The Challenges Facing Modern-Day Leaders - Coursework Example

CHALLENGES FACING MODERN-DAY LEADERS Name: Instructor: Date: Leadership constantly presents challenges to the leader’s abilities. Changes occur in the organization environment, disrupting the equilibrium. The approach a leader uses to handle and manage challenges effectively, greatly determine the success of the organization (Hall and Hord, 2006). In the modern-day organizations, challenges come in the form of people and obstacles that prevent the organization from reaching its goals. Moreover, there are a lot of complexity and unpredictability. New set of skills is required for the organization to stay competitive and achieve the set goals. Hence, the life of a modern-day leader is more demanding than ever (Kouzes and Posner, 2006). The challenges facing leaders are of three kinds: external, internal and those arising from the nature of the leadership role. The external challenges stem from the fact organization faces lack of funds, economic, social and political forces (Kanter, 2003). The leader must be able to cope up with crises that threaten the survival of the firm. On the other hand, internal challenges come from the fact that the leader's personality may be an impediment on reaching the organizational goals. Fear, lack of confidence, insecurity and intolerance can act as a barrier to leadership. Lastly, the leader is responsible for forging a vision and a mission for the organization (DuBrin, 2013). Moreover, modern-day leader should be strategic thinkers able create a vision of the future and motivate the employees to own it. Furthermore, the leader works with a group of employee from different regions of the world (Lewis and Gates, 2005). These employees have extensive knowledge and skills in different fields and thus it is more difficult for a leader to manage them. Moreover, in the information age, employees are continuously acquiring new skills, creating a learning organization. The work by Peter Senge (Senge and Suzuki, 1994) shows that it is harder to manage in a learning organisation. The reason being, the organisation becomes a part of a large system which is changing all the time and actions of an employee affect the whole organisation. Learning organization is relatively new concept in contemporary management. A learning organization encourages and facilitates learning in order to achieve business goals and objectives (Flood, 1999). These organizations create a culture of learning, supported throughout the organization. A leader in a learning organization integrates strategic change, continuous improvement, managerial leadership and learning and development. The leader in the learning organisation is more of a team leader than a manager. The leader thinks in terms of “control with” rather than “control over” over employees (Woodcock, 1979). They control with employees by enhancing relationships based on shared visions and shaping the organisation culture to achieve goals set by the leader. Such a role presents a lot of challenges to the leader. In the traditional management theories, leadership is mostly equated to management. But the management involves planning, coordinating, staffing, controlling and organizing which is pretty different from the role of a leader (Bass and Bass, 2009). Though, a leader should be a good manager, modern-day organisation demands interpersonal and strategic management skills. Team leadership is a challenge that has emerged recently. Modern organizations are more team-based as opposed to traditional one. The workplace also has moved from a close office layout to an open office layout (Mohrman et al., 1995). Such changes have presented leaders with great challenges in management. In such setting, the leader is forced to work with a cross-functional team. Though such team has different expertise, their efforts are directed to a common goal (Woodcock, 1979). The leader is often required to lead outside the core area of expertise. Moreover, in cross-functional teams there is no clear line of authority. Companies like Microsoft and Apple are team-based. They thrive by combining employees with different skills to come up with great products. For example, a managing a project in Microsoft, will require a leader to have a broad set of skills. A project like operating system development requires the project manager to lead a team that is cross-functional. Such projects needs research, engineers and developers who are working under a single manager. Microsoft succeeds in developing user-friendly products. On the other hand, Apple thrives on spotting unrecognized marketplace needs and creating new products for them. Mobile technology has grown rapidly, and these companies’ leaders must be able to lead a team that is evolving quickly. The leader task is to manage a group of employee that is constantly improving their skills. The changing skills also imply the leader must be a long life learner. Such an environment may be challenging to a leader. And thus, the leader must devise a way of track of employees’ skills. The challenge of team leadership is further compounded by the fact that, teams always has conflict. Conflict is a difference in opinion. The leader must devise ways of dealing with conflict in the team. The focus is to promote a healthy discussion that does not lead to division in the team . The team members come from different department and thus may have differing opinion on tackling the problem. The leader should be able to reconcile the different opinions into one strategy. In such cases, the negotiation skill becomes vital (Harrison, 1971). The leader must negotiate with the team member to strike a balance on the decision. Furthermore, the decision made by the team must be presented to the management and approved. The leader must convince the management that the proposal is viable, and its implementation will be beneficial to the organisation. The ability of the leader to negotiate for resources will enhance the success of the team. Team leadership challenges the leader to discard the limited personal goals for the broader team goals. Leadership mind-sets constrain the leaders’ views of the organisation. In modern organisation, where employees are required to work as a team, the leader needs to focus on the shared vision rather than personal goals (Stogdill, 1974). The leader should collaborate with other and develop a shared vision. The leader is also supposed to inspire the vision on the team. The leader needs to provide cognitive insight to the team on how move from narrow personal goals and embrace the team vision. Such coaching requires the team leader to develop good interpersonal and problem-solving