Leadership and organizational behavior

Introduction

Leadership and organizational behavior are fundamental issues to any organization and business organization are not an exceptional. They are essential and interdependent in goal achievement of any organization. The general description of leadership is an action of leading an organization or group of people. However, this definition does not fully offer a comprehensive meaning in a business situation since it fails to incorporate goal achievement. Organizational behavior is a study that examines the effects of groups of people and structure on behavior within an organization with an aim of implementing such knowledge in improving organizational efficiency (Donaldson and Ko, 32). The behaviors of individual groups in an organization have an effect on process of goal achievement. This paper discusses the various aspects of leadership and organizational behavior that are relevant to United States’ business setting.

Leadership

According to Northouse (50), a leader is the actual person who directs and leads people with a common goal in mind. Leaders are vital in the leadership process due to the social influence they have on the people and entities that help in one or more activities of leading. In effective leadership, leaders should provide guidance, directions and exercise their capacity and capability to lead fully. There exist two aspects of leadership namely formal and informal. Formal leadership is popular in many businesses or political organizations while informal is common in friendships. Leaders should have necessary and adequate leadership skills or competencies in order to deliver effective leadership that is fundamental in organization management. In organization, effective leadership surfaces when other people are being led accept to be directed and guided by an entity.

Characteristics of a healthy organizational leader

Successful leadership depends on the leaders’ characters and capabilities influence others. Some people argue that leaders are born with their competencies and capabilities while others believe the traits can be acquired and tailored to produce an effective leader (Phillips and Gully, 62). However, some traits seem to be natural in some leaders. The success or excellence of an organization does not depend whether the traits innate or not, what matters is what defines a person as a leader. Leaders seem to share some common characteristics. Additionally, those perceived to be having natural characters seem to be more effective when the natural traits are tailored.

Strong leadership character is essential for sustainable leadership. Leaders who do not have a strong leadership character have a tendency of going down the leadership ladder after sometime. Good leaders must maintain their leadership practice and aim at increasing its effectiveness. Leadership position is all about creating and achieving targets; hence a leader should not assume his leadership role, since this would affect negatively on goal attainment. Strong leadership character is essential to sustain the effectiveness of an organization in performing its role towards its success.

Ability to communicate is another elementary character that a leader should possess. This is the least of all qualities that a general leader should have to carry out leadership role since implications of leadership depend largely on communication. It is unimaginable for one to be a leader with communication incapability. This emphasizes how absolute this quality is primary and being an excellent communicator does not imply that one is a leader. Employing listening skills in communication completes the cycle. Effective leaders are skilled listeners to their followers for suggestions and feedbacks on a regular basis. Poor listening skills can hamper leadership and achievement of targets. Similarly, Richard (25) asserts that, listening does not imply that a leader should be swayed to make decisions that seem to be fully influenced by opinions of the followers.

Potential leaders are optimists and have a self-driven perception of positivity. This quality is applicable to anyone but to a leader it has a greater impact on the management of an organization. Positivity is noteworthy in providing motivational talks and activities to the people being led (Stech, 28). Additionally, it provides the possibility of accomplishing difficulty tasks in brutal and tough times. Leaders’ perspective should be from the brighter side.

People proclaimed leader should have vision and passion to achieve the set objectives. The imperativeness of having a   Vision to a leader is much than in a person who is not a leader. Perceiving the results of an activity grants the leader the authority and improves communication between the leader and well-illustrated anticipations. Passion is the desire to achieve which is the stepping-stone to success. Good leaders aspire to excel in their leadership practice.

 

 

Leadership Theories

Varying frameworks have tailored the present understanding of leadership. However, effective and appropriate usage of leadership knowledge can lead to greater levels of success. There are various leadership theories namely behavioral, contingency, trait theories, and power and influence theories developed by researchers. Leaders can adopt or combine any of the above to excel in leadership (Richard, 56).

