Leadership and Management Unit 4 Essay Sample
INTRODUCTION
Leadership can be defined as the ability of an individual to lead as well as influence other people for making their valuable contribution to the accomplishment of desired objectives. Business Management can be referred to as the administration of different business activities which is very much essential for driving an enterprise towards success. It is the procedure that involves planning, organizing, directing and controlling resources for accomplishing desired goals.
Effective leadership is very much essential for making employees feel motivated as well as satisfied with their job. An effective leader has specialized knowledge, skills and competencies which makes them different from other people at the workplace.
The essay will include a critical evaluation of leadership theories. It will emphasize the identification of key traits as well as skills that make an individual an effective leader in the context of practices in health and social care. There will also focus on analyzing the way leadership can be developed and improve.
MAIN BODY
1. Critical evaluation of leadership theories
Leadership can be defined as a procedure through which leader in an organization provides guidance as well as instruction to their subordinates. School of thought in the context of leadership mainly emphasizes the procedure through which an individual becomes a leader. It also emphasizes the identification of the reason because of which an individual becomes the leader. School of thought theory highlights the traits as well as behavior that could be adopted by an individual for enhancing their leadership abilities. According to the school of thought leaders are born with certain leadership qualities (Frankel and PGCMS, 2019.).
Leadership style can be defined as an attitude as well as the behavior of leader while directing, inspiring, guiding and managing people within health and social care. It is a leader who can positively influence people to improve their performance at the workplace and can bring significant improvement in an organization According to the. Lewins there are different types of leadership styles these are Autocratic, Democratic, transformational and transactional leadership style.
Autocratic leaders are those people who clearly communicate their expectations to subordinates. They also provide clear instructions about the way different business operations are to be performed. Leaders with autocratic leadership styles are generally commanding and they take the high initiative to retain their control on the activities of subordinates. Autocratic leaders make decisions on their own without seeking suggestions from other people in a group. It is a type of leadership style which is best suitable for the circumstances where quick decision are required to be made.
An individual who intends to adopt the autocratic leadership style is required to have depth knowledge about the business. An autocratic leadership style can be adopted in the deal where the is a great deal of pressure is involved. For instance, in the case of NHS which is a health and social care, medical professionals might have to take the important decision in some emergency situations when patient health is critical. In an emergency situation medical professionals themselves have to take decision-related to the treatment of a patient and generally, in such critical cases, medical professionals cannot waste time in making the discussion about treatment with their medical staff.
Other cases where a medical professional can adopt autocratic leadership is during a time of surgery where effective supervision can be provided only through detailed orders as well as for instructions to the untrained workers. The main strength of the autocratic leadership style is that it enables leaders to make a quick decision. Another strength of autocratic leadership is that there is a high chain of command. A decrease in the morale of workers is considered to be one of the biggest weaknesses of the autocratic leadership style.
Participative leadership style which is considered to be as most effective. A person with a participative leadership style provides proper guidance to their subordinates. But at the same time, they also participate with their subordinates and assist them in a competition of the task.it is the participative leadership style that enables leaders to develop a strong bond with their followers. Leaders with participative leadership style enable their subordinates to participate in the decision-making procedure but the final judgment is made by the leader themselves.
It is considered to be as most effective leadership style for positively motivating followers for facilitating innovation and enabling them to feel motivated (Bolden, Gulati and Edwards, 2019). Leaders with participative leadership style make their members feel a valuable part of a team which proves to be beneficial in terms of ensuring the high level of team members’ commitment towards objectives. The biggest weakness of the participative leadership style is that it slows the decision-making process.
Delegate leadership style, an individual with this type of leadership style provides little or no guidance to their group members. In addition to this, leaders with Delegate leadership style delegate decision making authority to their team members. It is the type of style that can be proved to beneficial when all members working together in a team are highly knowledgeable as well as skilled.
The biggest weakness of this leadership style is that Delegate leadership style leads to a lack of motivation as well as poorly defined roles. In addition to this, a lack of direction by leaders can have a negative effect on the performance of a team. The major strength of Delegate Leadership style is that it leads to the increase in more as well as the motivational level of workers. In addition to this by delegating some of the responsible managers or leaders in an enterprise can easily concentrate on the core task. For instance, in the context of NHS, the medical professional after giving the primary treatment to the patient can delegate the authority of regularly examining the patient to the nurse. The leadership style which can be applied in the health and social care setting is transformational and transactional.
Transformational leadership style, it is a style where leader positively influences their followers to facilitate innovation and for bringing the positive change at the workplace. An individual with a transformational leadership style mainly focusses on providing the training to their workers and preparing their followers for a higher job position. For instance, the manager or leader in NHS by adopting the transformation leadership style can promote continuous learning as well as the development that could be helpful in the context of improving the quality of care.
The biggest strength of transformational leadership is that it assists in reducing the high employee turnover rate. An increase in the morale of employees is considered to be as other biggest strength of the transformational leadership style (Nzinga, McGivern and English, 2018).
