Leadership and decision making individual assignment as maxwell (n d) once said “a leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way

This essay will analyse how a successful leader operate company based on leadership theories, then reflect on how to improve the leadership qualities.. In agreement with Hersey et al 199

Leadership and Decision Making

Individual Assignment

RMIT International University Vietnam

Individual Assignment

Student name & ID number

Date of Submission:

Friday of Week 9, 18 August 2017

Word Count:

As Maxwell (n.d) once said “A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.” There is no doubt that a good leader will lead their entire company successfully and a bad leader will destroy it (Anderson, 2013) Therefore, a leader is the one who converts the visual perception into reality Also a good leader is defined as the person who empowers and motivates others to achieve common goals (Kruse, 2013) According to Kraut et al (1989), an organization without leader will be the same with an army without generals Thus a leader plays an extremely important role in contributing to the success of an organization This essay will analyse how a successful leader operate company based on leadership theories, then reflect on how to improve the leadership qualities

To perceive profoundly the knowledge of these theories, Mrs Tran Nhu Thien My is considered as a typical example of a great leader She is the Ceo of Danang sea products Import - Export Corporation She is known as a successful leader in Danang city at this time (2017) She works with many employees, partners and other leaders who are not only in Vietnam, but also in abroad

To begin with, the first theory to analyze is Trait theory Zaccaro et al (2003) stated that the term “Trait” can be understood as the personality, ability, temperaments and other demographic attributes A great leader is not only a person who has skill and working ability, but he or she also has some special characteristics (Prive 2012) According to Trait theory of Kirkpatrick and Locke (1991), a good leader should include seven key traits: Drive, Desire to lead, Honesty and Integrity, Self-confidence, Cognitive ability, Knowledge of the business

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Back to Mrs Tran, she is considered to be an integrative leader which means words always go with action In accordance with Kirkpatrick and Locke (1991), an integrative leader is the one who can control, balance and unity between words and actions which means doing things exactly what he or she had said Mrs Tran stated “I just say what I will definitely do Otherwise

my subordinates will be distracted and ruin the work” From her point of view, a leader first need to unify the ideas between words and deeds, especially avoid presenting unnecessary views Thanks to doing this, she is respected and admired by her staffs

During the interview, Mrs Tran admits that she desires to contribute to the success of the company In the conversation, she said “The next 20 years plan for the corporation is to reach the international arena” From her opinion, having a great ambition to lead the company is one of the most essential elements of a great leader She explained “My big ambitions does not mean forcing people to fulfil it or putting them under work pressure I

keep the ambitions for myself and try to lead the corporation get ahead and achieve some challenge goals.”

Especially, she emphasizes that she always thinks of long-term decision and relationship

as well as the benefit Therefore, the ambition she is aiming for is the desire to achieve higher performance at work rather than desire for power or money It was these ambitions that can increase her motivation and energy at work Thereby, this characteristic belongs

to the first key trait concept of Kirkpatrick and Locke which is called Drive

The second theory to be determined is Contingency Theory In general, Contingency is the term that there is no certain way can fit into every situation (Miner 2005) To specific, it can be understood as the form of work that one best way cannot completely organize, make important decisions, and contribute to develop the company

Therefore, according to Norhouse (2012), there is no leader that has the same way of doing things A good leader is a person who uses different methods for different situations (Mulder, 2013) In fact, there are a number of theories that analyse the contingency concept However, one of the best theories that clearly points out the contingency concept

is Path Goal theory of House (1971)

According to House (1971), Path Goal explains for the leader behaviour towards subordinate satisfaction, performance as well as the motivation at work There are four different leadership behaviours including directive leadership, supportive leadership, achievement-oriented leadership and participative leadership (House, 1971)

To specific, Al-Gattan (1984) claims that directive leadership means a leader directly tells their subordinates what they are expected to do and how to perform the tasks As reported

by Al-Gattan (1984), supportive leadership is defined to be the approach of creating open working environment where a leader can be friendly and empathetic to their employees

He pointed out that an achievement-oriented leader often sets challenging goals for employee, desire them to achieve good achievements as well as showing attitude of confidence in their working ability The last leadership is participation which means a leader consult with the staff before making decisions (Trungpa 2011)

Back to the interview of Mrs Tran, she is considered to be an achievement-oriented leader She wants the perfection and innovation at work as she believes “Maintaining stability is

important But the breakthrough at work is even more necessary” Moreover, this working style can improve work efficiency, qualifications of staff and increase competition among staff members

In terms of employee perception and evaluation, Mrs Tran always sets challenging goals, show the importance of those tasks and also create the motivation for their staffs by telling them the rewards they will gain after completing the mission From her point of view, a leader is the one who tells their subordinate staff what they need to do and what brings to both company and staff when they complete the missions

Nevertheless, setting challenging goals may lead to invisible pressure for employees She said “To be honest, giving them difficult tasks is very easy to turn them into pressure So I set challenging goals but my staff members will be free whether they will do or not Simple, If they do, they will get reward” It seems like her leadership style is both serious and comfortable as she creates an open working environment for employees

