Theme 5: Your Vision of Leadership (Double Weighted)

 

Source: BrainyQuote

The past ten weeks of learning about leadership have benefit to me. Throughout the module, I had learnt many leadership skills and models, and able to differentiate for choosing leadership skill which most suits me. The leadership style that I prefer or I want to be is the transformational leadership. According to Burns (1978), transformational leadership is the leader and his followers help each other to achieve a higher level of motivation and morale.

Figure 1: Transformational Leadership Model (Murray 2015)

Current CEO in Microsoft, Satya Nadella is well-known for being a successful transformational leader. According to Evans (2017), Nadella realised the high demand of cloud service market, therefore he set a new vision for the organisation to engage in the cloud business. He came out some strategies and provide the way of achievement, therefore the team felt confidence and implemented them, resulted in Microsoft earned a $20 billion in 2017 (Cava 2017). Besides, Nadella believed in empathy, values, and trust (Hughes 2017). He looked into every level of the organisation, and propose some specific shifts in culture to improve. He also trusted his subordinates and encouraged them to drive out their values and strengths, so that the team felt motivated and giving their best (Barisso 2017). In addition, Nadella frequently took others’ feelings and perspective into consideration when in work, which helps to build up a loyal and trust relationship among the team, thus deliver a high-level job (Barisso 2017).

Figure 2: Satya Nadella at the Microsoft Developers Build Conference (Simonite 2017)

Video 1: PayPal CEO and Microsoft CEO Share Insights on Leadership (2017)

In my current working environment, I believe that my department Deputy General Manager (DGM) is successful in leading the team. The implementation of Adair Model which always motivate the whole team had resulted in everyone happy and willing to work with him. Besides, he had also applied Kotter’s 8 steps model of change, which he encourages people to perform change and assign the right person to implement change. In addition, he will set a clear vision and develop a strategy to achieve the vision, then only express the vision to the team, to make sure that we are on the right direction. The reward system applied by him had motivated us to continuously achieve high performance. Both leaders discussed in the blog had inspired me and provide a clearer understanding of effective leadership, which I can learn and implement in future.

In order to become a transformational leader, Anderson (1998) stated that 3 shiftings are required to develop this leadership style, such as: style-shifting, role-shifting and skill-shifting. Style-shifting is the ability to make people change their personal style to achieve both target and demand. Role-shifting is the ability to figure out the suitable communication methods in right time, whereas skill-shifting is the ability to combine all different skills to accomplish every task.

A successful leader must become a risk-taker. Leader must always learn about calculating and taking risk, as well as continuously seek for improvement. According to Harvey (2017), when a leader is calculating the risks, he can predict the success rate and comes out some plans to avoid or overcome risks. Besides, a leader should recognise and admit his mistakes, because it is the opportunity to learn and gain knowledge (Llopis 2015).

Based on the test result from http://www.16personalities.com test, I realised my defender personality, which becomes one of the strengths when leading the team, as I can take care of my subordinates and give advice to them when facing any issues. However, I found out that my willingness to take risks is low, meaning that I resist changing. Therefore, it is necessary to learn about both risk and change management.

Figure 3: Test Result from 16 Personalities Test (16personalities 2018)

Risk management can help me to identify the critical risks and come out corresponding solutions, whereas change management can increase employee engagement and sustainability of changes. Since there are some projects in my current workplace which require implementation of changes in the whole system, I can learn the ways of influencing others to change from my project manager. Seeking her way to deal with other stakeholders can gain me a lot of knowledge, thus improving my leadership skill.

Besides, according to peer review from teammates, I am not likely to encourage and provide confidence to other people, as well as lack of self-confidence. Therefore, I should learn about motivation skill, by foster collaboration within all team members and appreciate their ideas. Keeping the whole team happiness is also important as a leader, due to positive attitude and atmosphere will lead to high progress of works.

In conclusion, I strongly believe that leaders are made rather than born, therefore having a proper leadership skill is important to become an effective leader. In my MBA studies and workplace, I will continue to improve my leadership skill so that I can turn around to become a good leader in future.

(784 words)

Reference

Anderson, T. (1998). Transforming Leadership: Equipping Yourself and Coaching Others to Build the Leadership Organization. US: CRC Press.

