PSY FPX 6720 Assessment 2: The Importance of Leadership and Diversity 

Abstract

In an organization, leadership plays an important role for any team. To ensure that they thrive, there are three key traits that every leader should possess. Integrity, decisiveness, and enthusiasm are traits possible for any leader to adopt if only they can put their followers first, i.e., individuals of affiliative style of management and those practicing adaptive leadership. Leaders who successfully develop these traits and adapt their leadership and management styles are more likely to positively impact their team members, which in turn helps them achieve their own success.

The Importance of Leader Values, Traits, and Context

Being a great leader is more than being in a position at work. A leader ought to be someone who possesses some specific qualities that can enable them to be leaders at work in order to perform better. It can be daunting to become a good leader for some, but something needs to be kept in mind during the period of transformation: leaders are made, not born. The things that one has to endure on their journey to becoming a good leader can change them for the better and help them develop into a stronger and more confident person (Bennis & Thomas, 2002).

Essential characteristics that all leaders need to develop in their metamorphic process are those of integrity and decisiveness, as well as enthusiasm. For one to apply characteristics collectively, they must know what they are separately. The integrity character consists of the desire to achieve something and the enthusiasm to guide; the decisiveness character consists of the strength to confront day-to-day challenges with the mindset that every goal will be achieved; and finally, the enthusiasm character allows full-of-energy leaders to strive for their goals and never lose hope (Emere et al., 2019).

PSY FPX 6720 Assessment 2: The Importance of Leadership and Diversity 

I previously worked at a local cinema, where I was an employee, and the general manager was the ultimate example of an effective leader, as he met all the demands of what it is to be a good leader. For example, whenever this manager was working, he would always go out of his way to ensure that all visitors enjoyed a good time while in the theater, this meaning all the theaters being clean for the next batch of people as well as the working experience of the employees being good. Therefore, when it was time to prepare for the next film location and the staff fell behind on cleaning, this manager would take a dustpan and broom to help his team. This practice not only showed his integrity as well as firmness of imposing the standards that he was enforcing on the workers, but also himself. In addition, this move showed his willingness to ensure that everyone would enjoy themselves while within the theater. In addition, these behaviors that this leader had had strengthened the relationship he had with his followers.

When observing a workplace, the role that has the most impact on the rest of the team is that of the leader. Regardless of the ever-shifting definition of effective leadership, traits such as integrity, decisiveness, and enthusiasm have proved to be major factors when the focus is being a successful, effective leader (Hunt & Fedynich, 2019). Research has shown that if leadership can display these traits, it allows their followers to have more trust and also develops assurance that their leaders will be capable of completing the task at hand, since good leadership can make a tremendous impact on a company (Putra & Cho, 2019). The importance of this is to show that qualities that leaders bring to the table not only affect them but also affect their team and their company.

Choices that Reflect a Leader’s Values

Leaders make a great impact when it comes to motivating their employees and staff. Although there are a number of leadership styles that are being practiced by most, one style that seems to function best when it comes to tapping the qualities of enthusiasm and decisiveness, as well as integrity, so that positivity could be sustained is that of the affiliative management style. The affiliative management style is the process of having your followers or team work in a harmonious and collective working condition (Pinelli et al., 2018).

The significance of this is to illustrate that when team members and leadership can work together in accordance with their expectations of each other, it makes the working condition nicer. Regardless of how good the decision of the leader is, the role of a good follower is also at stake. A person who sets standards of a good follower is a person willing to have the courage and confidence to speak respectfully with your leader if you believe you’re not going in the right direction (Chaleff, 2009). The importance of having good followers in your organization is due to the fact that there must be common understanding and confidence regarding the things to be accomplished on both sides.

PSY FPX 6720 Assessment 2: The Importance of Leadership and Diversity 

In the video “Leadership Lessons Learned at Starbucks,” Howard Behar illustrates an experience in which his believers, who were initially very much excited about his promotion, over time had started losing faith in his ability to represent them. As soon as Howard began to alter his personality to fit some unstated standard when he was present in meetings. This alteration of his traits had begun to loosen the bonds between Howard and his believers. The leadership traits and abilities Howard exhibited that made his followers have faith in the efficacy of their leader were how enthusiastic his leader was and how prepared he was to impart his ideas and thoughts to others.

