Leadership is a tool which is used by the effective leaders to control and direct their followers in a certain direction or goal of an organization. Leadership helps a leader to get things done in an effective and efficient manner .A leader is a person who wills posses good leadership skills and uses them to increase the productivity of the employees.
Leadership styles
Autocratic
Democratic
Free rein
Autocratic style is where the whole power and authority will be in the hands of the leader .He will tell the employees what needs to be done and when it has to be done . A leader practicing this type of leadership style wont welcome any suggestions and ideas from his followers .He will make decisions by himself and make the employees follow them .Mistakes can occur in this type of leadership .Because the decisions are made by one person (Leader).This leadership has lost its influence in the new business world .No one will be willing to work under this type of leadership style.
In a Democratic leadership style the leader will consult his followers before making the decisions .The leader will give respect to the ideas and views of the followers in the decision making process . This type of style is suitable in situations when a company wants to give challenging tasks, training, personal growth etc to its employees, when a big problem is identified and cannot be solved by the leader himself so in those circumstances an organization can use this style to put things right .This leadership style can motivate the employees because the organization is trusting them and sharing the decision making and problem solving tasks with them. This type of leadership style will make certain events to occur in a slow manner but often the output will be better and best.
An organization practicing the Free rein will provide full freedom to its employee's .The leader will let his followers to take their own decision and share their views with each other. This type of leadership takes place in organizations where they have faithful employees with the required amount of skills to get things done in less time and in an effective manner. The leader will be inspecting the activities of his followers and provide guidance to them time to time in order to minimize the faults and mistakes.
The theories of motivation and application of them in the workplace
In order to make an individual or a group to work or function according to our wish the particular group or individual should have an interest to work for us .Without that willingness or interest we cannot expect the required performance from them. An effective leader will use different motivation strategies to keep his followers motivated and work for him with their maximum effort.
Motivation theories are practiced by the leaders in organization for motivating their employees and keep them work in the company for long time with dedication. There are two types of motivation theories available they are content and process.
The content theories
Maslow's hierarchy of needs
Alderfer's ERG theory
Herzberg's motivator-hygiene theory
McClelland's learned needs or three-needs theory
Process theories
Adams' equity theory
Vroom's expectancy theory,
Goal-setting theory
Reinforcement theory
Maslow's hierarchy of needs and application of this theory in the work place
The Maslow's theory states that the five stages of needs physiological, safety, belongingness and love, esteem and self actualization needs should be satisfied by the organization to its employees if the organization needs to diagnose behavioral problems. Now I will be discussing about the needs of an individual (employee) according to the Maslow's theory.
Physiological - Food, water, shelter, and sex are considered as the requirements in the Physiological needs.
An organization can fulfill the Physiological needs of its employees by giving fair wages to them. Creating a suitable work place/environment providing flexible working programs etc.Once the Physiological need is satisfied it cannot be used to motivate the employees the organization has to move on to the next stage which is safety need .
Safety- employees should have a safe working environment and working conditions. This need can be fulfilled by the organization by providing safe living conditions, insurance etc.
belongingness and love -this is also called as social needs, Which is the first stage of higher level needs once the employee feels safe he can be motivated further by the social needs which consists of love, belonging to a group or family etc .An organization can full fill the Belongingness needs by encouraging the employees to work as a team .Building unity between the employees by holding constant meetings and events etc.
Esteem - The requirements which an organization needs to overcome in order to motivate its employees. Recognition (external motivator) , Attention (external motivator), Social Status (external motivator), Accomplishment (internal motivator) and Self-respect (internal motivator).
Self actualization- This is the summit in the Maslow's theory .The needs at this level cannot be satisfied because they are growing and changing time to time .Wisdom, justice truth etc can be considered as the needs or requirements at this level.
Alderfer's ERG theory and application of this theory in the work place
This theory has a similarity of the Maslow's theory .This theory consists of three needs which are arranged in a hierarchy .Those needs are Existence, relatedness and growth. The needs in the existence level are food, water, shelter and sex .In order motivate the employees using this level an organization have to provide good salary, health insurance ,medical facilities etc. To satisfy the relatedness level in an organization the manager has to provide a friendly working condition to its employees, and the employees should be provided with work assistance and support when they attend their tasks.
The growth level needs are hard to be satisfied because they are growing and changing .Time has a major influence on the growth level. An organization wishing to satisfy its employees using this level has to provide challenging projects and responsibilities to its employees and give rapid feedbacks on them.
Herzberg's motivator-hygiene theory
Theory
The main idea behind this theory is that people can be motivated by hygiene factors or motivation factors.
Herzberg came to the conclusion that there were two motivation categories
Hygiene factors
Hygiene factors are needed to ensure an employee does not become dissatisfied. They do not lead to higher levels of motivation, but without them there is dissatisfaction.
