Positive Leadership
The article “How positive leadership shapes positive organizational behaviors” by Paloma Cantero-Gomez focuses on leadership and its significance in contemporary organizations. The author explores organizational behavior as a key factor in ensuring the company’s continued development and growth. Cantero-Gomez (2019) discusses the importance of positive psychology in organizing teamwork and laying the groundwork for success.
Under these conditions, positive leadership is one of the most vital factors in positive organizational psychology. Leaders of this type are fundamental for achieving the optical performance of individuals and teams (Cantero-Gomez, 2019). For this reason, it is vital to focus on cultivating this paradigm within a company.
Positive leadership includes the three major components necessary for achieving desired outcomes. These include focusing on people’s strengths and abilities to ensure their potential is realized, an emphasis on outcomes that exceed the average individual and organizational performance, and a concentration on the essential virtues of the human condition (Cantero-Gomez, 2019). These aspects are crucial for establishing a framework for positive leadership and cultivating leaders who can make a positive contribution to the organization’s development.
The article also introduces the main models of leadership that can be viewed as positive ones. Transformational leadership focuses on motivating followers to achieve current goals. Servant leadership emphasizes the importance of serving others. Spiritual leadership implies that the needs and capabilities of a leader and followers are incorporated to attain shared goals (Cantero-Gomez, 2019).
The authentic leadership model implies the development of personal characteristics within an individual (Cantero-Gomez, 2019). Ultimately, ethical leadership fosters appropriate behaviors in followers through personal relationships. In this way, the article explains the importance of positive leadership in cultivating organizational behavior and the forms it can take within the firm.
Corporate Culture
The next article, “The leader’s guide to corporate culture” by Gorysberg et al., was published in the January-February 2018 volume of Harvard Business Review. It revolves around culture and its importance for managing positive change and attaining the desired goals. The authors state that strategy and culture are the major levels available to leaders to build high-performance teams and help organizations to boost their effectiveness (Gorysberg et al., 2018).
Strategy is vital for clarifying existing goals and enhancing decision-making. At the same time, culture is a more important phenomenon because it implies more factors vital for the work of any company. These include unspoken behaviors, mindsets, social patterns, and rules accepted within a collective (Gorysberg et al., 2018). In this way, the primary goal of any leader is to gain a correct understanding of the existing culture and its formation, thereby ensuring better cooperation among individuals.
The article also outlines the critical elements of organizational culture. It should be shared, meaning a group should have similar beliefs that are pervasive, enduring, and implicit. Individuals should realize the existing patterns and follow them. At the same time, the authors introduce eight distinct cultural styles that leaders can use to cultivate the necessary behavioral patterns within an organization. These are caring, purpose, learning, enjoyment, results, authority, safety, and order (Gorysberg et al., 2018).
Determining the organization’s culture profile is vital for any top manager, as it contributes to selecting better strategies and their effective integration into the company’s work. In this way, the article demonstrates that organizational performance can be enhanced through cultural change by employing the models mentioned by the authors. Leaders should be aware of the dominant culture existing within their teams and define an aspirational target culture (Gorysberg et al., 2018). Using this information, it is possible to establish the course and contribute to positive change.
Shaping Workplace
The third article, “How some women are remaking the workplace to better suit their lives” by Raksha Vasudevan, was published in The New York Times on September 10, 2021. It highlights the crucial importance of effective workplace organization. The author says that an individual’s effective work is linked to the ability to set physical, emotional, and cultural boundaries between work and life (Vasudevan, 2021). This approach helps to avoid burnout and guarantees that an employee does not suffer from the negative impact of work on their private life.
Vasudevan introduces specific examples of how women shaped their workplaces to ensure the existing model meets their personal and professional needs. For instance, a woman working in human resources requires others to wear masks as part of her and her close people’s security (Vasudevan, 2021). It helps a worker demonstrate higher performance levels due to the absence of additional stressors and pressure.
In this way, the article highlights the critical importance of shaping workplaces, setting boundaries, and fostering a favorable culture. Any person should care for their physical and emotional health and avoid burnout because of the pressure at work. For this reason, the ability to consider factors that might have a negative influence and address them is vital.
Leaders should also be prepared to redesign the workspace to ensure it meets the primary needs of their followers. It is key to attaining high performance levels because the existence of a specific stressor can have a detrimental impact on performance and motivation. Under these conditions, the article highlights the need to establish a distinct culture within a workplace and ensure it can meet a person’s current needs. Otherwise, there is a high risk of burnout and stress.
Reflection
Culture is one of the most critical aspects of an organization’s work, and leaders should consider and utilize it as a tool to achieve higher performance levels and current goals. The three articles above prove this idea as they revolve around similar issues. Organizational behavior, strategy, and employees’ interactions within a company depend on the existing rules and patterns that can be viewed as the organizational culture. For this reason, leaders’ ability to manage cultural change is the top priority, as one of the central aspects for building high-performance teams and ensuring followers are motivated and ready to work.