However, using this concept to operate company may lead to some failure since the employees have chance to challenge themselves as well as fulfil difficult goals As John Wooden once said “If you're not making mistakes, you won’t improve” Therefore, a leader need to accept and forgive the mistakes and failure of employees because making mistakes is a good way to improve themselves and perceive new experiments

The last theory to analyze is Power theory Stapleton (2014) claims that the most important things as a leader is distinguish when to use power and when not to use power According to Maxwell (2001), power of leadership means the ability to influence others In other words, power of a leader can be understood to be the ability to make others listen to you and the ability to reward or punish (Lunenburg 2012)

However, the term “power of leadership” can be understood in both negative and positive sides In negative side, a leader may use their power to do some unethical or abusive power to accomplish their own purposes (Brown 2005) Brown (2005) also stated that they even can use power as a tool to force employees to follow them unconditionally In positive side, power of a leader means they use their power to achieve great goals and accomplishments for the organization (Hersey et al 1993) In agreement with Hersey et al (1993), a great leader will use power as a method to improve and contribute to a company

as well as devote their best to the company

The fact is that there a number of theory that explains for the term power of leadership but one of the most common concept is the French and Raven (1959) power types Base on this concept, they pointed out how a leader’s power can influence others and how effectively their employees perform In general, French and Raven divided power into two main types which are position power (including legitimate, reward and coercive power) and personal power (in terms of referent and expert power) (Fairholm 2009)

In a short conversation with an ordinary staff before meeting with Mrs Tran, he said “Mrs Tran is actually an integrative leader as she does not abuse power to impose employees” Through the interview of Mrs Tran, she used both position and personal power to lead the corporation successfully First, about the position power, she is considered to use the reward as a tool to increases productivity at work

According to Fiore (2004), reward power can be understood to be the ability to reward employees for having good performance such as donating bonuses, giving some promotional support when they buy products from their company A leader who has reward power can motivate their employees, make them feel comfortable, satisfied and work more effectively (Reid and Bojanic 2009) Also using reward power is similar to the theory of transactional leader which means motivate employees by reward or punish (Burns, 1978) For Danang sea products import-export corporation, every employee who has the higher performance and productivity compared to last month all has the reward She said “Whether small or big rewards also contribute to motivate and boost morale of staff”

Second, about the personal power, she uses referent power as a method to help employees imitate and follow her Using this power is considered to be like the transformational leader (Bass, 1996) According to Daft (2007), referent power can be seen to be the concept that a leader will become a pioneer for their employees to imitate A strong referent power of a leader can be admired and attracted by employees that will encourage them to do everything which can satisfy that person (Harris and Hartman 2001) Back to Mrs Tran, she believes that referent power can be a secret key to success in her job

She said “If I want someone to devote their best to the corporation, then first I have to devote all my best The best way to motivate people is it's you who have to work all your best first Then you will be respected, admired and everyone will listen to you.” Mrs Tran claims that being a pioneer for employees to imitate does not only increase their motivation,

but it can also increase their attitude and responsibility at work It can be seen that Mrs.Tran uses referent power as a tool to support her job

On these days, an organization is strong and successful in which there is a wise, psychological and ambitious leader From the interview with Mrs Tran, we can draw that she is a leader of integrity and ambition In general, a person of integrity means the consistency of words and actions or we can define by the term “so said so done” In other words, we can understand that a person of integrity will not be distracted by some external factors such as emotions, interests, knowledge or prejudices Therefore, only when a leader has the unity of words and deeds, he or she will be respected and admired by subordinates as well as lead the company to outstanding success

Mrs.Tran is not only an integrative leader, but she is also an ambitious person In addition

to maintaining stability for the company, Mrs Tran also desires to reach the company on

an international scale From Trait theory of Kirkpatrick and Locke (1991) and the meeting with Mrs Tran, we can draw that a leader who has great ambitions will require higher working ability among their subordinate staff members and always think of long-term plan Thus, having great ambition will help a leader obtain big motivation and energy at work

Mrs Tran also applies achievement-oriented leadership of Path Goal theory to operate her corporation It can be seen that an achievement-oriented leader often set challenging goals, encourage employees to compete with each other and expect to achieve high level

of performance By using this leadership style, a leader can motivate employees, achieve challenging goals and improve company performance

Finally, a successful leader is a leader who knows the way of using power to control the company According to Mrs Tran, using reward power as a tool to motivate employees is one of the best way to improve their performance such as giving bonus, promotional support or extra holidays By doing this, employees can not only enhance their working ability and productivity, but they also feel satisfied and comfortable at work Besides that, using referent power is considered to be an effective way to encourage staff to work From Mrs Tran, we can understand that as a leader, the best way to motivate staff member is becoming the pioneers of working hard Then every subordinates will respect you, imitate and follow your working style

From what I have learned, I want to become a leader of integrity since I think that being a integrative person will not be distracted by many external factors and will be respected by employees Furthermore, I want to use achievement-oriented leadership and reward power to operate the company The main reason is to motivate employees as motivation

is the best way to improve productivity and creativity

To conclude, every leader has different trait, uses different leadership style and power Nevertheless, to be a successful leader, people need to use these things in the right way and to the right person

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