Motivation factors
Motivation factors are needed in order to motivate an employee into higher performance. These factors result from internal generators in employees.
Hygiene Factors
Working conditions
Quality of supervision
Salary
Status
Security
Company
Job
Company policies and administration
Interpersonal relations
Motivation Factors
Achievement
Recognition for achievement
Responsibility for task
Interest in the job
Advancement to higher level tasks
Growth
Application of the theory in the work place
Job enlargement, which consists of expanding the responsibilities and tasks of a particular job .can be used in organization to satisfy the employees .by using the job enrichment method and giving challenging tasks and assignment to the employees and make them use their skills and talents on the tasks will make them motivated . by using the Job rotation a manger can change the tasks and responsibilities of an employee time to time and make him interested in his /her job.
McClelland's learned needs or three-needs theory
McClelland's model of motivation is based on three needs: Achievement, affiliation, and power. Although all needs are present in all, for most people one is dominant. He applied his understanding of the relationship between these different motivations and success to management, co-founding a consulting firm, McBer Consulting Company. Their work has assisted numerous companies to improve their methods of evaluating employees and training managers. McClelland provided an alternative to the standard personality and intelligence assessments used for evaluation and promotion, helping companies to hire more effectively and also helping individuals to find a career and level of responsibility that best suits them and through which they can best contribute to the larger society.
(Newworldencyclopedia, Contributors, 2010)
Application of the theory in the work place
Achievement
The theory states that an employee in any organization will seek for success in their career. A manager can use this level and motivate his employees by giving them challenging tasks and responsibilities and providing feedbacks for what they do.
Affiliation
This stage involves team work and team spirit .A manager can motivate his people by providing proper guidance and help in his people's tasks and responsibilities
Power
Many employees in organizations will seek for power and authority at level managers should be aware of this and try to provide power to the employees. This can be done by providing authority and power to the employees.
Adams' equity theory and application of the theory in the work place
This theory argues that an employee will feel satisfied when he feels that his inputs (Hard work, dedication, effort, punctuality etc). are equal to the outputs provided by the organization to him , the outputs are ( Recognition ,praise ,rewards ,achievement etc).When the outputs are lesser than the inputs from the employee ,he/she will feel dissatisfied and lose interest in his work ,This will make the employee work inefficiently and ineffectively in the workplace
A manager of an organization has to combine the inputs and the outputs of the employee and create proper strategies to provide better outputs to the employees. An employee can be satisfied by giving Salary increments, bonuses, perks etc.
Vroom's expectancy theory and application of the theory in the work place
Unlike the other theories this theory does not focuses on the needs but on the outcomes .This theory consists of three variable that are Valence, Expectancy and Instrumentality.
Valence - It deals with an employee's expectation towards the completion of a certain task .If the employee feels he can achieve the desired expectation through the completion of his task then the valence is positive .If he feels he will achieve something he doesn't want on the completion of his task, then the valence is negative
Expectancy- this involves in the belief of the employee regarding the completion of his task .The skills ,guidance , resources and information has a major influence in the expectancy .
Instrumentality
The main idea behind this is the employees will work hard if they feel that working hard will result in achieving the desires outcome. An organization can implement PRP (performance related pay and motivate its employees.
Goal-setting theory
This theory states that if you expect good performance in your organization then the goals of your organization must be clear and well defined. Clarity, challenge and achievability are the most important aspect in this theory .An organization must have clearly defined vision on what they do, how they do and why they do. The Goal should be challenging, challenges will increase the excitement in the minds of the employees. The goal should be achievable and they should not lead to failure.
Reinforcement theory
This theory consists of three major steps or parts they are
Positive
This involves positive reaction for a positive action of an employee .For example an employee can be praised for his achievement in a certain task .
Negative
The negative method of reinforcement is often confused with the method punishment .But it's totally different from that . Negative reinforcement is rewarding the employees by removing the negative aspects.
Punishment
This is removing the positive aspects when rewarding the employee so that he won't repeat the same action again .Penalties ,Salary reduction ,and suspension comes under punishment .
Differences of motivation and leadership
Motivation is something which increases the performance, profits, productivity etc in an organization by increasing the interest level in employees regarding their job. Leadership consists of leading and directing the peoples of an organization into a path of success to the organization. A Leader is a person who makes the people follows him by his leadership skills such as forward looking, effective communication, dedication, self confidence, faithfulness etc
A good combination of motivation and leadership will lead an organization to success .Most of the leaders in any organization will use motivation and motivational strategies which I have mentioned above to make their followers do things according to organization's direction .Motivation acts as a push strategy in leadership to push the people in to the correct direction .
Effective leaders play a vital role in any organization because they are the people who plan and set certain goals and objectives and work hard to achieve them through their leadership skills.
Effective leaders in organization boost the speed of the organizational activities and increase productivity and performance in the organization.
