For hundreds of years, autocratic leadership has been known to be a relevant management style in many industries. Essentially, an industry that involves little to no communication between group members and management will be more efficient with authoritarian managers. This perfectly relates to cedar production, group members in this case are mostly unskilled workers. With this style of leadership, there is evidence of quick decision making, and maintenance of secrecy about critical strategies.
However, in most instances, employees will feel that they are being strained working under autocratic leadership. Absenteeism and employee turnover are usually high. The leader will draw most attention, unlike in democratic leadership where the group is of focus. As the power is being concentrated in fewer hands, leaders face many problems and such an organization is most likely to collapse like a house of cards.
As the new CEO of Cedar Products, my intended style of management is a compromise between democratic leadership and autocratic leadership. Since the production of our line of products does not engage creativity and constant communication, we are likely to be in terms with industry standards with this level of management. Compromising the democratic rule for majority and autocratic characteristic of concentration of power will enable our business to improve on value.
In order to maximize efficiency in the company production, various measures require undertaking. This will infer to initiating competitive advantage in the industry. This will constitute various strategies: cost leadership strategy- this strategy will aim at minimizing production costs while maximizing profits. This can be achieved through sound managerial decisions, which are supported by software systems such as decision support systems or expert systems. These are achievable in accordance to the proposed management style.
Implementation of differentiation strategy; this will aim at producing cedar products that distinguishes our company from competitors in terms of quality. Investing in information technology can be a good kick start, as through computer aided design the company can come up with unique products. This is entirely in line with our general company growth goal. In the next five years the company will be able to fully globalize. This means a larger market share facilitating higher sales.
Employee motivation is the bedrock of any successful company. It is the point where the rubber meets the road; CEOs are serviced with a unique responsibility of motivating employees. As an effective way to achieve employee motivation, various tasks have to be undertaken to meet this end of the goal. Embracing an open door policy- to facilitate communication, facilitating employee learning and trainings, aligning employee goals with those of the organization and creating a power to change are key eye openers to employee motivation. This will enable the employees to gain a positive perspective, build high self-esteem, and improved ability to achieve goals. An increase in employee paybacks, provision of social amenities and other incentives are key to improving performance during and after change of the management structure.
CEOs exist in a mild world full of uncertainties and surprises. They are continually required to meet the demands of ever-changing consumers, workers and business owners. They have to additionally strive for better performance, better returns and desirable results. To attain this, a proper changeover plan should be instituted considering key points that are likely to affect a change in management. These include; size- small business is usually bundled with overlapping roles that can be easily eliminated, unlike large business entities that have complex roles requiring large manpower to manage. With the current business level, our firm is of moderate size and it will be a simple task merging some roles while eliminating others. Another key point is, age. Having been in business for several decades now, business processes in the company are bureaucratic in nature due to maturity. It will, therefore, not be flexible enough to reinvent business rules and procedures.
In today’s competitive business environment, businesses go through revolutions and CEOs are faced with difficult tasks aimed at pleasing customers, workers, unions, and business partners. Therefore, an efficient decision making model is fundamental. With this proposed management overhaul and reinvention of business criteria, swift decision making is guaranteed. What this means is everybody’s guess.
References
Fairholm, M. (2009). Leadership and Organizational Strategy. The Innovation Journal: The Public Sector Innovation Journal, 14(1), 1-15.
Vonderembse, M. A., & White, G. P. (2013). Operations Management. San Diego: Bridgepoint Education, Inc.
Yun, S., & Sims, H. (2007). Leadership and Teamwork: The Effects of Leadership and Job Satisfaction on Team Citizenship. International Journal of Leadership Studies , 2(3), 171-193.
