unresolved disagreements tend to cause conflict.

While disagreements are normal, inability to resolve them causes and extends conflicts. If another situation occurs, then the unresolved disagreement will result into a conflict. Thirdly, miscommunication and errors in communication tend to cause conflict among members of work teams, especially when such errors are not corrected on time.

In addition, personality clashes are a common cause of conflicts because people are different and have different ways of approaching issues and problem. People obtain certain values and beliefs from their families, churches, friends, the media, schools and societies. People tend to hold onto such beliefs. Differences between such values in an organization may be potential causes of interpersonal conflicts.

Conflict management styles

According to Thomas and Kilman (2007), five conflict management styles are effective in organizational leadership. First, accommodating is the process in which a high degree of cooperation is required. It is mostly at the expense of the manager because it works against his or her own goals, desired outcomes and objectives.

Avoidance: One person or party tends to avoid approaching the issues. However, this method is not effective because the parties involved do not focus on achieving their goals. Moreover, it does not help them in finding common grounds to solve the matter.

Corroborating: The parties tend to pair in an attempt to achieve their goals. In this way, the parties achieve a win-win scenario, which means that there is no loser.

Competing: it is a “win-lose” situation- one party acts in an assertive way to achieve its goal. There is no effort to seek cooperation with the other party or parties involved.

Compromising: In this style, both parties to the conflict end up losing. In other words, it is based on “lose-lose” scenario- all the parties involved fail to achieve their goals.

Potential barriers to communication

Several features associated with individuals or groups affect effective communication. For instance, subordinates and their leaders may influence conflict if they fail to develop trust between them. In addition, antiquated ordering system that does not update deliveries in real time also affects communication.

Poor communication languages, emotional barriers, taboos, poor attention or cultural differences also affect communication. Such barriers to communication affect the performance of the group and work teams in a number of ways. For instance, they distract sharing of information and ideas.

In addition, they distract the process of solving conflicts, passing orders and motivating team members. Moreover, barriers to communication may prohibit some members from providing their suggestions and ideas in the process of decision-making, thus affecting group or work team performance.

References

Lord, R. G., & Maher, K. J. (2003). Leadership and Information Processing: Linking Perceptions and Performance. New York, Routledge

Nelson, D. L., & Quick, J. C. (2013). Organizational Behavior. Mason: OH: Cengage learning

Thomas, K. W., & Kilman, R. H. (2007). Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument. New York: CPP.

Weingart, L., & Jehn, K. A. (2000). Manage Intra-team Conflict through Collaboration. New York: Blackwell Handbook of Principles of Organizational Behavior.