Behavioral theories are based on a leader’s behavior with regard to decision-making communication. According to these theories, leaders can be classified into three categories, which includes autocratic, democratic and laissez faire leaders. Autocratic leaders carry out no consultation from their team members. These leaders seem to be effective on matters concerned with quick and genuine decision, especially when affirmations from team members are not necessary. Democratic leaders exercise their leadership by permitting the participation of team members, through decision-making. Additionally, such leaders carry out many consultations before initiating an action (Raina, 9). Democratic leaders show their efficacy in matters pertaining team management. Democratic leadership presents one significant limitation, since it can result to difficult team managing due to opinion difference. Laissez faire leaders permit team members to make any decision.

Dereli (15) points out that, contingency theory focus on how efficient leadership is affected by situations. The inexistence of every leadership theory to offer the most efficient form of leadership has led to reliance of leaders on circumstances. According to this theory, the best leadership is subject to situation. Contingent theory predicts the best leadership model that can suit the circumstance especially when the leader demands full support he uses democratic leadership.

Trait theories concentrate on the personality of a good leader, and it advocates that leaders have   common characteristics and personality traits, which results to leadership. Early theories suggested that leadership was natural and inherent character that one could posses or lack. This theory recognizes some qualities for leading others, which surfaces as a simplify leadership model. The traits supported by this theory include assertiveness, principled decision making and geniality among others (Raina, 18).

Power and influence theory describes the basis of a leader’s power. This theory is founded on how leaders acquire and use their power and necessary leadership models to achieve a collective goal. An example of these theories is the French and Raven’s Five Forms of Power. According to this theory, there are three kinds of positional power and two power sources. The types of positional power include legitimate, reward, and coercive powers. On the other hand, the powers sources are comprised of expert and referent. Moreover, personal power is the best option and expert power, a justifiable option (Northouse, 65).

Organizational behavior

Organizational behavior establishes the relationship between the people and the organization through a system approach (Dereli, 25). The people organization relationship can be in terms of an entire person, group, organization, and social system and it are aimed to create improved relationships through attaining, human, organizational, and social objectives.  Organizational behavior takes in a variety of aspects namely human behavior, change, leadership, and teams among others.

Elements of organizational behavior

Elements of organizational behavior refer to what makes up organizational behavior. Such constituents include people, structure, technology, and environment. Groups are also included in the social system as an instance of people. Stech (25) classifies groups as formal, informal or dynamic. Structure as an element describes the associations of people and their role. Organizational structure has led to the emergence of division of work and departmentalization hence subdivision of task. Different departments are inter-reliant; hence, they need to work hand in hand to accomplish a task (Northouse, 36).Technology allows production of quality and large amounts of goods and services. The last constituent of organizational behavior is the environment, classified as internal or external. External factors refer to what the business cannot control in production such as other organizations. Internal factors can be controlled by the organization such as supplies.

Models of organizational behavior

Organizational behavior is based upon four cardinal frameworks namely custodial, supportive, custodial, and collegial (Phillips and Gully, 56). Autocratic organizational behavior rests on managerial inclination of authority. The team or people being led depend heavily on the leader and their job desires being satisfied are subsistence. The mental outcome for employees is absolute dependence on the boss, leader who has the capability to hire and hire. This model is typified by low wage-payment since no attention is given to workers. Autocratic models have been noted to have minimal performance result.

Custodial model relies on economic resources and the inclination of management towards money; the employees are inclined towards security, advantages, and reliance on the organization. Security is the employees’ or team’s need that is met under custodial style of organizational behavior, whereas performance outcome is passive cooperation. This model creates dependence on the organization by the employee rather than the boss since employee’s needs would have been considerably met (Raina, 12). Employees under custodial are normally occupied with their benefits and economic rewards.

