Definition of Leadership

DISCUSSION

Definition of Leadership

Leadership is defined as the ability to influence group members so as to help achieve the goals of the group (Stephen, 2004). Leaders can emerge from within a group as well as by formal appointment to lead a group. It is important for all managers to establish themselves as leaders (Shami & Lau, 2000). Consequently it must be noted that all leaders do not necessarily have to be a manager (Senior, 1997). To be a leader, one must have the ability to cause other persons to move in the direction that a leader want them to go.

Importance of Leadership

Organizations need strong leadership and strong management for optimum effectiveness (Robbins et al 2004). Excellent leadership leads to higher productivity, foster better relationship and resolve problems faster and easier. As represented in Jack Welch's "4E's" of leadership development model: energy, energizes, edge and execute, a leader is important to provide vision, motivation and attaining of goals with the followers (Jeffrey, 2005).

Qualities of An Effective Leader

An effective leader possessed qualities such as openness, encouragement, appreciation, forgiveness and understanding (Dale, 1997). A leader wants people to be truthful even when it is unpleasant to hear, there is no hidden agenda. People expect encouragement from leaders as it helps to build stronger relationships and makes one felt appreciated. Failure to recognize the importance of employee leads to employee dissatisfaction. (Kenneth, 2003). According to John (1999), top traits of an effective leader includes character, charisma, commitment, communication, competence, courage, discernment, focus, generosity, initiative, listening, passion, positive attitude, problem-solving, relationships, responsibility, security, self-discipline, servanthood, teachability, and vision.

Trust

The foundation of leadership is trust. Trust is the glue that holds the group together as a team. Leaders need to gain trust from the individuals in order to get work done (Robert, 1997). Trust is the key to effective leadership (Christel & Reinhard, 1998). It comprises of reliability, care and respect.

As stated by Ralph (1979), "Trust men and they will be true to you; treat them greatly, and they will show themselves great". Followers look upon leader who have trust in them and will usually perform better when trust is built. Trust is vital to leadership not just because that is what followers want. It is vital because it is difficult and in most cases impossible to lead persons who don't trust you (Jeswald, 2006). Without trust, leaders will not be able to direct, integrate, mediate, educate, motivate, or represent the persons in the organizations (Jeswald, 2006). Trusting in someone is similar to making an investment (Niklas, 1979). As with buying shares, a person should realize that risk is involved when making a decision to trust someone. There are some obstacles that can prevent the development of trust or destroy the trust that exists. Leaders must therefore beware of trust obstacles of lack of time, leadership mobility, an overly competitive environment, and exaggerated manifestation of the leadership ego (Jeswald, 2006). Trust can affect various organizational behavior concepts such as motivation, team management, learning and communication.

Motivation

It is a primary responsibility of the leader to ensure that all team members are motivated and feels positive towards the tasks in hand (Philip, 2004). Motivation is a person's inner drive to do something. Followers should be able to express their personal drives through work. People achieve satisfaction from successful, purposeful work. People dislike to be bored or feeling useless. For the follower to feel motivated, there must be certain trust between the leader and the follower. Leader can win the trust by getting to know something about the follower's personal lives such as families, aspirations, achievements, experiences, and disappointments. This is a slow process that requires the investment of a significant of the leader's time. Leaders may need to deal with the emotions of the persons they lead (Jeswald, 2006). Followers will appreciate the assistance rendered by the leaders and thus motivating them to perform better. Leaders can also win the trust of followers by recognizing their efforts and rewards them accordingly. Followers will be motivated by the praises and rewards that are given. However, if leaders apply praises and rewards too frequent, it will become matters of pure form and ritual, deprived of significant meaning. Sometimes, incentives are insincere and border on the fraudulent. Eventually, employees come to recognize manipulation for what it is and will either ignore it or react negatively when they realized their leaders are manipulating them. Trust plays an important part in the whole process of motivation.

Communication

Communication is defined as the transmission of a message between a sender and a receiver. If the message doesn't goes through, no one has communicated. Trust must exist when communicating between leaders and followers. Without trust, information could be distorted when passed down. Inaccurate information can lead to misunderstanding, low productivity level, confusions, errors and risk of safety. One example of poor communication is staff turnover. Workers leave firms at all stages of their careers (Edward, 1998). Workers sometimes felt cheated and unappreciated when there's no trust in the communication. Workers felt that leader is not sincere and unfair, hence chose to leave the organisation. Workers may also be confused if the leader is not sharing genuine information. This may result in rumours and create unnecessary tensions. The longer that there is confusion, the more likely there will be permanent effects on organizational health and morale (Ray, 2005). It is therefore important for a leader to develop trust in communication to prevent employee dissatisfaction and worries. Communication will help to curb the worry and re-direct employee synergies to the job at hand (Fisher, 1988).

Communication is a continual process that does more than just transferring of information - it is the basis on which an effective and rewarding working relationship is built (Philip 2004). Communicating with trust can have positive outcome in terms of improving working relationship, lower employee turnover rate, greater work satisfaction and better productivity