Barisso, J. (2017) Microsoft’s CEO Sent An Extraordinary Email To Employees After They Committed An Epic Fail [online] available from <https://www.inc.com/justin-bariso/microsofts-ceo-sent-an-extraordinary-email-to-employees-after-they-committed-an-.html&gt; [22 March 2018]

Burns, J. (1978) Transformational Leadership [online] available from <https://www.langston.edu/sites/default/files/basic-content-files/TransformationalLeadership.pdf&gt; [22 March 2018]

Cava, M. (2017) Microsoft’s Nadella Hits Promised $20 Billion Cloud Milestone Months Early [online] available from <https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/news/2017/10/26/microsofts-nadella-hits-promised-20-billion-cloud-milestone-months-early/804711001&gt; [22 March 2018]

Evans, B. (2017) 10 Powerful Examples Of Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella’s Transformative Vision [online] available from <https://www.forbes.com/sites/bobevans1/2017/07/26/10-powerful-examples-of-microsoft-ceo-satya-nadellas-transformative-vision/#4636545d24fb&gt; [22 March 2018]

Hughes, Z. (2017) Transformation In Progress: Leadership Lessons From Satya Nadella – Zach On Leadership [online] available from <https://zachonleadership.com/transformation-progress-leadership-lessons-satya-nadella&gt; [22 March 2018]

Llopis, G. (2015) 4 Reasons Great Leaders Admit Their Mistakes [online] available from <https://www.forbes.com/sites/glennllopis/2015/07/23/4-reasons-great-leaders-admit-their-mistakes/#3ab6b61d4628&gt; [22 March 2018]

Murray, R. M. (2015) Transformational Theory Page [online] available from <https://wikispaces.psu.edu/display/P5PFL/TRANSFORMATIONAL+Theory+Page&gt; [25 March 2016]

Simonite, T. (2017) Microsoft’s Nadella Wants To Help Coders Take A Quantum Leap [online] available from <https://www.wired.com/story/microsofts-nadella-wants-to-help-coders-take-a-quantum-leap&gt; [22 March 2018]

Theme 4: Leadership & Change

Change is very common in organisations nowadays, and can happen at any time and locations. According to Young Entrepreneur Council (2016), change management has now become essential for an organisation to promote business growth and ensure constant improvement, thus able to survive in a long run. Cooper (2016) stated that change management helped 54% of organisations to receive most funding in 2016.

Mullins believed that little management can be done for resistance to change. However, it is not totally true as a successful leader must have a strong skill in managing, promoting and leading changes. The leader must also have a positive mindset and always motivate his subordinates, as well as listen to their issues and give advice.

Sometimes, it is true that resist to change can help to avoid risks, especially when comes to the decision which the result is uncertain on success. Besides, when the members are using the same way for years, they are more proficient in the way. Changing will cause the lowered of work efficiency, which eventually results in reduced work performance and output (Chaffold 2017).

Some people are resisting to change due to they prefer to stay in the comfort zone (Mullins 2013:712). Besides, some claim that lack of information and misunderstanding of changes make them unconfident to proceed any changes (Nur Izzah and Rozhan 2016). According to Tanner (2018), people afraid of failure to apply changes. They are worried that they might not able to adapt to a new environment or culture.

Kotter’s 8-Steps Model of Change

In 1996, Kotter had developed an 8-steps model of change which outlined the detailed steps of managing changes in an organisation (Kotter 2016). The model recognises the importance of incorporate opinions and ideas from both staffs and stakeholders (Small et al 2016: 305). 8 steps included in the model are as per below:

Step 1:	Establish a sense of urgency	Leader will identify the potential threats and opportunities to promote change. Leader will also have an honest discussion with team member on why, what and how to change.
Step 2:	Create a guiding coalition	Leader will identify the stakeholders and members who have the capability to implement change, then work on team building.
Step 3:	Develop a vision and strategy	Leader will determine a vision and create a strategy to achieve the vision.
Step 4:	Communicate the change vision	Leader will express the vision to all team members, and receive concerns and feedbacks.
Step 5:	Empower broad-based action	Leader will recognise and reward people who able to perform changes. Besides, leader will also look into the people who resist change, then find a way to help them.
Step 6:	Generate short-term wins	Leader will look for sure-fire projects to be implemented and achieve success, so that every team members are motivated and accept changes with higher difficulties.
Step 7:	Consolidate gains and produce more change	Leader will set goals for continuous team building and improvement for the future change. When there is a success achieved, leader will analyse the factors of success and rooms for improvements.
Step 8:	Anchor new approaches in the corporate culture	Leader will share the change ideas and value when recruiting new staffs. In addition, leader will recognise all the key members of the original change coalition in public, so that everyone will know their contributions and efforts.

Table 1: 8 steps discussed in Kotter’s Model of Change (Kotter 2016)

Figure 1: Kotter’s 8-steps Change Model (Kotter 2016)

Advantages

The model creates passion and interest to works with the team (Irace 2018). Webster (2018) stated that Kotter’s model can provide a guideline for leaders to get the right team, as well as trusting each other when doing a job. The steps in each stage are clear, therefore it is easy to implement, if the leader follows step-by-step (Tumpelon 2014). According to Appelbaum et al (2012), it can act as a starting point for leaders to apply changes in the organisations, as the first two steps: create a sense of urgency and build a guiding coalition help team members to understand the reason of change, so that they agree and willing to change.

