Essay
Introduction
In 2011, Steve Jobs abdicated his position as Apple's CEO, proclaiming Tim Cook as the company's new leader. Jobs passed away that same year (Jose, 2014). Numerous people expressed their doubts about Apple's future without Jobs. Despite being gravely sick for several years, Jobs silently made sure that the company's success would carry on. Apple associates claim that Cook was actually the key driver of Apple's success a few years before the resignation of Job. The performance of Cook as Apple's new CEO was evaluated soon after Jobs's death. Cook was not planning to follow the footsteps of Jobs in terms of leadership; instead, he wanted to make a difference as Apple's new leader (MacIntosh & Maclean, 2014). Apparently, he has his own leadership style, one that is different from Jobs's transformational and charismatic leadership. Generally, Cook is more of a transactional, managerial leader, being more pragmatic than emotional. This paper critically analyses the leadership style of Tim Cook.
Overview of Apple's Leadership
Jobs was definitely a remarkable and charismatic leader, while his successor is totally the opposite. But according to some Apple insiders, Cook is as nearly an idealist as Jobs, and was said to have taken the lead prior to Jobs's resignation. Cook is also exceptionally dedicated to his work. Cook became part of the company in 1998 and is presently recognised as being the organiser of the smoothly running and highly successful Apple (Jose, 2014). As shown in Apple's design, a business strategy is especially crucial when selling technologies. Moreover, Apple depends on an intricate network of facilities, stores, and suppliers that has to work together to sustain the secret and the indescribable trendiness that mostly make the company's products irresistible and compellingly appealing to consumers.
The extraordinary success of Apple has been largely attributed to Jobs's leadership. Cook is the person who handles the everyday operations of the company and makes sure that he is informed of even the smallest details about Apple's activities. However, Jobs was the architect and motivator and the one who successfully launched the company's products in the market by introducing them at prestigious conferences (Sinding & Bollingtoft, 2012). Nevertheless, experts claim that Cook is methodical, dependable, and skilled. He had considerable knowledge of the production and logistics of the company-- areas crucial for the success of any electronic company, but not areas by which one acquires new customers (MacIntosh & Maclean, 2014). Thus, many had questioned whether Apple can sustain the strong, sustaining path that has guaranteed the company's exceptional success without Jobs's leadership.
Cook himself declared that Apple will remain successful as ever (Sinding & Bollingtoft, 2012, p. 95): “I want you to be confident that Apple is not going to change. I cherish and celebrate Apple's unique principles and values. Steve built a company and a culture unlike any other in the world, and we are going to stay true to that-- it is in our DNA.” By the end of 2013, the company had sustained its outstanding success under Cook's leadership. Cook is able to sustain Apple's dominant status in several markets and reinforced its capacities. Numerous people presumed that Apple would decline without Jobs, but the company is still performing exceptionally. Cook has held the reins of the launching of the iPad mini and the releasing of the iOS7, the company's most important modification to its operating system (Sinding & Bollingtoft, 2012; Jose, 2014). Apple still holds the top rank as the most admired company in the entire globe.
The leadership style exercised by the top management is crucial. More often than not, the style of the leader will be anchored, at least in part, in his/her personal experience, ideals, and philosophy. For instance, rooted in his personal ideals, Cook spearheaded more charitable, humanitarian programmes for the company, and he vigorously took part in the tackling of major critical issues, like creating a discrimination-free workplace, one that respects gender/sexual and racial/ethnic diversity. He also shared power and responsibility with the company's management team and motivated them to remain committed (Lashinsky, 2012). Through this, Cook exhibited characteristics of what are called 'responsible leadership'-- being actively concerned about the stakeholders of the company. Even though Cook has made an effort to preserve the corporate culture of Apple, he has clearly initiated and empowered changes in the management of human resources and in the wider corporate objective.
Applying Leadership Theories
Without a doubt, Tim Cook is a participative and transactional leader. But before thoroughly discussing how Cook fits into these leadership styles, it is important to first provide an overview of the participative and transactional leadership theories. Participative leadership, also referred to as democratic leadership, involves encouraging followers or subordinates to actively take part in the decision making. Although this style of leadership is not as widespread or popular in the corporate world, several professional sectors or organisations necessitate this leadership approach, such as facilitators, group counselors, and social workers (Northouse, 2012). A participative leader asks suggestions or advices from his/her subordinates and incorporates their ideas into the decision-making process.
Participative leaders realise corporate goals through their people, by means of cooperation among groups and teamwork, and by means of collective participation in the undertaking. Participative leadership encourages shared ownership so that subordinates will have a sense of collective responsibility for the decision made and its outcome. Participative leaders motivate their followers by showing them how important they are to the organisation (Kouzes & Posner, 2012). It is presumed that participation enhances employee motivation and commitment when tasks are somewhat disorganised. It is argued that participative leadership can encourage the appreciation of followers towards the connection between their work and achievement of goals; it guides them in choosing goals that would empower them. Certain decision techniques can range from low level to high level of empowerment, such as delegation, shared decision, consultation, and autocratic decision (Northouse, 2012; Uhl-Bien, 2005). Participative leaders often exercise empowering techniques of decision-making.