The major weakness of the transformational leadership style is that there are high chances of a negative outcome. In addition to this, another limitation of the transformational leadership style is that it mainly emphasizes on fulfilling individual needs only.
Transactional leadership style, a person with this type of leadership style provides both rewards as well as punishment to their followers for both good and bad performance. By providing the rewards to their subordinate leaders positively influence people to make their significant contributions towards the accomplishment of desired objectives.
The major strength of the transactional leadership style is that it promotes an employee’s motivation. It eliminates confusion. The major weakness of the transactional leadership style is that It does not provide much flexibility. For example, in the context of NHS, a leader in an organization by implementing strict regulations can encourage workers to improve performance.
The situational theory of leadership
It is the hypothesis that mainly focuses on analyzing the influence of the situation as 3well as the environment on leadership. According to the situational leadership style, a leader cannot rely on a single leadership style for dealing with different types of situations. As per the situational leadership style, leaders in NHS is required to adopt the leadership style considering the nature of the situation as well as the demand of their subordinates. Hersey and Blanchard leadership style is among one of the most popular leadership style (Günzel-Jensen, Jai and Kjeldsen, 2018.). As per the Hersey and Blanchard leadership style, there are basically four styles of leadership these are directing, coaching, supporting and delegating.
An individual with directing leadership style gives orders and expects obedience from their followers. Leaders with directing leadership style provide both guidance as well as support to their subordinates.
Coaching leadership style where leaders give a lot of orders as well as a high level of support to their followers.
Supporting style, leaders with this type of leadership style offers plenty of help, but the very little direction to employees. In the context of the delegating leadership style, an Individual with a specific leadership style provides low support and help to their followers.
2. Identification of the Key Traits and Skills Which are Important for Becoming an Effective Leader
Clinical nursing is a leader is an individual who is directly engaged in providing direct care to patients. The role of a leader in health and social care is to positively influence other people to improve their performance at the workplace. In the context of health and social care, manager or leaders in an organization required specialized knowledge, skills, and knowledge for performing their roles as well as responsibilities in a systematic manner (Ginter, Duncan and Swayne, 2018). In relation to the NHS, the role of a leader nurse is to act as a role model for other people at the workplace.
In addition to this, it is the duty of a leader nurse is to create the provision in order to ensure the delivery of quality care to patients. The role of the nurse leader is to provide instruction, training to their followers. They are required to provide useful information about treatments and other types of assistance to their followers. According to the role as well as responsibilities, the skills, as well as knowledge which are needed to be possessed by a leader nurse, are effective communication and management skills. They should belong to the educational background in finance as well as health economics. In addition to this, a nurse leader should pose negotiation as well as problem-solving skills.
They need t5o to have a high decision as well as influencing power. Both eff4ectivre communication skills and influencing power will assist nurse leaders in positively influencing people to make their significant contribution to the accomplishment of desired objectives (Byrne, Stratfor, and Davidson, 2018.). Problem-solving skills will help nurse leaders in solving the different issues faced by their team members as well as patients. The qualities which are needed in order to become an effective nurse leader are collaboration, creativity, courage, and confidence. In addition to this, it is very much crucial for the nurse leader to get themselves aware of changes in the external environment.
The trait theory of leadership highlights the characteristics of both successful as well as unsuccessful leaders. According to the trait theory of leadership, an effective leader has a high level of ambition as well as energy. Other skills which are needed to be developed by an individual in order to become an effective nurse are honesty, integrity, high level of satisfaction, emotional maturity. The major strength of the trait theory of leadership is that it provides depth knowledge about elements of leaders in leadership procedures. It also provides a way to judge whether an individual person as a leader is effective or not. In addition to this, the trait theory of leadership can be applied at all levels in an enterprise.
In the context of NHS, a leader nurse in an organosilicon can use the trait theory of leadership for assessing their position in a firm. It is the trait theory which will enable nurse leader to develop the understanding of their strength and weakness. The biggest limitation of trait theory is that it is very much complex (Figueroa Chauhan and Meyer, 2019.). Another disadvantage of the trait theory of leadership is that it involves subjective judgment in the context of determining success as well as an unsuccessful leader.
Power and influence theory of leadership, it is the hypothesis that mainly emphasizes on the identification of the skills which distinguish a leader from a manager. According to the power and influence theory of leadership, it is the ability to positively influence others is the skills which made leader different from the manager. The power and influence theory states that a successful leader is those who can influence all employees working at a different level of an organization and can positively affect the behavioral outcomes by bringing positive change in the attitude of people.
3.Identification of own leadership style
I have adopted the transformational leadership style to perform my role as a leader nurse in health and social care organizations. After developing the understanding of the trait theory and high power and influence model, I have been able to access my strengths and weakness. I have used the transformational leadership style in order to engage with people to bring positive as well as a drastic improvement in the workplace. It is the leadership style which has assisted me in fulfilling the requirements as well as helped me in meeting the expectation of my followers.