 

Limitations

Kotter’s model is a linear and sequential in processes, resulting in some organisations that consist of many management levels are difficult to apply (Webster 2018). According to O’Keefe (2011), the model will result in employees lose trust and credibility to change as it is a top-down model which only C-suite executives can come out real changes, and others just require to follow. Furthermore, it consumes a lot of time in order to apply the model, as each stage covered different objectives to complete (Tumpelon 2014).

 

Real-life Industry Example

Ford CEO Alan Mulally saved the company by promoting changes in both internal and external of the organisation started from 2009. He changed the entire organisational culture by coming out a plan “One Ford” (Caldicott 2014). All employees were emphasised to work as a team and created the entreprise skill for innovation (Kraemer 2015). One Ford innovation platform covered 4 main points:

1	Bring all employees together as a global team
2	Leverage Ford’s unique automotive knowledge and assets
3	Build cars and trucks that people wanted and valued
4	Arrange the significant financing necessary to pay for it all

Table 2: One Ford plan (Rao 2015)

Mulally had successfully transformed the foundation of the corporate culture by cutting down labour cost of United Auto Workers from 77 USD to 55 USD per hour in 2014 (Caldicott 2014). Besides, he also changed the internal culture where all employees to practice team collaboration over self-preservation and to encourage data and knowledge sharing, instead of blaming each other (Caldicott 2014). In addition, he had encouraged everyone to give their ideas in innovation, and he invited external guests to join the meeting and provide comments for changes (Kurtzman and Distefano 2014). Changes applied in Ford resulted in the company turned from losing 14 billion USD in 2008 to achieve a high profit of 2.7 billion USD in 2009 (Bunkley 2010).

Figure 2: Ford Motor Company CEO Alan Mulally (Ayres 2014)

Video 1: Alan Mullary introduces One Ford Plan (Phillis 2013)

 

Conclusion and Recommendations

In conclusion, a leader should play an important role in managing and enforcing the change. A good leader will always provide a clear vision for changes and motivating team members to follow the right direction. The guidance of Kotter’s model will aid leader in determining changes to apply and bring benefits to the organisation. Based on the model, a leader should always explain to team member on why require changing, instead of just providing the way of changing. Give training to team members will help them to overcome the changes and provide effective work (Gleeson 2016). In addition, a successful leader should emphasise on continuous learning to promote change if necessary and able to forecast the impacts and risks of changing (Ready 2016).

(825 words)

Reference

Appelbaum et al. (2012) “Back To The Future: Revisiting Kotter’s 1996 Change Model”. Journal Of Management Development [online] 31 (8), 764-782. available from <https://www.researchgate.net/publication/242339672_Back_to_the_future_Revisiting_Kotter’s_1996_change_model&gt; [15 March 2018]

Ayres, M. (2014) 3 Things Every Sales Rep Should Learn From Alan Mulally [online] available from <https://wideangle.com/3-things-every-sales-rep-learn-alan-mulally-ceo-ford&gt; [15 March 2018]

Bunkley, N. (2010) Lessons At Toyota Help Alan Mulally Of Ford Post Profit [online] available from <http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/29/business/29ford.html&gt; [15 March 2018]

Caldicott, S. (2014) Why Ford’s Alan Mulally Is An Innovation CEO For The Record Books[online] available from <https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahcaldicott/2014/06/25/why-fords-alan-mulally-is-an-innovation-ceo-for-the-record-books/#7ec76d507c04&gt; [15 March 2018]

Chaffold, J. (2017) 8 Reasons Why Employee Productivity May Suffer – Insperity [online] available from <https://www.insperity.com/blog/8-reasons-why-employee-productivity-may-suffer&gt; [17 March 2018]

Cooper, A. (2016) Why Leaders Need To Lead Change, Not Just Manage It [online] available from <https://www.cgsinc.com/blog/business-leaders-change-management&gt; [15 March 2018]

Gleeson, B. (2016) 8 Steps To Help Your Employees Accept Change [online] available from <https://www.inc.com/brent-gleeson/8-steps-for-helping-your-employees-accept-change.html&gt; [15 March 2018]

Irace, A. (2018) The 8-Step Process For Leading Change [online] available from <https://www.kotterinc.com/8-steps-process-for-leading-change&gt; [13 March 2018]

Kotter, J. (2016) 8-STEP PROCESS [online] available from <https://www.kotterinc.com/8-steps-process-for-leading-change&gt; [13 March 2018]

Kraemer, H. (2015) How Ford CEO Alan Mullaly Turned A Broken Company Into The Industry’S Comeback Kid [online] available from <https://qz.com/431078/how-ford-ceo-alan-mullaly-turned-a-broken-company-into-the-industrys-comeback-kid&gt; [15 March 2018]

