Introduction
Organizations are often faced with unique challenges that require special leadership skills. Leadership has been a topic of interest in the organizational contexts with the focal assumption highlighting leadership as a process rather than an event. According to Yukl (2010), leadership is a process of influencing others by facilitating collective engagements to achieve shared objectives. From this definition, leadership is not an event, but rather a process in which the efforts of other members are brought on board under the guidance of a leader to collectively address challenges that may emerge.
Leaders can be categorized as courageous leaders, inspirational leaders, and servant leaders. Courageous leaders will bravely pursue a vision even in the face of imminent risks and opposition and have strong stands in regard to what they want to achieve. Inspirational leaders are characterized by their passionate commitment to ideals and develop positive attitudes that help to establish emotional connections with the followers to strengthen the commitment of people towards a common vision. Servant leaders often concentrate on creating an environment that helps people to achieve their full potential.
Modern organizations rely heavily on teamwork and thus may require different leadership approaches. From a personal perspective, leadership is a partnership characterized by bounded flexibility, accountability, and decision-making and is based on service to others (Crevani et al., 2010). To adopt a leadership approach based on the partnership, it is essential that a team leader and the team members in unison shape the vision and values of the organization, have joint accountability, formalized agreements, and engage each other objectively.
Theories Review
In the behavioral theory of leadership, task-oriented leaders often plan the tasks and outcomes of the followers’ jobs and seek to ensure that each task is carried out according to the plan set out. Such leaders are often directive, autocratic, and production oriented. The underlying principles in regard to the behavioral theory are management and control. The position and interpersonal power give the leader the opportunity to exert influence as they exercise control over various variables such as job outcome. Control over individual demeans their self-efficacy and thus followers may believe they are incapable and that they cannot have control over how well they do. Control in this context is a function prior to leadership action that acts as a guide to behavior so that followers do not deviate from set plans and direction.
In the charismatic leadership theory, the underlying principle is social in nature and is based on extraordinary enthusiasm and inspiring actions that provide a channel for fraternization. For a charismatic leader, power and influence are ascribed in the social symbolic meaning and the social construction of reality which have the potential of enabling meaningful discussions with regard to the social influence. This helps to build the aspects of self-awareness and capacity to self-reflect which helps people find meaning in what they engage in and in their decisions (McCleskey, 2014). In the transformational leadership, the theory is based on the principle of exchange and raising the consciousness of followers to a higher moral point to encourage them to aspire certain effective qualities. The increased levels of engagement in followers increase the leader’s awareness of the effects on followers by raising their emotional intelligence. Much of the power and influence of transformational leaders is based on the personal, ethical, or moral framework and the ability of the leader to raise the concern in morality and ethics in followers.
Theories Critique
In the classical theories, leadership is dominantly referenced on the basis of characteristics and behavior of the leader. The main strength of the classical theories is that leadership relations are viewed in the context of a formal hierarchy which is socially predetermined and thus there is a clear definition of who the leader or supervisor is and who the follower is. From the classical approach, leaders are seen as having particular personality traits that differ from those of the followers or subordinates. The major weakness in this regard is that concentrating on individual characteristics might not explain the reality behind leadership in cases where situational differences emerge (McCleskey, 2014). A leadership theory that classifies people may also be fuzzy and thus limit individual strengths in the team.
The contemporary theoretical approaches conceptualize leadership as a process of interaction. The major strength of the contemporary theoretical approaches to leadership is that the group or team performance is considered well beyond the economic perspective to include shared experiences (McCleskey, 2014). It also pays respect to the current perceptions and expectations based on the reality of the situations rather than an imposed directional setting. In reference to the contemporary approaches of the leadership context, leadership is depicted as being a complex, dynamic, and ambiguous process characterized by subjective constructions of reality. The sequence of multidirectional and reciprocal influences at different levels conceptualizes leadership as a social construction and as a projection of human imagination.
Theories Application
Inspirational leaders and servant leaders exemplify aspects related to transformational and charismatic leadership theories as well as behavioral theories. Inspirational leaders seek to inspire others by positively influencing their actions and involvements. This is achieved as the leaders engage the followers to find a reason to morally pursue certain actions rather than impose the directions on the individuals. On the other hand, the servant leaders will use their desire to serve and a strong belief in certain objective ideas to influence the followers to pursue a particular path in relation to their actions and beliefs. In the servant leadership, the needs of followers are the first priority of a servant leader and thus self-interests of leaders are placed in a subservient position. The inspirational leaders and servant leaders are characterized by the enduring spirit to establish a relationship with the followers and bring them on board in the leadership process. This means that the followers are active participants as depicted in the contemporary theories of leadership. Both leadership styles focus on tasks and goals, but first by building a relationship with the followers which explains how the leadership aspects relate to the behavioral theories of leadership. These considerations influence the decision-making process because it places the followers first and thus decision-making should serve the people as a matter of priority to fulfill the organizational goals and processes.
For the courageous leaders, they tend to set out plans which may not necessarily be in line with the common interest of the followers but focused on achieving results against the social odds. In the courageous leadership model, the leader may not be focused on building relationships but rather setting defined goals that the followers are expected to follow. This leadership style may be effective in situations where processes and activities are defined and alterations based on different interest points may adversely affect the effectiveness of the overall process.
In an organization, there are various factors at play. The factors may include the social dynamics and a defined goal that should be achieved. In an organization where different interconnected sectors exist, it is impractical to set and achieve defined goals when the different sectors are not socially connected. The social connections are the basis of understanding the relevance of one sector in relation to another. In this regard, leadership is about building a consensus by first getting people to know how their input relates to the achievement of the overall goal (McCleskey, 2014). From this perspective, the application of contemporary leadership theories that emphasize relationships and shared experiences is paramount before defining the goals and objectives as facilitated by the classical leadership theory.
Summary
Leadership theories draw from both the contemporary and classical theoretical contexts to address the processes that are essential to effective leadership in the organizational context. From the contemporary perspective, the aspects of collective involvements, human motivation, and guiding change are essential elements. The classical theories also highlight the importance of influence and setting goals as one way to achieve results in the organization. These theoretical assumptions highlight the importance of treating leadership as a partnership process in which team functioning is more important than the individual leader’s qualities. Rather than funneling the leadership process, the importance of engagement and collaboration is important thus supports my perspective of leadership as a partnership.
References
Crevani, L., Lindgren, M., & Packendorff, J. (2010). Leadership, not leaders: On the study of leadership as practices and interactions. Scandinavian Journal of Management, 26(1), 77-86.
McCleskey, J. A. (2014). Situational, Transformational, and Transactional Leadership and Leadership Development. Journal of Business Studies Quarterly, 5(4), 117-130.
Yukl, G. (2010). Leadership in Organizations (7th ed.). New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