Transformational leadership style has proven to be helpful for me in order to positively influence people to change their attitude, It is the transformational leadership style which has also helped in fulfilling my own needs (Bolden, Patterson and Thompson, 2019). By using the transformational leadership style, I have been able to inspire my followers to increase their working efficiencies and improve productivity at the workplace. In addition to this, the main advantage which I have got is that it has assisted me to bring positive change within an organization and also in the quality of care that has been delivered to patients. I provide continues feedback to my followers which assists them in the identification of performance gap and through the feedback they get ease in bringing improvement in performance at the workplace.
In addition to this, it is the transformational leadership style, which has supported me in bossing the morale of my subordinates. In addition to this, I adopted the transformational leadership style in order to build a strong relationship with my followers, as I perceive that it is very much essential for driving an organization towards success.
I just focus on the completion of the task. After performing the self-assessment, I found that I need to bring improvement in my leadership style. By analyzing the outcome of the assessment test, I found that I sometimes lose task-oriented focus that has an adverse effect on my performance at the workplace. I believe that I need to mainly concentrate on understanding the value as well as the importance of tasks rather than just completing it. I also think that I should emphasize on maintaining the quality of work rather than just completing it.
For instance, in the case of health and social care setting, while delivering the services, I need to concentrate on the quality of care being delivered to the patient. As transformational leaders, I always try to find new ways of achieving success in my field. I also sue the humanistic approach to bring the change in the culture at the workplace. I give equal treatment to all patients and provides equal working opportunities to my followers which has led to a high level of satisfaction among them.
Equal treatment strategy adopted by me as a transformational leader has assisted an enterprise in reducing the employees’ turnover rate. I utilize a charismatic approach for serving as a role model for my subordinates. I also use my energy to demonstrate the way followers can achieve their desired target. The main disadvantage of the transformational leadership style which I perceive is that an individual with a specific leadership style can achieve success if they have high potential to maintain open communication with their followers. In addition to this, leaders with transformational leadership style needs to provide continuous feedback in order to maintain the high level of enthusiasm among their subordinates can be quite complex as well as challenging task during the time of workload.
Transformational leadership can be quite risky if a leader is immoral (Peters, 2018). In addition to this, I have experienced that if an individual is a risk-taker like me and the decision taken by the person as a leader is not effective then an individual might have to face high-level o criticism from their subordinates.
In addition to this., the decision taken by a leader on the basis of emotion can have a negative effect on the behavior as well as the performance of other people in a team. After self-assessment, I found that I make the majority of the decision related to team members emotionally. I believe that in need to have control over my emotions while making a decision. I have also experienced that transformational leaders have to face many issues as well as challenges when their team members are not at all supportive.
If the employees are made to work for long hours it might lead to a high level of dissatisfaction. I believe that I need to find out the innovative ways to make most of the work done by subordinates within working hours. I have decided that I will eliminate the policy of giving money for doing extra time. I will motivate my team members to complete their work within working hours by setting the short as well as long term targets for them.
CONCLUSION
It has been concluded from the above essay is that the leadership style adopted by leaders varies according to the circumstances and demands of their followers. The other fact which has been found is that it is the high influencing power that makes leaders different from the manager within an organization. It has been concluded that both tractional, as well as a transformational leadership style, is considered to be as effective to perform the role of the leader in health and social care organization.
The other fact which has been discovered is that the skills that make an individual an effective, as well as successful leader, are effective communication, management, and high influencing power. It has also been concluded that an individual who wants to become effective nurse leaders are required to have specialized knowledge and expertise in a particular field.
It has been suggested that leader nurses in health and social care institutions transformational leadership style, as it will enable them to enhance their role at the workplace.
REFERENCES
Books and journals:
Frankel, A. and PGCMS, R., 2019. What leadership styles should senior nurses develop?. Mental health. 12. pp.50.
Bolden, R., Gulati, A., and Edwards, G., 2019. Mobilizing change in public services: Insights from a systems leadership development intervention. International Journal of Public Administration. pp.1-11.
Barr, J. and Dowding, L., 2019. Leadership in health care. SAGE Publ
Nzinga, J., McGivern, G. and English, M., 2018. Examining clinical leadership in Kenyan public hospitals through the distributed leadership lens. Health policy and planning, 33(suppl_2), pp.ii27-ii34.
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Günzel-Jensen, F., Jain, A.K. and Kjeldsen, A.M., 2018. Distributed leadership in health care: The role of formal leadership styles and organizational efficacy. Leadership.14(1). pp.110-133.
Ginter, P.M., Duncan, W.J. and Swayne, L.E., 2018. The strategic management of health care organizations. John Wiley & Sons.
Byrne, L., Stratford, A. and Davidson, L., 2018. The global need for lived experience leadership. Psychiatric rehabilitation journal. 41(1). pp.76.
Figueroa, C.A., Chauhan, A. and Meyer, L., 2019. Priorities and challenges for health leadership and workforce management globally: a rapid review. BMC health services research. 19(1).pp.239.
Bolden, R., Patterson, M., and Thompson, E., 2019. Developing systems leadership in public health: A scoping report.
Peters, S.C., 2018. Defining social work leadership: a theoretical and conceptual review and analysis. Journal of Social Work Practice. 32(1). pp.31-44.