Kurtzman, J. and Distefano, M. (2014) Alan Mulally: The Man Who Saved Ford [online] available from <https://www.kornferry.com/institute/alan-mulally-man-who-saved-ford&gt; [15 March 2018]

Mullins, L. (2013) Management And Organisational Behaviour. 10th edn. New Jersey: FT Publishing International

Nur Izzah and Rozhan (2016) “Resistance To Change: The Moderating Effects Of Leader-Member Exchange And Role Breadth Self-Efficacy”. Journal Of Advanced Management Science [online] 4 (1), 72-76. available from <https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Resistance-to-Change%3A-The-Moderating-Effects-of-Le-Izzah-Radzi/5f8b4c3cd03421e04f20d3cb98aee745c4d58216&gt; [7 March 2018]

O’Keefe, K. (2011) Corporate Communications: Where Kotter’S 8 Steps Gets It Wrong [online] available from <https://www.cebglobal.com/blogs/where-kotters-8-steps-gets-it-wrong&gt; [15 March 2018]

Rao, M. (2015) “Embrace Change Effectively To Achieve Organizational Excellence And Effectiveness”. Industrial And Commercial Training [online] 47 (3), 145-150. available from <http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/ICT-10-2014-0065&gt; [15 March 2018]

Ready, D. (2016) 4 Things Successful Change Leaders Do Well [online] available from <https://hbr.org/2016/01/4-things-successful-change-leaders-do-well&gt; [14 March 2018]

Small et al. (2016) “Using Kotterʼs Change Model For Implementing Bedside Handoff”. Journal Of Nursing Care Quality [online] 31 (4), 304-309. available from <https://journals.lww.com/jncqjournal/Citation/2016/10000/Using_Kotter_s_Change_Model_for_Implementing.2.aspx&gt; [13 March 2018]

Tanner, R. (2018) Organizational Change – 8 Reasons Why People Resist Change [online] available from <https://managementisajourney.com/organizational-change-8-reasons-why-people-resist-change/&gt; [15 March 2018]

Tumpelon (2014) A Comparison Between Lewin´S And Kotter´S Models Of Change [online] available from <https://tumpelontekeleet.vuodatus.net/lue/2014/08/a-comparison-between-lewin-s-and-kotter-s-models-of-change&gt; [15 March 2018]

Webster, M. (2018) Successful Change Management — Kotter’S 8-Step Change Model [online] available from <https://www.leadershipthoughts.com/kotters-8-step-change-model/#creatingaclimateforchange&gt; [13 March 2018]

Young Entrepreneur Council (2016) Why Change Is Essential To Your Organization (And How To Embrace It) [online] available from <https://www.inc.com/young-entrepreneur-council/why-change-is-essential-to-your-organization-and-how-to-embrace-it.html&gt; [15 March 2018]

 

Theme 3: Most Effective Leadership & Management Styles & Approaches

Leadership often misinterpreted as management, however both have many differences. According to Mullins (2013), leadership is defined as a skill which one person use to influence others in acting or behaving, whereas management is to get people to complete certain work.

Leadership	Management
Similarities
Both people in leadership and management are required to work with people to accomplish a task or goal (Gordon 2014).
Both will contribute to decision-making process (Gordon 2014).
Differences
Leadership proposes new ideas, strategies and techniques for the organisation (Ryan 2016).	Management focuses on managing people through available resources, to ensure that all obey rules.
Leadership emphasises on teamwork and build relationship among members (Monnappa 2017).	Management emphasises on the work delivered rather than team building.
Leader promotes social influence to encourage people to achieve the goals (Ryan 2016).	Manager groups people together to accomplish company goals with effective use of resources.
Leadership includes the willingness to take risks (Monnappa 2017).	Management tries to avoid risks.
Leadership is about to motivate and inspire people (Nayar 2013).	Management is about to solve problems and deliver tasks.

Table 1: Similarities and differences between leadership and management

 

John Adair’s Action-Centred Leadership Model

Based on Diagram 1, Adair’s Model is divided into 3 parts: achieving the task, managing the team or group and also managing the individuals (Innovative Team Building 2017). Adair stated that in order to achieve maximum output, the balance of these 3 parts is very important.

