Yousser Gherissi Hegazi

PhD in Leadership development & management

May 2014

Building strong leadership

Introduction

“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.” Peter Drucker, Warren Bennis

Leadership skills are related to analytical and human capacities that drive organizations to significant growth and senior managers to leaders

strategic leadership must build understanding

Strategic leadership defines the benefit to supply an effective alignment that allows the organizational success and the development of an organization. Leadership needs the necessary skills for the strategy formulation and the implementation of the organization. (Applied strategic leadership; Consulting Parkli- 2013). However management requires strategic leaders with managerial abilities that allow them to work with their groups of work and to adapt necessary changes. Consequently the applied strategic leadership must build understanding, ownership and the alignment of the strategic program with the function of all key stakeholders groups

Driving successful changeorganization leadership team’s levels define a clear strategic direction practical and easier to understand by all, such as:

Build the senior team’s leadership capabilities that lead to change;

Communicate clearly the strategic direction which link to drive successful transference;

Understand how to adapt and take benefit of new changes;

Some behaviors are reported as a result of work, such as:

Employees prioritize work that has greatest strategic impact;

Teams find new ways to do work that lead to organization’s gains;

Employees look for ways to support experienced strategy that link to job satisfaction and self-confidence increases

Main strategy key roleAnalytical- leaders must be convinced that the proposed strategy is able to manage the development results that reach the goals and the growth of organization. Consequently they must focus on organizing and mastering the data and developing arguments that will drive the

organization’s competitive advantage  

Human- Build the capacity for strategic thinking across work group that allow change happen and totally adopted .The second question concentrates on how leaders conceive their role as they participate in the strategy process which provides clear leadership of personal capabilities qualified to serve as a coach and guide in order to enable others to perform and stand in the limelight (T. Mullen and S. Stumpf-The effects of management styles on strategic planning (Journal of

Business Strategy, 1987)

Human- leaders view themselves as coaches or monitors and believe that the organization’s strategy define the commitment and the understanding of task responsibility. Strategy is sequentially coordinated and serves as basis of building commitment for achieving tasks. And strategy process will define a community, and will creates a team & measures the vigilance of leaders in management. The concern remains in how much strategy making creates theorists and commitment

that link to social responsibility among a large society?leaders concentrate their efforts about building community values and building group of young leaders. People who are working in an organization are well informed and seem very motivated to be a part of the decision makingwhen leaders see strategy as a continuing work and in continual development. They shape their strategy according to customer’s need, and competitors. They are driving their strategy process in reviewing critical assumptions. Research stated that changes in strategy are indicators of leadership success.

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Analytical- strategy approach creates special thinkers with high knowledge and experienced. These groups are beneficial and are working as an expert society which possesses exclusivity of the data and rationality that lead to implement strategies. Good strategy follows a lined process with its achieved task. And strategy is built upon framework plan with defined time period

Analytical human dimensions processeshuman dimensions strategy creates benefits to the organization in understanding and execute activity program. Consequently program requires leaders with ability and a broad vision of strategy development. Building strategy needs a shared language that integrates vision, mission, fact base, KPI, goal, objective, Record, Driver, strategic action plan, strategic analysis based upon principles. It’s the process of both the analytical and human dimensions that increase the quality and quantity of the strategic thinking. However frameworks and tools must be built upon shared terminology and the organizations success depends on the investment value .

Strategic leadership qualities Strategic leadership refers to manager’s potential to define a strategic vision for the organization, to motivate and influence others to attain that vision. The main objective of strategic leadership focuses on strategic productivity that develop employee skills in assessing organization needs each one in his respective sector. However strategic leaders should use reward and incentive system that encourage production and performance value for their organization. Consequently functional strategic leadership remains in individual qualities to achieve results and attain goals and requires creative mind and acuity of the environment of work in strategy making. It’s also compels to forecast, to have a good understanding of the work environment and to have a broader vision.

 

Effective leaders demonstrate their qualities through:Loyalty- leaders express their vision by their words and actions;

Keeping them updated- they should be informed about what it’s happen within their organization through formal and informal sources in the organization;

Cautious use of power- Strategic leaders should make use of power with a clever manner and develop approval for their ideas progressively and not trying to impose their ideas upon others;

Have wider perspective/outlook- strategic leaders have diverse experience and some knowledge about a lot of things;

Motivation- Strategic leaders must show passion for work that goes beyond money & power, and must be determined to achieve work goals;

Compassion- strategic leaders must make decisions with consideration of the views and feelings of their subordinates ;

Self-control- strategic leaders must control troubling moods and avoid to impact it on others;

Social skills- strategic leaders must be friendly and able to discuss and to hear all people;

Self-awareness- the potentiality to understand their own emotions as well as their impact on others;

Readiness to delegate and authorize- effective leaders should be proficient at delegation and must recognize that authorizing the subordinates to take responsibility will motivate them to achieve their work successfully;

Articulacy- Strong leaders must be persuasive in their communication of the organizational vision.