skills. Moreover, a team leader should be an effective listener. Listening allows the leader to understand the employee point of view and minimise the time spent on conflict resolution. Leading a team is made more complex by the fact that the leader must establish proper ways of communication and socialisation. Effective conflicts resolution occurs where proper mechanism of reporting and resolution are established. Teams must be able to communicate progress both amongst the members and to the management. The leader should be the team spokesperson on major development. The leader can also direct how members in the team interact with each other. Socialization enables members to collaborate with each other which is vital for the team. But there are some situations that socialization becomes dangerous and unproductive. Such cases involve where some members of the team are discriminated or harassed. The leader should lay proper structures to ensure each member thrives in the team. The leader needs to develop a set of skills that reduces miscommunication. Miscommunication leads to stress and anxiety among the team members. Such conditions lead to uncertainty in the team. The leader should value the background of each team member, differences in priorities and values. Team leadership is not only a challenge to the leaders because of miscommunication but also due to the environment. Modern leaders deal with a team that is culturally diverse. Culturally diversity in the workplace demands the leader be able to recognize cultural variable (French, 2010). A leader has to be sensitive to each member culture. Culture affect communication and in essence team dynamics. Culture sensitivity reduces friction and allows smoothing coexistence among members. A leader must learn how to enhance intercultural communication and reduce potential difficulties (Lewis and Gates, 2005). Apart from intercultural issues that a leader faces, there are also gender issues. Gender in a team can present a challenge especially in communication and cooperation. Men and women in the workplace have different needs both physically and psychologically. Hence, the manager faces challenges when dealing with a heterogeneous group. The feminist advocates for the involvement of women in management. The leader should treat both genders fairly and respectively. It is paradoxical as the team leader is supposed to create team unity in such diverse environment. Lack of unity in a team leads to poor results. The team needs to develop trusting relationships, and the team leader needs to offer the right environment for such relationship to grow. Unity is most needed when employees are working in a common project which has successive stages. Team unity boosts employees’ self-esteem among employees. Motivated employees stays focused on the end goal and thus are more productive. The team leader must give sufficient incentive to keep the team motivated. The leader must show that the employees are valued and respected by the company (Drath, 2001). It is crucial that the leader be able to inspire confidence during crises. The leader should stand firm lead by example. During crisis, it is the duty of the leader to stand give direction. The modern business is more challenges due to the rate of change in business processes. Major innovations are being released in a span of less than ten years and thus the crises in business are common. The leader should stand out in such occasions. As opposed to traditional leadership styles where the leader is always right, modern business demand the leader to give room to others. In team leadership, it is crucial for a leader to step back for other to step up. The leader needs to mentor others in the group. It is challenging to the modern day leader to channel their experience to junior employees. Teams work well when their roles are clearly defined. Role confusion is a common where the leader is not well acquitted to the whole project. Since the project needs diverse skills to completed, the leader may not have the required skills in some specific areas. The challenge is to develop clear and specific roles that each member should play. The leader needs to explain the role in details and monitor each member to ensure that the member adhere to the assigned role. Lastly, teams should have a specific place where they meet. The place should be quiet and conducive for teamwork. Meetings room should allow members to be creative and innovative. Poor work environment reduces productivity. The leader should come up with ways to make the workplace more engaging to the employees. Including amenities for the recreation may be helpful, if the work entails stressful sessions of brainstorming. It is up to the leader to learn the team preferences and tailor a work environment that stimulates employees to creativity and innovation. In conclusion, due to the complexity and unpredictability of the environment in which the organisation operate in modern time, new styles of leadership are needed. Furthermore, in cases of team leadership, new approaches to negotiation must be developed to reduce tension between the employees and the leaders. Teams cannot run smoothly unless the leader communicates clearly and can negotiate effectively. References Bass, B.M., Bass, R., 2009. The Bass handbook of leadership: Theory, research, and managerial applications. Simon and Schuster. Drath, W.H., 2001. The deep blue sea: Rethinking the source of leadership. Jossey-Bass San Francisco, CA. DuBrin, A.J., 2013. Principles of leadership. South-Western Cengage Learning. Flood, R.L., 1999. Rethinking the fifth discipline: Learning within the unknowable. Psychology Press. French, R., 2010. Cross-cultural management in work organisations. CIPD Publications. Hall, G.E., Hord, S.M., 2006. Implementing change: Patterns, principles, and potholes. Pearson/Allyn & Bacon Boston. Harrison, R., 1971. Role negotiation: A tough minded approach to team development. Development Research Associates. Kanter, R.M., 2003. Challenge of organizational change: How companies experience it and leaders guide it. Simon and Schuster. Kouzes, J.M., Posner, B.Z., 2006. The leadership challenge. John Wiley & Sons. Lewis, R.D., Gates, M., 2005. Leading Across Cultures. Nicholas Brealey. Mohrman, S.A., Cohen, S.G., Morhman Jr, A.M., 1995. Designing team-based organizations: New forms for knowledge work. Jossey-Bass. Senge, P.M., Suzuki, J., 1994. The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. Currency Doubleday New York. Stogdill, R.M., 1974. Handbook of leadership: A survey of theory and research. Free Press. Woodcock, M., 1979. Team development manual. 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