On the other hand, the early theories of leadership have placed emphasis on leadership's transactional features. The transactional leader, according to Burns (1978), “approaches followers with an eye to exchanging one thing for another” (as cited in Bryman et al., 2011, p. 88). The transactional leader normally creates definite structures through which it is clear-cut what is needed or expected of their followers, and the incentives and rewards that they obtain for accomplishing tasks given to them. Such transactions constitute the totality of the leader-follower relationship and distinguish the early leadership theories. Transactional leaders are task-centred and capable of orienting or guiding their subordinates in particular ways to attain established objectives (Nye, 2014). They exert their best efforts to achieve their followers' compliance by means of different methods: stimulating the rational judgment of their subordinates, motivating the team spirit of their followers, establishing appropriate punishments, and granting rewards.
Transactional leaders do not fully get involved in the group. They intercede in the group task once they have observed that the group is misdirected. As explained by Bass (1990), “Most experimental research, unfortunately, has focused on transactional leadership, whereas the real movers and shakers of the world are transformational leaders” (p. 23). However, transactional leaders can also be remarkable leaders on their own rights. There are leaders, like Cook, that could possess the capability of inspiring their followers to give their best efforts to attain established goals, by means of attitudes and behaviors that could incorporate contingent ewards, and involved and uninvolved management actions. Transactional leaders usually exercise 'management by exception' (Northouse, 2012, p. 195; Lussier & Achua, 2015), abiding by the rule that management should focus its attention only on aspects requiring immediate response.
The leadership style of Cook exemplifies the attributes of participative and transactional leaders. Above all, Cook has focused on promoting collaboration among Apple's depository of geniuses or capabilities such as Phil Schiller, Craig Federighi, and Jony Ive (Jose, 2014). Such attitude is highly suggestive of the participative leadership style, which promotes teamwork, negotiation, and consensus building. The importance of actual, direct involvement of the corporate executive in the development of the company's products has substantially diminished since Cook took over the CEO position in 2011 (MacIntosh & Maclean, 2014). Cook prefers to distribute tasks or responsibilities to his people and to be as less involved as possible in the activities of product engineering, which is indicative of transactional leadership. However, according to Lashinsky (2012), although his remarkably less involved or forceful but indirect leadership approach has improved employee empowerment and commitment, it has also led to a reduction in innovation and delayed decision-making.
The impact of Cook's leadership on Apple's corporate culture has been succinctly captured by Lashinsky's statement (Crandall et al., 2014, p. 541): “Cook is maintaining, by words and actions, most of Apple's unique corporate culture. But shifts of behaviour and tone are absolutely apparent; some of them affect the core of Apple's critical product-development process. In general, Apple has become slightly more open and considerably more corporate.” Basically, Cook exhibits three of the key attributes of participative leadership-- empowering, team building, and accommodating of others' opinions and suggestions.
Cook is recognised for his ability to trust or exude confidence in the suggestions and ideas of his team. He is quite lucky to have numerous people in top management that can productively contribute to the venture. Cook knows that these people are great leaders themselves with ingenious and proficient insights, and will generally these leaders to govern the endeavour. Apple's marketing senior vice president, Philip Schiller, has made remarkable progress in brand recognition and sales. He was able to achieve such success because Cook encouraged him and provided him a considerable leeway (Jose, 2012). Cook guides his people to generate a venture that is an outcome of teawork. He does this by bringing together diverse people with opposing techniques and insights. At times, Cook finds it imperative to get involved in a software problem and afterwards, in a limited amount of time, assists in resolving a dispute between teams concerning workload (MacIntosh & Maclean, 2014). Cook, although prefers less involvement in the details of the company's product development, is highly supportive of his team.
Moreover, Cook is composed and soft-spoken. This could be because he is concentrating and thoughtfully listening to the ideas and opinions of the people around him. An Auburn University professor, Saeed Magahsooloo, confirmed such (Helft, 2011, para 21): “I hardly ever saw him asking questions. He sat quietly and studied.” A participative leader listens attentively to others and take their opinions into consideration. He does not have to be loud or boisterous to get his message across; instead, he is appreciative of the suggestions of other people even if their ideas are better than his. Although the final decision remains in the hands of the leader, the contribution of other people is valued and respected. This is the reason Cook is highly respected by his people-- he is always open to suggestions.
Cook is also a transactional leader in a sense that he does not want to get that much involved in the daily operations of the company. He exhibits two main aspects of transactional leadership-- practicality and extrinsic motivation. Cook is known for his practicality. He is pragmatic when it comes to making decisions and solving problems, and he largely considers every realistic, actual opportunity and limitation (Helft, 2011). In fact, Apple is an organisation that develops only a handful of products. Cook is practical, asserting that they must focus on a few products than on numerous ones. He said once, “I mean, if you really look at it, we have four iPods. We have two main iPhones. We have two iPads, and we have a few Macs. That's it” (Tyrangiel, 2012, para 23). Cook is pragmatic in making decisions regarding the development of new products. And, lastly, as repeatedly mentioned beforehand, he knows how to elicit the best performance from his people-- through extrinsic motivation or empowering them externally.
Conclusions
Apple has been one of the world's most successful companies because of the diversity of leadership styles that its executives adopt and exercise. Despite Jobs's death, the company continues to be remarkably profitable and successful under the leadership of Cook. Cook is a participative and transactional leader. He knows how to motivate his people both internally and externally; he is open to suggestions; he trusts in the capability of his team; he is innovative; and, he is pragmatic. However, it is important to mention that Cook is more of a participative leader than a transactional one, because he is more people-centred than task-oriented. In fact, he is an ambiguous mixture of both leadership styles.
References
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