Constancy/Reliability- strategic leaders must transfer their vision until nurturing an organizational culture.

Finally strategic leaders are able to create and express vision and drive it passionately to execution

Management stylesManagement styles define the ways of making decisions and link to work style with subordinates. Consequently management styles classified two main styles, autocratic and permissive (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute- Management styles 2012). However Robert Tannenbaum and Warren H. Schmidt developed the autocratic, paternalistic and democratic styles of management (exploring different management styles, 2012). They argued that leadership style depends from main circumstances and that leaders should exercise a range of management styles and deploy them as appropriate .

There are two types of autocratic leaders:

A directive autocrat makes decisions individually and supervises subordinates closely;

A permissive autocrat makes decisions individually but gives subordinates latitude in carrying out their works

Consultative- paternalistic form is essentially dictatorial. And decisions take in consideration the best interests of the employees as well as the business. It does share disadvantages with an autocratic style and employees become dependent on the leader.

Persuasive- managers maintain control over the whole decision making processes. The persuasive manager will spend more time working with their subordinates to convince them about his right decision. For example, if some complicated tasks need the estimation of an expert, it’s not right to delegate the decision making process to subordinates.

Democratic- managers allow the employees to be a part of the decision-making and decisions are agreed by the majority. The communication is

balanced from employees to leaders .)

Chaotic- Chaotic management gives the employees total control over the decision making process. Some companies have adopted this style of management and have become among the most influential and innovative such as Google.

Laisser-faire- the leader’s role here defines a mentor and staff manage their own areas of the business. It’s the style for entrepreneurial subordinates in an organization with dynamic growth and various orientations. This style comprehends the best professional and creative groups of employees.

Management by walking around (MBWA) - is the classic technique that managers use to have more information possible in order to avoid situation worsening. It’s stated that managers listen to employee’s suggestions and concerns which will elude probable crisis. By walking around, managers will have an idea of the level of morale in the organization and can offer their help in function of the problems. Managers must maintain their role as coach and counselor and by leaving decision-making

responsibilities with the employees .   

Conclusion

Leadership theory is associated to traditions and beliefs. It’s defined as an ancient art evolved in the works of Plato, Caesar and Plutarch. There is a commitment that leaders are influential individual and person with high civic engagement. For example the principal responsible in schools foster the environment of teaching and are indirectly responsible of the level of competence and the morale of teachers. They are considered the main link between the community and the school and they are responsible about how scholars develop their cognitive capacities and about their attitudes & behaviors. If students perform the best of their abilities, the school is considered as the principal leadership of key success ( R.J. Marzano-school leadership that work).

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The same example can be applied to managers in companies or civil society who have a central role in articulating learning research. According to Hallinger and Heck (1996), in the “quantitative research from 1980 to 1995”, among 5.000 articles and studies addressing leadership in schools, only 69 examine the quantitative relationship between building leadership and the academic status of students. Researchers recommend to putt in to practice capacity building programs to educational administrators in order to gain new methods in leadership skills and to contribute toward the prosperity of their nations. In other part the strategic leadership must also build understanding and commitment between managers and subordinates, because commitment is the beginning of a good relationship between organizations or service providers & the direct community

Consequently team’s leadership defines capabilities that build a larger communication & shared cultural values of integrity, consciousness and civic engagement. However strategic leadership links to manager’s potential to express a strategic vision for the organization, to motivate and persuade others to acquire that vision. The effective leaders show their fairness through their vision, their manner of speaking and their actions toward workers and community. Furthermore the management styles is necessary to make us conscious about our attitudes at work and in our manner to behave that may hurt people or lead to mistakes. And I personally discovered that leadership in the world needs to be rethinking in terms of morality and consciousness. if the world is today in crisis it’s due to the lack of morals and the pursuit of power and money.

Bibliography

Marzano, R. J., Waters T., Mc Nulty B. A. School leadership that works: from research to results. Published by Mid-Continent Research for

Education & Learning, 2005 .

http://www.amazon.com 

Management Study Guide- Strategic Leadership: Definition and qualities of a strategic leader, 2013 .

http://www.managementstudyguide.com

 

Applied Strategic Leadership- Consulting, Park Li

www.parkli.com