In the model, there is a 50:50 rule which mentioned that 50% of motivation is from the person themself, whereas another 50% comes from the external environment and their leaders (Adair 2011). Therefore, it is required for both leaders and their subordinates to boost their motivation together to become success. Adair also proposed an eight rules in motivating people, which guide leaders the correct way of motivating people (Adair 2011). Those 8 rules are:

1	Be motivated yourself
2	Select people who are highly motivated
3	Treat each person as an individual
4	Set realistic and challenging targets
5	Remember that progress motivates
6	Create a motivating environment
7	Provide fair rewards
8	Give recognition

Diagram 1: John Adair’s Action-Centred Leadership Model (Yisrael 2015)

 

Advantages

Adair’s model can aid in improving both work productivity and quality (Innovative Team Building 2017). A leader can determine the performance of every member and assign the suitable tasks accordingly to achieve the maximum efficiency. Besides, it can promote self-development. Motivation and guidance provided by leader to his subordinates can help team members to stay positive whenever facing any difficulties and encourage them to look into rooms of improvement. In addition, the increased awareness among leaders can help them to lead the whole team to the correct directions, thus improve overall performance effectiveness in the organisation (CMI 2008). Leader can look into the ways to maximise performance output, whereas subordinates can stay focus on their tasks to ensure all completed within time.

 

Limitations

However, the model is less suitable in the current modern workplace as it is more applicable in formal, military-type environment (CMI 2008). Many organisations nowadays are more likely to promote changes and innovation, which somehow less appropriate to apply to their cultures. Other criticism is the model is more link to common sense view and relatively simple, making it difficult to apply in certain organisations which consist of many managerial levels and face different kinds of situiations (CMI 2008).

Based on CMI statement, I agree that there is no perfect leadership style which suits every working environment. Different people have their own culture and leader will require determining the suitable leadership style to be used on them.

Video 1: How to become Great Leader (Adair 2013)

 

Good Leadership

Xiaomi CEO, Lei Jun is a successful leader in many ways. When comes to motivate his team, he had offered the profit sharing all team members since the first day the company formed. He also listens to subordinates and respects them when making any decision (Ko 2017). When the company had operated successful, Lei had donated stocks worth HK$93 million to his employees, which everyone will get HK$23,400 (Blum 2014). As a leader, he had win subordinates’ hearts and all will continue to deliver the best in working. Besides, Lei also always seek for the people who have high skills and willing to work as a team (Pandaily 2017).

Figure 1: Lei Jun and his management team (Chan 2017)

 

Bad Leadership

Yahoo had finally come to its end after led by CEO Marissa Mayer. Marissa did provide motivation to her subordinates, but with motivation through fear (Aryal 2017). The fear-driven motivation had led to negative mindsets and directions to her subordinates, which eventually caused a bad impact to the whole organisations. She never trusts her employees by banning all telecommuting and not allow them to work from home (Bort 2015). With such distrust relationship among the whole organisation, the dissatisfaction level will rise and all employees will not willing to deliver their tasks with maximum output. Due to her improper strategy and mismanagement, the company has reached a net income of 4.4 billion USD lost in 2015, and finally sold to Verizon with 5 billion USD in 2016 (Russell and Goel 2016).

Diagram 2: Annual Net Income of Yahoo (Russell and Goel 2016)

 

Recommendations

A great leader should always listen to their team members, and willing to provide guidance when someone facing any issues. Work as a team and collaboration among team members is very important as it is the only way to achieve success. A leader should always possess a strong leadership skill to their subordinates, stay confidence and motivate to support them, therefore all members will be willing to work along. And also, a leader must trust his teams, so that they feel respect and will put more efforts on their jobs (Mineo 2014). A leader can refer to Johari window to have a self-insight and always accept feedback or ideas from subordinates, promoting both self-development and team improvement (Rogel 2017).

Diagram 3: Johari Windows (Rogel 2017)

 

Conclusion

Every leader should practice on leadership styles and self-development in managing people. A good leadership skill will eventually lead the whole team more efficiently, thus improve overall performance to the organisation.

(795 words)

Reference

Adair, J. (2011). The John Adair Lexicon of Leadership: The Definitive Guide to Leadership Skills and Knowledge. 1st ed. London: Kogan Page, p.116.

Aryal, A. (2017). Why Marissa Mayer couldn’t save ‘the sinking ship’ in Linkedin. [online] available from <https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-marissa-mayer-couldnt-save-sinking-ship-aakriti-pandey&gt; [Accessed 2 Mar. 2018].

Blum, J. (2014). Xiaomi founder Lei Jun donates HK$93 million worth of stocks to employees in South China Morning Post. [online] available from <http://www.scmp.com/news/china-insider/article/1549689/xiaomi-founder-lei-jun-donates-hk93-million-worth-stocks&gt; [Accessed 2 Mar. 2018].

Bort, J. (2015). Marissa Mayer defends her famous ban on remote work: ‘I hope that’s not my legacy’ in Business Insider Malaysia. [online] available from <http://www.businessinsider.my/mayer-still-defends-remote-work-ban-2015-11/?r=US&IR=T&gt; [Accessed 2 Mar. 2018].