Change Management Through Positive Leadership
One possible approach to leading change is to utilize positive psychology and leadership. Cantero-Gomez (2019) defines the first phenomenon as a framework that focuses on aspects that mitigate unhappiness and increase people’s satisfaction and positive outcomes. It means that positive leaders are the central element for individuals’ better performance. They possess the ability to shape the existing culture, establishing a favorable atmosphere and eliminating factors that make employees unhappy.
Under these conditions, the positive paradigm is viewed as beneficial for modern organizations. Thus, the analyzed articles show that being a positive leader requires specific competencies and a unique attitude toward followers. It requires additional effort from a leader.
Components of Positive Leadership
Positive leadership has specific components that are vital for promoting cultural change within an organization and among individuals. First of all, it is the focus on people’s strengths and abilities (Cantero-Gomez, 2019). Leaders should understand individuals’ potential and give them a chance to realize it.
Second, focusing on results that exceed average levels is vital, as it motivates employees. Finally, human resources should be viewed as the most valuable asset, meaning individuals’ needs should be considered and fulfilled (Cantero-Gomez, 2019). Considering these three major components require competence and commitment from a leader, however, it also helps to establish a positive atmosphere within an organization and cultivate the necessary culture.
Choice of the Optimal Leadership Style
The positive change within an organization also depends on the leader’s ability to select the appropriate model. Cantero-Gomez (2019) outlined the five leadership styles that are positive: transformational, servant, spiritual, authentic, and ethical. The approaches focus on various aspects; however, they are united by the idea of positively transforming teams and cultivating the necessary culture. In other words, transformational or servant leaders focus on followers’ interests to motivate them and guarantee they are ready to continue their personal and professional development (Cantero-Gomez, 2019). It becomes vital for leading the culture change, as the positive personal example has a more favorable impact on individuals compared to authoritative measures or direct commands.
Overcoming Resistance to Change
At the same time, top managers or executives might face resistance when trying to initiate a change process within an organization. In numerous cases, it may occur due to the existing culture or unspoken behaviors, patterns, and beliefs shared by the collective. A set of these factors can be determined as the corporate culture. The model used by employees and management to interact is vital as it impacts all processes within the company. Thus, Groysberg et al. (2018) argue that the ability to define and understand a company’s culture is vital for a leader. It will help to align the enhanced interaction with the teams and ensure they are engaged in the work process.
Choice of Cultural Model
Additionally, the selected article demonstrates that different styles may apply to both organizational culture and leaders. Groysberg et al. (2018) list eight patterns, starting with caring and ending with order, that can be used within an organization. However, it is vital to understand that the integration of a particular model depends on employees’ characteristics, the degree of their independence or interdependence, flexibility, stability, and readiness to be engaged in new projects (Groysberg et al., 2018). In other words, a certain leader’s incentive should rely on the dominant culture to be successful. At the same time, the radical change necessitates the alteration of existing beliefs and a shift to a new style.
Relationship Between Culture and Leadership
In this way, the information in the articles suggests that leadership and culture are interconnected. A leader cannot be effective if they do not understand the unspoken behaviors and rules within a company. Moreover, they cannot succeed in leading culture change if the selected model does not fit the existing individuals’ peculiarities. From this perspective, the leader’s ability to understand and shape the organizational culture when necessary should be considered one of the most important competencies. It will address the possible resistance to change and manage it by providing employees with the things they need at the moment.
Importance of Organizational Culture to Positive Outcomes
Another critical idea gleaned from the articles mentioned above is that culture is closely tied to outcomes. If aligned with leadership and strategy, it can promote positive organizational outcomes and contribute to attaining higher performance levels (Groysberg et al., 2018). It means that strategy, as the guideline for attaining a specific goal, should rely on the dominant values, beliefs, and ideas. Otherwise, there is a high risk of collapse because the workers are unwilling to follow the course and engage in the change process. The desired change can be achieved if the appropriate model for interacting with individuals is selected, which requires an enhanced understanding of culture and the ability to engage with it effectively.
Role of the Workplace Culture
Finally, the analyzed readings show the importance of organizing the workplace. It can be viewed as part of the culture and one of the aspects vital for attaining high performance levels. Setting boundaries between work and personal life is essential, as it helps avoid burnout (Vasudevan, 2021). For this reason, employees’ ability to modify the workplace or establish an appropriate working culture is crucial for achieving high performance levels and driving positive change. Moreover, leaders should be ready to support workers’ incentives to create an appropriate working culture and ensure their workplace suits their lives. It is a key to cultivating a positive atmosphere and a better understanding.
Summary
Altogether, the discussed articles offer important information on leadership, culture, change, the creation of an appropriate working environment, and how it can help to attain desired goals. For me, these are vital sources for cultivating a deeper understanding of cultural change and the methods that can be used to lead it. The articles promote a better understanding that culture is a complex phenomenon consisting of various aspects. An effective leader should be ready to interact with employees to consider all unique elements and ensure the proposed change rests on the existing employees’ peculiarities, strengths, and needs.
References
Cantero-Gomez, P. (2019). How positive leadership shapes positive organizational behaviors. Forbes.
Groysberg, B., Lee, J., Price, J., & Cheng, Y. (2018). The leaders’ guide to corporate culture. Harvard Business Review.
Vasudevan, R. (2021). How some women are remaking the workplace to better suit their lives. The New York Times.