Successful leaders have the courage to take action while others hesitate .An effective leader will be initiative to act upon a certain action .He will always have solutions to the problems arouse in organization and will be ready to accept them and anticipate them .
Over the past years many organizations fell due to the absence of an effective leader .Microsoft Corporation can be considered as a perfect example for this statement. Things went smoothly and as planned in the organization during the days when Bill gates ran the organization .But suddenly everything turned upside down when Bill gates was retired and replaced by a new CEO (Steve Bellmer) .Over the past years the company faced heavy economic damages in terms of market share and profits .Apple took this as an opportunity and captured some of Microsoft's shares in the market. An effective leader can put things right and an ineffective leader will be a burden to an organization.
The nature of group and group behavior in organizations
Group implies of two or more people working as team to achieve or reach their desired goals and objectives .Groups in organizations can be divided into two formal and informal .Formal groups are created by the organization for certain purpose such as completing a particular business project, making a decision regarding an issue etc.Informal groups are created automatically by the employees due to their similar interests and attitudes.
The formal groups in organizations can be categorized in to two they are, Command groups and Task groups .Command groups are the groups which are determined by the organization chart. Composed of individuals, reporting directly to their manager. The task groups are the groups which work towards to complete a certain task or project given by the organization.
The informal groups also have two subdivisions within them they are friendship groups and interest groups .Interest groups are formed when employees have common interests .among them . The Friendships groups are established in organization based on social factors, such as politics, sports ,culture ,believes etc. A good example for interest group is employees celebrating cultural events in organization such as Christmas, new-year etc.
The stages of group development
There are five stages involved in the process of creating a group. They are respectively,
Forming
Storming
Norming
Performing
Adjourning
Forming
Forming deals with the creation of groups .people will join the group for many reasons they can be due to a project work, or similar interest in a certain aspect
Storming
The problems will arise in the groups at this stage and they will be anticipated
Norming
The group will become strong at this stage and it will be driven towards the goals and objectives of it.
Performing
The group will start to conduct its activities and a good relationship and understanding will be established among the members of the group.
Adjourning
At this stage the group will achieve the purpose or desires of forming the group.
Factors leading to effective team work
Effective communication is a vital aspect in effective team work .All the members of a team should have good communicational skills such as listening, observing, speaking and understanding. Lack of communication will spoil the effectiveness of the team .Therefore it can be considered as a threat to the team.
Respect is another major factor in groups..Each and every member should be respected and treated equally in the groups .All their views and ideas should be welcomed and appreciated.
There won't be an effective team or group without effective leader .Effective leaders will have excellent leadership's skills to control the members of the team group and divide the tasks and activities between them.
Time management the time should be managed efficiently within the group .The tasks given to the group should be completed before the deadlines.
All the members of a team should work with dedication and interest in a team to bring out the desires and objectives of the team into reality. They should work and act without selfishness .Punctuality must be maintained well in the group and tasks should be completed in time. If not the purpose of the team/ group cannot be achieved by the leader and his followers in a group.
Team cohesiveness
Two factors influence on the cohesiveness of the team .they are the sense of being connected to others based on emotional satisfaction like the way we all feel connected to family and friends. Another is the sense of being connected to others based on the shared need to get the job done, like the way football teams need all their members to work in tandem to accomplish a victory.
Strong communication helps build mutuality between the members of the team and therefore team cohesiveness can be gained. Dividing the tasks and duties to the members and providing guidance will strengthen the relationship between each members of the team and by that team cohesiveness can be gained.
Respecting each other and welcoming their views in the group, effective communication will result in team cohesiveness.
Motivational tools
Praising - the members of the group shoulfbe praised for their excellence in work .this wil motivate them and make them to achieve more
Mutual understanding - This helps the group to get rid of stress in the workplace and work with interest in tasks.
Guidance - By providing proper guidance the members can be motivated and they will work hard to bring the desires of the group into reality
Trust - Trusting the group and providing challenging tasks to them
The impact and importance of technology on team functioning in organizations
Technology plays a vital role in groups and teams .Technology has opened a new gate in the information sharing process and the groups are solely depending on the information .All the members of the group have to share certain message or information with each other in some situations .Due to the rise in the technology the information sharing process has been made easy .there are certain tools available for sharing and conveying the information in a time efficient manner .they are computers , internet , databases ,mobile phones ,email etc. Computers make the works and duties easier in groups. For example a group member can create a report using the word processor in less time rather than writing the whole report by his hands. By using the databases the information can be retrieved and stored with less effort and less time.
Internet makes the communication between the group members easy .The members can hold meetings with each other through video conferencing and feel like they all in the same room .reports and files can be sent and received in no time using the e mail service .Mobile phones can be another excellent tool of communication among the members of the group .By the use of mobile phones the group can be informed about meetings and decisions in a time efficient manner.
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