Chan, M. (2016). Xiaomi Founder Lei Jun, And 8 Lessons We Can Learn From The Rise Of His Tech Empire in Vulcan Post. [online] available from <https://vulcanpost.com/591831/lei-jun-founder-of-xiaomi-lessons-learnt/&gt; [Accessed 2 Mar. 2018].

CMI (2008). John Adair Action-Centered Leadership Thinker 032. pp.2 – 4. [online] available from <https://www.managers.org.uk/~/media/Campus%20Resources/John%20Adair%20-%20Action-centred%20leadership.ashx&gt; [Accessed 1 Mar. 2008].

CMI (2013). Managing Others: Teams and Individuals: Your Guide to Getting it Right. 1st ed. [Place of publication not identified]: Profile Books ltd, p.90.

Gordon, L. (2014). Are managers and leaders the same? in Progressive Cattleman. [online] available from <https://www.progressivecattle.com/topics/management/6096-are-managers-and-leaders-the-same&gt; [Accessed 3 Mar. 2018].

Innovative Team Building (2017). John Adair’s Action-Centred Leadership Model. [online] Innovative Team Building. [online] available from <http://www.innovativeteambuilding.co.uk/john-adairs-action-centred-leadership-model/ [Accessed 1 Mar. 2018].

Ko, Y. (2017). Character lessons from Xiaomi’s Lei Jun in EJ Insight. [online] available from <http://www.ejinsight.com/20170710-character-lessons-from-xiaomis-lei-jun/&gt; [Accessed 3 Mar. 2018].

Mineo, D. (2014). The Importance of Trust in Leadership. Research Management Review, 20(1), p.2. [online] available from <https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1038828.pdf&gt; [Accessed 2 Mar. 2018].

Monnappa, A. (2017). What’s the Difference Between Leadership and Management? in Simplilearn. [online] available from <https://www.simplilearn.com/leadership-vs-management-difference-article&gt; [Accessed 22 Feb. 2018].

Mullins, L.J. (2013) ’The Meaning of Management’ in Management & Organisational Behaviour, tenth ed. London: Person, p.421

Nayar, V. (2013). Three Differences Between Managers and Leaders in Harvard Business Review. [online] available from <https://hbr.org/2013/08/tests-of-a-leadership-transiti&gt; [Accessed 3 Mar. 2018].

Pandaily (2017). Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun: How Xiaomi Turned the Tables in Pandaily. [online] available from <https://pandaily.com/xiaomi-ceo-lei-jun-how-xiaomi-turned-the-tables/&gt; [Accessed 2 Mar. 2018].

 

Theme 2: Challenge of Managing Diverse Teams

Nowadays, diverse team is popular in global organisations. Most organisations especially multinational corporations (MNC) consist of employees from different varieties. Diversity is not only differentiated based on age, gender and race but also involves educational level, personality, life experience, socio-economic status and disability (Blackman 2017). As diverse team become very important, managers should learn to manage it and to match every member according to each skill with requirements of organisation (Mullins 2016).

 

Advantages

According to Viki (2016), diverse team is smarter and more creative. All the members come from different cultures, which they had experienced different things, educations and situations. Due to cultural and experiences differences, they might have different ideas, and ideas sharing promote innovation. Many ideas are generated and merged together to come out a better solution, thus the team is able to achieve the common goals which eventually bring benefits to the organisation.

Dike (2013) stated that a diverse team can promote growth and learning. When people come from different places or cultures, they will have a chance to explore the global environment and develop intellectual ideas and perspective. They can able to learn experiences and knowledge from other, result in self-development.

A diverse team can also make the company more competitive. As diverse team possess a wide range of skills and languages, it can help the company to serve and deals with customers on a global basis (Greenberg 2013). The company will stay strong and compete with others globally.

According to Hunt et al (2017), research conducted had shown that diverse team can deliver higher performance and increase company’s profit margins. The analysis is shown as per below:

Gender Diversity	Racial and Ethics Diversity
Companies with top quartile in gender diversity are 15% more likely to have a financial return and 27% more likely to achieve high economic-profit margin.	Companies with top quartile in racial and ethics diversity are 33% more likely to outperform other companies on profitability.

Table 1: Comparison of Gender Diversity and Racial-and-Ethics diversity (Hunt et al 2017)

 

Challenges

However, Green et.al (2015) stated that diversification faced challenges due to prejudice, discrimination and racism among teams. Many staffs had experienced workplace racism and discrimination due to differences of genders, races and cultures. Research conducted by Ong and Burrow (2013) showed that approximately 78% of Asian-American faced microaggression over 2 weeks. In addition, research conducted by Parker and Funk (2017) showed that 40% of working women in the United States faced gender discriminations at their workplaces.

Graph 1: Statistic of working women experienced gender discrimination at the workplace (Parker & Funk 2017).

