Leadership Challenge: Moving to Leadership
What are the challenges you are likely to face as the new leader
Being a new leader is quite difficult because organizations often face tough problems and challenges that need quick responses. For a new leader, this is challenging since the atmosphere of crisis provides no time or patience for learning. Secondly, most organizations are rigid and sticks to the old belief that “old is gold”.They do not allow room for raw talent, training, making mistakes and experimentation. Most organizations believe that an effective leader is that who has long years of service.
What are some of the actions you would take to help smooth the transition?
First, a meeting with the outgoing leader takes place to enable the new leader to interact and share information about the organization together with the outgoing leader to gain insight into the leadership roles. The new leader should set up relationships with the people who he will work with to try to win them. He should try to build trust with the employees to enable him to work well with them. A leader should have courtesy and act friendly and should always smile. Having a good attitude is also important as it will enable the new leader to fit easily into the new environment.
What are some things you should avoid?
One of the things one should avoid is taking oneself too seriously. Being too serious will only draw hostility from the people one is leading and as a result eliciting hatred, dislike and disfavor. One should develop a good sense of humor as this would help him to interact well with the people they lead. It is advisable not to overdo certain things. Working too hard on impressing people leads to dislike and hatred from the employees and hence affecting the relationships with them.
Leadership Challenge: Juggling Cultures
Whom do you send to Saudi Arabia as head of your team?
Between the man and the woman, the man would be my best choice as the team leader in Saudi Arabia even though the woman has more experience and ability compared with the man. This is mainly because men in Saudi Arabia are the leaders or the decision makers, while women are a minority and of no much use in the community. The men are the ones who decide whether the women should engage themselves in work, study or anything else.
What cultural factors do you need to consider?
In choosing the person to represent them, a leader needs to understand the cultural context of the host country. Discrimination is one of the factors influencing the leader’s choice of the person to go to Saudi Arabia. In countries like Saudi Arabia, defined by Edward Hall’s model as high context countries (Hall, 1976), cultural nuances communicate more and determines the kind of response received and if not handled well, this can lead to the loss of a business deal. It determines whether a business deal will succeed or not.
Women in the country are the most discriminated and disadvantaged and this is not based on their abilities or actions, but based on cultural factors. Women face obstacles and barriers of becoming leaders and men prevent them from moving to the highest levels of organizations. In Saudi Arabia, women experience gender segregation and are barred from participating in public life including work places. Choosing a woman to go on this mission would seem disrespectful for the culture adopted by the Saudi Arabian government and automatically lead to the failure of this enterprise. Thus, leaders are to know the culture of the people in question to enable them to make the necessary decisions.
What are the implications of your decision for your business and the message you send as a leader?
Understanding the impact of culture is important to a leader since leadership is a social and an interpersonal process. The leader needs to research and understand the different cultures so that he can make more informed decisions. As a leader, choosing this man to represent his company would be the most favorable thing to do as it will enable him to attain his set goals and succeed in closing profitable deals. Since the man in question does not have experience, this can offer a perfect opportunity for him to develop his skills and experience hence benefiting the organization.
For the woman who is more experienced and more qualified, the leader can explain to her the cultural obstacles involved hence not hurting her feelings. The leader can send her to go on missions in other countries that are low-contexts and that encourages women taking leadership roles. Training and education can help people be aware of their biases, understand their own and others’ cultural point of view and accept their differences. By having diverse people in leadership positions, an organization “walks and walk” and can prove its commitment to diversity.
Leadership in Action: The Caring Dictator
How would you describe Jack Hartnett’s leadership style?
A leader as defined by some scholars refers to someone with commanding authority and influence. Others define it as a person’s ability to influence people and groups within the organization and hence helping them set up their goals and guide them towards achieving those goals set by the organization (Afsenah, 2012).
Jack Hartnett’s leadership skills encompasses all the above. Though he appears bossy and autocratic, he puts into consideration the welfare of his employees and listens to them. He adopts the no-nonsense attitude and develops it into a culture in the organization. An organization can develop a culture where the employees share common values and beliefs on work-related issues. This is what jack does and it indeed produces results and leads to the success of the company.
He allows his employees to balance their family life with work and when they face problems he acts as their counselor and helps them resolve their issues. His autocratic and intolerance enabled him to succeed. He sets the rules which his employees must follow. He ensures that his employees are happy because he believes that unhappy people do not produce results. As a result, he has managed to create an organization that is dynamic and successful.
Why is he successful? Would you work for him?
Yes I would work for Jack because he is a good leader who discourages laziness and rewards hard work. The reason for Jack Hartnett’s success is in his devotion to work coupled with his cooperative and supportive workers. The atmosphere in this organization is like that of a family where everyone is nurtured well. He picks the best employees to work for him and in so doing he ensures that he chooses the best people to work for him. He motivates his employees by giving them handsome rewards and interacting well with them.
Leadership Challenge: How Much is Enough?
What factors contribute to high compensation packages?
In an organization, what determines high compensation packages usually is the place that one holds. Top executives in any organization, both public and private, wield large amount of power. The legitimacy of their positions enables them to get high compensation packages. Compared to other employees, they enjoy many privileges because of their power.This is because they are usually the ones responsible for allocation of resources to themselves and to those in lower positions.
Furthermore, these executives are usually in high demand and organizations compete with each other to acquire them.
What are the personal and organizational implications of your decision?
Yes, I would take the job but would only agree to high compensation packages based on performance. I would then make sure that I create rapport between the company’s top executives and the employees by ensuring that they interact so as to understand each other better. I would encourage the employees to become creative, support them and motivate them to work hard. Furthermore, I will make sure that I set high performance standards and tie rewards clearly and sorely on performance.
I would also make sure that as a leader, I apply power properly to meet efficiency and effectiveness. This will entail sharing of power with subordinates through delegation to make sure that the organization through high quality decisions achieves greater success.
References
Afsenah, N. (2012). The art and science of leadership. Pearson: Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prenttice Hall.
Hall, E.T. (1976). Beyond culture, New York, NY: Doubleday.