Leadership Communication - Coursework Example

? Bringing People with You -- The Only Way to Make Monumental Things Happen (Add (Add (Add Executive Summary The concept of leadership is still significant in today’s organizational environment despite all changes in business settings and technological developments occurred over the recent decades. Even though an organization has the strengths of improved technological capabilities and skilled workforce, an efficient leader is necessary to coordinate all those aspects. This paper has identified ‘leadership communication’ as the major element that can contribute to the fast growth of any business, for this concept promotes the effective upward and downward communication flow whenever necessary. A leader with better communication abilities can easily influence his audience and make them focused on the firm’s mission. By doing so, the leader can ensure integrated efforts from the part of his followers to achieve the firm’s short term as well as long term goals. Similarly, the paper maintains that a leader has to influence and persuade his audience so as to find the success quickly. Primarily, the leader should make certain that his followers (workers) hold a positive view of the organization, because employee perceptions about the firm determine the firm’s worksite culture. Hence, the leader should specifically try to convince his subordinates that the organization is particularly obliged to ensure its employees’ wellbeing. In addition, the leader has to influence other stakeholders including shareholders, investors, creditors and banks. The leader must make certain that those stakeholders are actively involving in the firm’s business activities. By influencing the audience thoughtfully, a leader can keep his organization’s stakeholder groups well coordinated in order to reach the business goal(s). Introduction For an organization of any size, active support and participation of employees and other key stakeholders are necessary to achieve long term goals and objectives. Communication is the most important factor that assists a leader to get his people focused on the firm’s mission. Hence, leadership communication plays a notable role in promoting business growth and changing the way the organization operates. In order to be a successful leader, one should influence perception, habits, and values of his audience. This paper will identify the most major factor that will enhance an organization’s growth. In addition, the paper will also explore the key stakeholders and their actions influencing the long term sustainability of a business. Leadership Communication Although a wide variety of factors play a crucial role in growing a business, communication is the most important element that greatly influences an organization’s market share growth. This element is also essential to bring meaningful changes to the organization’s day to day business activities. In order to influence his audience effectively, a leader should possess better communication skills and capabilities. Therefore, the conventional management concept of leadership communication is of considerable importance still in modern days. “Leadership communication is an interactive process in which a leader intentionally influences, and is influenced by, followers employing a range of verbal strategies and a variety of non-linguistic models” (Charteris-Black, 2007). Some old studies point out that a leader spends nearly 70 to 90 percent of their working time on communication activities every day. If the same studies are conducted today, the result would be much higher than this because nowadays leaders (or managers) widely use modern communication channels like e-mail and text messaging. A leader may adopt different communication strategies such as active listening and managing the conversation so as to identify his audience’s problems and thereby pass information to them on time. The active listening communication strategy maximizes the effectiveness of communication. Under this communication technique, the listener paraphrases or re-states what he has heard from the speaker to confirm the mutual understanding between both parties. Finally, the listener is required to provide the speaker with proper feedbacks. Managing the conversation strategy requires the leader to lead the conversation; this technique is greatly beneficial for a leader to save time. Even a potential leadership strategy would fail to meet its desired goals if the leader lacks sufficient communication skills. Better communication ability may greatly benefit a leader to create and maintain good understanding and trust which are essential to encourage his followers to abide by the accepted practices and process of the organization. Evidently, a leader with better communication capabilities can maintain close interpersonal relationships with his followers. An early Harvard Business School study conducted for identifying the most important element enhancing business growth concluded that a leading organization will have a leader who “is able to communicate, to make sound decisions, and to get things done with and through people” (as cited in Barrett, 2006). Scholars opine that leadership communication facilitates ‘intentional and managed transfer’ of information through which leaders can influence an individual, an organization, or a community. Under the concept of leadership communication, a leader applies his communication abilities and other resources to manage external interventions. This will help him create and deliver momentous messages for coordinating, motivating, and controlling his audience. In short, better leadership communication practices would aid a leader to achieve the firm’s preset goals within the stipulated time. The Way to Success In order to ensure long term business sustainability, a leader needs to influence his firm’s key stakeholder including employees, shareholders, investors, creditors, and banks and other financial institutions. Undoubtedly, an organization cannot effectively meet its short term or long term objectives unless its employees focus on the firm’s mission or ultimate business objectives. As stated, employees play a significant role in defining the organization’s workplace culture, which in turn can have a great influence on the firm’s organizational behavior (Management Study Guide, n.d). To illustrate, what employees opine