 

Tuckman’s Team Development Model

Tuckman had developed a team development model for training team to be more productive in 1965. He categorised team life cycle into 4 stages: forming, storming, norming and performing (Elsey 2014). Lately, there is a fifth stage added in: adjourning (Anon 2016).

Graph 2: Tuckman’s Team & Group Development Model (Elsey 2014)

Forming	Team members are not sure about their jobs and relying on their leader.
Storming	Team members tend to refuse to do their jobs and find reasons for not doing them.
Norming	All team members start to agree on working as a team, and to complete tasks together.
Performing	All team members are able to achieve a high level of collaboration and promote teamwork, willing to help each other, share knowledge and able to allocate resource in order to achieve the objectives.
Adjourning	Team members had achieved success and move to new or different directions.

Table 2: 4 plus 1 stages of Tuckman’s Team Development Model (Nestor 2013)

 

Advantages of Tuckman’s Model

Every member has a chance to raise their opinions, and they can contribute more to the tasks (Darke 2014). Besides, they are able to get ideas from others, thus can improve the tasks activities. Team performance can also be improved by applying this model as all team members share the common goals and mutually accountable (Ricky 2013).

 

Limitations of Tuckman’s Model

According to 12Manage (2018), the model is more applicable to a small group only. Some large organisation might find it difficult to be applied. Next, many group processes are not as linear as mentioned in Tuckman model (Guttenberg 2017). Instead, it is more cyclical. Guttenberg (2017) also stated that the model itself lacks timeframe guidance when moving to the next stage, hence some teams will find it difficult to be used.

 

Real-life Industry

Colgate-Palmolive as a worldwide corporation had successfully become a global group of employees all around the world able to work together and maintain trust values (Colgate n.d.). According to DiversityInc (2017) ranking list, Colgate-Palmolive had achieved No. 36 in global corporations, which it involves 19.7% more women in senior management, and also 22.3％ more Asians, Blacks and Latinos into total management, compared to other global companies. In company policies, Colgate-Palmolive had emphasised on applying global teamwork and provided training for building managerial skills among employees to promote diverse culture (Colgate n.d.). It had also adapted “Managing with Respect” into its organisational culture so that employees can work together and achieve goals (Colgate n.d.).

Figure 1: Colgate-Palmolive internship program with a diverse team (Glassdoor n.d.)

However, Colgate-Palmolive still faced challenges in managing a diverse team, such as discrimination. According to Alsop (2017), there are still discriminations towards HIV staffs in its working environment, even though the company had provided HIV testing, counselling and treatment programs.

Video 1: Diversity & Inclusion in Colgate (DiversityInc 2012)

 

Conclusion and Recommendation

In conclusion, a diverse workforce can bring both advantages and disadvantages to the organisation. Hence, it is important for managers to promote teamwork and build up a good relationship and trust among diverse teams to ensure consistently high performance. Managers may consider the implementation of Tuckman’s Model into the team culture and development.

Manager should also emphasise on communication skill. Manager should deliver organisation’s goals to team members clearly. In addition, manager is recommended to listen to members’ issues and provide guidance if necessary, so that they can continuously deliver their jobs effectively. Remember, team diversity can promote continuous growth to the organisation in long-term.

(759 words)

Reference

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Alsop, R. (2017). These workers face discrimination from inside, and out in BBC. [online] available from: <http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20170302-these-workers-face-discrimination-despite-protective-laws&gt; [11 Feb. 2018].

Amey, K. (2015). Handy infographic explains hand gestures around the world in Mail Online. [online] available from: <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-3000521/Handy-infographic-explains-hand-gestures-world.html&gt; [9 Feb. 2018].

Blackman, A. (2017). What Are the Important Dimensions of Workplace Diversity? in Business Envato Tuts+. [online] available from: <https://business.tutsplus.com/tutorials/important-dimensions-of-workplace-diversity–cms-28319&gt; [8 Feb. 2018].

Colgate (n.d.). Colgate Management Training – “Leading With Respect” in Colgate. [online] available from: <http://www.colgate.com/app/Colgate/US/Corp/LivingOurValues/ManagingWithRespect.cvsp&gt; [11 Feb. 2018].

Colgate (n.d.). Diversity of Colgate People in Colgatepalmolive.com. [online] available from: <https://www.colgatepalmolive.com/en-us/core-values/our-policies/colgatepeople&gt; [10 Feb. 2018].

Darke, B. (2014). Bruce Tuckman’s Team Development Theory in Prezi.com [online] available from: <https://prezi.com/jz6ua24pksx8/bruce-tuckmans-team-development-theory/&gt; [10 Feb. 2018].

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Glassdoor (n.d.). Interns Volunteering… – Colgate-Palmolive Office Photo | Glassdoor.co.uk in Glassdoor. [online] available from: <https://www.glassdoor.com/Photos/Colgate-Palmolive-Office-Photos-IMG1139466.htm&gt; [11 Feb. 2018].