The leader, Howard in this instance, thought of followership because he realized that he was not the kind to be the quiet man in the conference room; he was there to serve and speak for his followers. This situation served to underscore how effective the leader would have been had they taken the time to listen to the issues of their followers. Studies have shown that when affiliative leaders lose their ability to motivate their employees, as well as themselves, it makes the employees feel like their work is foreign to them, and the levels of job and moral satisfaction start depleting (Preston et al., 2015). The importance of these value-based leadership and ethical leadership in this case study is that, if the trust between the followers and the leaders is lost, employee performance can be negatively affected.

The Importance of Adaptive Leadership in the Workplace

Adaptability should be a quality that all leadership should learn in order to be successful in their careers. Adaptive leadership bears tremendous resemblance to the affiliative management style because both styles of management are follower-centric, whose principal concern is how the leaders are related to the followers (Nelson & Squires, 2017). Leaders who portray traits of integrity, decisiveness, and enthusiasm can assist leadership in extending itself to their followers. Adaptive leaders who are able to adopt the affiliative management style provide a variation that is based on collaborative solutions among both the management and follower teams. Studies have shown that leaders who are able to adopt multiple different leadership strategies into their toolkit have better relations with their followers (Nelson & Squires, 2017).

At my former working environment, at which I formerly worked in a cinema hall, the management used to recognize workers with exceptionally great performance and sales by rewarding them with a “shout out.” The shout-out would take the form of the management declaring their achievements to the rest of the employees and consenting to treating them to one of their meals during the course of the week. By rewarding followers in this way, adaptive and affiliative leaders demonstrated to their followers that their efforts are appreciated and contribute to the success of the rest of the team and the company (Heifetz et al., 2009). The significance of leadership decisions lies in how they reflect a leader’s values, as a leader’s actions impact their entire environment. Therefore, if a leader can identify his or her followers correctly, it opens up a greater level of employee morale as well as job satisfaction. Research has shown that when adaptive leadership can effectively reach followers on multiple levels, it leads to higher retention, greater job motivation, and a more collaborative work culture (Randall & Coakley, 2007).

Conclusion

The leadership and management position for management leadership is vital for any organizational team, and it is also one of the most important roles. Effective leaders who are able to change the leadership and management approaches prove to be more successful at influencing others within their team in an effort to become more successful. However, management is something that is not known by birth; real and true leaders are molded through experiences. The ability to relate to one’s team requires tough attributes, e.g., enthusiasm and decisiveness, as well as integrity. Possession of these attributes will guarantee leaders and followers can succeed in living together because, without living together, none of them would be living.

PSY FPX 6720 Assessment 2: The Importance of Leadership and Diversity

Nelson, T., & Squires, V. (2017). Addressing Complex Challenges through Adaptive Leadership: A Promising Approach to Collaborative Problem Solving. Journal of Leadership Education, 16(4).

Preston, G., Moon, J., Simon, R., Allen, S., & Kossi, E. (2015). The Relevance of Emotional Intelligence in Project Leadership. Journal of IT and Economic Development. 6(1), 16-40.

Pinelli, N. R., Sease, J. M., Nola, K., Kyle, J. K., Heldenbrand, S. D., Penzak, S. R., & Ginsburg, D. B. (2018). The Importance of Authentic Leadership to All Generations Represented within Academic Pharmacy. American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education. 82(6). 637-640. https://doi.org/10.5688/ajpe6694

Putra, E. D., & Cho, S. (2019). Characteristics of small business leadership from employees’ perspective: A qualitative study. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 78, 36-46.

Randall, L. M., & Coakley, L. A. (2007). Applying adaptive leadership to successful change initiatives in academia. Leadership & Organization Development Journal.