Phillips and Gully (64) points out that, supportive organizational behavior model depends hugely on leadership rather than power or money. Management offers an environment that is conducive to employees to advance and achieve their goals at the benefit of the organization. This style provides a presumption by the leaders that supportive work environment does not make workers inherently inactive and resistant to organizational demands. When management grants an opportunity, the team takes accountability, advance themselves, and creates a drive to contribute. The management’s inclination in custodial organizational behavior focuses on the employee’s performance instead of employee benefit payment. Workers in supportive model of organizational behavior feel involved in organizational matters, which are a motivational factor to them (Dereli, 23).

Collegial model hugely relies on partnership feeling between the employee and the management created by the management. The outcome of this model is that makes employees feel wanted, functional, and managers are contributing. The perspective of managers in this model changes from bosses to contributors in task accomplishment. The management advocates for teamwork rather any other thing. Employees have an obligation to produce effectively and uphold quality devoid of being monitored. Self-discipline is the foremost employee’s mental outcome.

Organization development

Organization Development (OD) is constituent of organizational behavior that refers to methodical deployment of behavioral science knowledge at different levels such as the organization and groups to initiate coordinated change. The aims of organization development include better quality of work-life, productivity, effectiveness, and adaptability (Raina, 25). The objectives are achieved through changing attitudes, values, conduct, organizational policies, and structures to enable the organization acclimatize to the competitive-technological innovations, and rapid changes in management. Organization Development can be typified by humanistic values, systems orientation, problem solving, and contingency orientation (Richard, 25). Humanistic values are affirmative values regarding employees’ potential. Systems orientation refers to organizational segments such as structure, technology that must work together. Contingency orientation as a feature of organizational development involves selection of actions to suit the need.

In conclusion, leaders have a social influence on the people they are leading. Effective leaders provide guidance and directions to the people they are leading for a collective goal achievement. Effective leadership is built upon the capabilities of a leader rather than the believed natural traits. Leaders are defined by their qualities such as the ability to communicate, positivity, and vision and passion. Different types of leadership styles are used in the United States such as autocratic, democratic, laissez faire, charismatic and servant leadership. Leadership theories include behavioral, contingency, trait theories, and power and influence theories. Organizational behavior focuses on the relationship between people and the organization. Organizational behavior is affected by people, technology, environment, and structure, which are its composition. Various styles of organizational behavior include custodial, supportive, custodial, and collegial. Social systems refer to a collection of people in the business organization and their internal and external relationships. The application of behavioral science knowledge increase effectiveness and improves quality through organization development.

An annotated Bibliography

Dereli, Mahçe. Leadership Styles. New York: VDM Verlag Dr. Mueller e.K., 2010. Print.

Dereli’s work, “Leadership Style” takes a keen evaluation into modern leadership styles employed by firms. He points out that there are five types of leadership namely democratic, charismatic, autocratic, laissez faire, and bureaucratic leadership styles on page 12. He clearly illustrates the differences between them and proceeds to claim that organizations can deploy a combination of them provided the intended task be accomplished. In the same Book, Dereli perceives organizational behavior as tool that establishes a relationship between the people and the organization on page 25. He stresses on the supportive of organizational behavior in which he advocates that it provides motivation to workers, hence this book provides relevant knowledge concerning leadership and organizational behavior.

Donaldson, Stewart and La Ko. “Positive organizational psychology, behavior, and scholarship:   A review of the emerging literature and evidence base.” Journal of positive psychology        (2010): 177-191. Print.

Donaldson and Ko defined organizational behavior as a study a study that examines the effects of groups of people on behavior within an organization with an objective of applying the knowledge in improving organizational effectiveness. The behaviors of individual groups in an organization have an effect on process of goal achievement. They provide a behavioral observation from a Laissez faire model of leadership in which the team has full responsibilities to ensure that goals are achieved. Additionally, the journal clarifies that leaders should oversee progress and report to the team.

Northouse, Peter. Leadership: Theory and Practice. New York: SAGE, 2009. Print.