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Theme 1: Leadership and Ethics

What is ethical leadership? Ethical Leadership is currently one of the most important skills to be acquired by every leader. It is defined by Northouse (2013: 424) as the method used by a person to encourage and lead others to achieve the same goal. Then, why should a leader be ethical? An ethical leader acts as a role model to the whole team, to attract top employees, and build up a good corporate culture (Ataya 2016).

There are 2 principles theories of ethics: Deontological and Teleological ethics.

Deontological Ethics

According to Gülcan (2007), deontological ethics indicate that correctness of actions is differentiated by moral value, rules and laws set, rather than the intention behind. Basically, it carries an idea as per following: when action from someone is against law, the person is still guilty regardless what reason is behind. For example: a person had lied in order to save someone from murderer. The intention is accepted, but morally non-allowed. The limitation of this ethic is the moral obligations appear arbitrary or inexplicable except by reference duty, and sometimes it is very difficult to leverage the duty has a good motive as it will be influenced by many factors (Kant 2015).

Teleological Ethics

In contrast, for teleological ethics, the action taken by someone is more towards the final goal, rather than look into any morality aspects. For example: a soldier had killed a terrorist, even though killing is wrong but it had resulted in saving more lives, therefore is acceptable. Teleological ethics are often linked to utilitarianism, which means the best action to be taken to bring out greatest happiness to all people (Eggleston 2012: 4). Eggleston (2012: 4) also stated that teleological ethics have the meaning of consequentialism, where an action is to determine whether it had achieved the final outcome. It has limitations, which sometimes the consequences are uncertain and many actions will fail in any situations (Duffy 2015). Besides, it will allow actions against moral to be taken.

4-V Model of Ethical Leadership

Dr Grace had developed 4-V Model of Ethical Leadership with the intention of combining both external and internal factor to achieve a common good (The Center for Ethical Leadership n.d.). He summarised the roles a leader should carry out:

Values	Identify core values and adapt when making decisions.
Vision	Set up goals, purpose and directions.
Voices	Motivate the team based on visions.
Virtue	Apply ethical behaviour to working culture.

Figure 1: The 4-V Model of Ethical Leadership (The Center for Ethical Leadership n.d.)

Ethical Leader

Tan Sri Dr Lim Wee Chai is both founder and chairman of Top Glove Group, had come out a set of business ethics and implemented them into his corporate culture, which focuses on integrity, honesty and transparency. All employees from top management to low ranking staffs are required to wear an “anti-corruption” badge, to continuously remind and set an honest mindset (The Star Online 2015). Due to his effort against corruptions and bribery, Top Glove had successfully obtained ISO 37001:2016 Anti-Bribery Management System in 2017. He is also encouraging employees to raise suggestions about the organisation to seek for improvement, by giving rewards for good suggestions, and to adapt them to it.

Figure 2: Tan Sri Dr Lim gave his speech in PowerTalks (Tee 2016).

Apart from that, He also emphasises on healthcare, where every staff should test on Body Mass Index (BMI) quarterly, and ensure everyone is in good health state (Tee 2016). From his idea, the employee with a healthy body is able to think and act fast, thus maintain a good job.

Unethical Leader

Martin Winterkorn, former CEO of Volkswagen AG had caught involving into cheating scandal after the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had found out that the software installed inside diesel cars had against EPA emissions standards, which will generate  40000% more pollution than normal standards (United States Environmental Protection Agency 2017). According to Dakers (2015), Winterkorn had allowed cheating by installing the illegal software in certain diesel vehicle engines, making the emissions lower temporary so that it is able to pass in federal emission test.

As the result, car sales in Volkswagen dropped dramatically, losing around 25% of sales in US, making the company able to sold out 23,882 vehicles only in November 2015, compared to 31,800 vehicles in the previous month (Korosec 2015). Apart from that, company share price had hit over 23% drop within few days after the scandal, from 162.6 to 132.2 euros (Bryant & Sharman 2015). The scandal came to an end when US Court had finally approved a settlement between Volkswagen, government and customers, with the settlement fees of 14 billion (Tovey 2016). Winterkorn had forced to resign after the company faced US lawsuit by American investors.

Figure 3: Former Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn in a news conference at New York’s Museum (Bryant & Sharman 2015)

Conclusion and Recommendations

It is no doubt that a leader that being ethical can lead the whole organisation towards success, to build a good image and help employees to discover their core values. Therefore, to recommend that good leader should always seek for self-improvement and motivation, to stay a positive mindset, to encourage teamwork and to guide the whole team towards right directions.

(809 words)

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Tee, 2016. Top Glove emphasises on healthy workforce. StarBiz, 13 June 2016. pg 2.

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