about their organization, how they perform in the workplace, and how they are happy with the organization greatly impact the firm’s brand image, customer loyalty, and market reputation. Hence, traditionally, management theories give particular focus to employee satisfaction. As part of this strategy, leaders follow various employee motivation techniques like financial incentives and holiday packages. Similarly, shareholders are the backbone of any business because finance is the primary factor that supports a firm’s day to day business activities. As Basu (2012) points out, in addition to financing, shareholders play a crucial role in an organization’s operations, governance, and control aspects. Therefore, a leader should try to keep the firm’s stockholders satisfied with the business and its profitability. In other words, the primary goal of any business is to increase the shareholder values. Furthermore, better stockholder treatment is necessary to attract new stockholders to the organization. An organization’s shareholder strength would directly affect the firm’s brand image because modern consumers tend to analyze firms’ business strengths. Hence, a leader should ensure that the firm’s stockholders are satisfied with the way the firm operates and they obtain active participation in various governing activities. Likewise, a leader has to specifically try to make certain that the firm properly meets the interests of its investors and other creditors. Investors and creditors assist a firm to raise funds immediately in times of contingencies. In addition, an organization needs additional funds to finance its growth initiatives and unexpected obligations. Evidently, a business concern cannot meet all those expenses only by issuing new shares or utilizing reserve funds. Hence, investors and creditors often assist an organization to meet its additional financial needs. Furthermore, procedural formalities involved in raising funds from investors and creditors are less complex as compared to other ways of fund raising. Finally, leaders cannot quickly grow their business unless they can effectively influence banks and other financial institutions. Normally, a business depends on banks and other similar institutions to raise money for funding its day to day business activities. While lending money to businesses, banks and other institutions particularly analyze the creditworthiness of the business. Hence, a leader must be able to convince bankers about his organization’s strong financial background and its potential to repay the credit money within the stipulated period. Effective Involvement of the Audience Different perceptions, habits, or values of the above identified audience need to be built, changed, or reinforced to reach the organization’s ultimate goal(s). Firstly, a leader has to promote employee values in a way that would contribute to organizational success. Many employees are of the view that their employers exploit them; such perceptions would restrict an employee from contributing to the organization’s success. Hence, a leader should be able to convince his workers that the organization is always obliged to protect the welfare of its employees. As Orisatoki and Oguntibeju (2010) remind, a leader must encourage interpersonal relations among workers so as to keep his employees coordinated. When the employees believe that the organization can improve their living standards, they will certainly do their best to achieve the firm’s predefined goals. Similarly, a stockholder may leave the company if he holds the view that the organization cannot contribute much to his financial prosperity. Therefore, a leader must make sure that the firm’s shareholders are satisfied with the levels of dividends they are paid. By allowing shareholders participate in the organization’s governing activities, a leader can convince them that they have a superior role to perform in the organization. Some stockholders think that they do not have a role in the organization’s operations and their only duty is to receive dividends at the end of the financial year. Such passive shareholders can add little to the firm’s overall performance. Hence, it is the duty of a leader to keep the firm’s stockholders connected to the management. Sometimes an organization passes through states of sales decline and financial instability. Under such circumstances; investors, creditors, bankers, and other credit lenders may hesitate to offer credit facilities to the organization as they suspect the firm’s repayment potential. In order to overcome such difficulties, a leader should adopt effective strategies to convince lenders about the firm’s financial capabilities. Finally, a leader should closely analyze the effectiveness and weakness of the firm’s financial policies and suggest amendments if required. However, it must be noted that only a strong and fully committed leadership can introduce successful change plans and gain the support and commitment of the stakeholders. Conclusions From the above discussion, it is clear that a leader must ensure the active involvement and support of the firm’s stakeholders, especially employees, to perform the organizational tasks effectively and thereby enhance business growth. For this, a leader must develop sufficient communication skills and influence among the firm’s stakeholders. Leaders should necessarily influence the organization’s key stakeholders including shareholders, investors, banks, and other creditors in order to shorten the distance to success. A leader may adopt several plans and strategies to influence the perceptions, habits, or values of its interest groups. References Barrett, D. J. (2006). Strong communication skills a must for today’s leaders. Handbook of Business Strategy, 7(1), 385-390. Basu, C. (2012). The importance of shareholders in business. Chron.com. Retrieved from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/importance-shareholders-business-20844.html Charteris-Black, J. (2007). The Communication of Leadership: The Design of Leadership Style. USA: Routledge. Management Study Guide. (n.d). Role of employees in organization culture. Retrieved from http://www.managementstudyguide.com/role-of-employees-in-organization-culture.htm Orisatoki, R. O & Oguntibeju, O. O. (2010). Job satisfaction among selected workers in St Lucia, West Indies. Scientific Research and Essays, 5(12), 1436-1441. Read More