Northouse defines a leader as an individual who directs and leads people with a common goal in mind because of the social influence they have on the parties being led. On page 65 of the same book, he considers leadership power by comparing two forms of power in organizational leadership, which as personal and expert. According to him, personal power is the best option and expert power, a justifiable option. The author also looks at the relationship between elements of organizational behavior in page 36 of the book, in which he justifies that they are interdependent. This reference material corresponds to the issue under discussion by the paper.

Phillips, Jean and Stanley Gully. Organizational Behavior: Tools for Success. New York:  Cengage Learning, 2011. Print.

This book provides a description of organizational behavior, and necessary strategies for the efficiency of organizations in matters pertaining to their success. The authors review the effect of behavior on a leader’s leadership qualities. They affirm that some leadership traits are innate while others can be modified to produce effective leaders. The book states that there are common characteristics in leaders that define their personality. According to the authors, there are four essential models of organizational behavior namely custodial, collegial, supportive, and autocratic. The authors point out that, supportive organizational behavior model; depend hugely on leadership rather than power or money. The book clearly indicating the relevance of the material has assessed these models.

Raina, Suresh. Elements of Organizational Behavior. 5 November 2009. Web. 23 February 2012            <http://www.excellentguru.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=209:   lements-of-organizational-behavior&catid=45: organizational-behavior&Itemid=59>.

Raina examines the elements of organizational behavior and reviews the custodial model of organizational behavior. The author claims that, this model creates dependence on the organization by the employee rather than the boss since employees needs would have been considerably met. Moreover, the author points out that, assertiveness, principled decision-making, and geniality are some of the inborn traits of many effective leaders.

Richard, Swanson. Analysis for Improving Performance: Tools for Diagnosing Organizations       and Documenting Workplace Expertise: Easyread Large Edition. New York:   ReadHowYouWant.com, 2009. Print.

This book reviews how leadership and organizational behavior play a critical role in improving employee performance. Richard reviews the listening trait of a leader on page 25. The author claims that being good listeners are not guaranteed to be leaders. This book validates the combination of various leadership theories by leaders to excel in leadership. Leadership theories provided by the book include behavioral, contingency, trait and power and influence theories. The book analyzes organization development as a constituent of organizational behavior that aims to improve productivity, quality of work-life and adaptability. According to the author, Organization Development is characterized by humanistic values, problem solving and contingency orientation. This source provides information that is related to the specified task of the assignment.

Stech, Ernie. “Leadership Education, Training and, Development: An Exploratory Study  Involving New Construct.” International journal of business management (2011): 24-32.    Print.

This journal provides leadership education, training and development. On page 23 of the journal, the author points out that charismatic leadership involve enthusiasm that develops cohesiveness and forward movement towards goal achievement. Additionally, the organizations social system has immeasurable boundaries in the exchange of ideas, culture, and goods. The author claims that leaders need to be positive in their thinking and influence the people they leading the same line of thought. On page 25 of the journal, classification of groups into formal and informal has been discussed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

Dereli, Mahçe. Leadership Styles. New York: VDM Verlag Dr. Mueller e.K., 2010. Print.

Donaldson, Stewart and La Ko. “Positive organisational psychology, behavior, and scholarship:    A review of the emerging literature and evidence base.” Journal of positive psychology        (2010): 177-191. Print.

Northouse, Peter. Leadership: Theory and Practice. New York: SAGE, 2009. Print.

Phillips, Jean and Stanley Gully. Organizational Behavior: Tools for Success. New York:  Cengage Learning, , 2011. Print.

Raina, Suresh. Elements of Organizational Behavior . 5 November 2009.  Web. 23 February            2012<http://www.excellentguru.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id    209:lements-of-organizational-behavior&catid=45:organizational-behavior&Itemid=59>.

Richard, Swanson. Analysis for Improving Performance: Tools for Diagnosing Organizations       and Documenting Workplace Expertise: Easyread Large Edition. New York:   ReadHowYouWant.com, 2009. Print.

Stech, Ernie. “Leadership Education, Training and, Development: An Expoloratory Study            Involving New Construct .” International journal of business management (2011): 24-32.   Print.