Leadership & Related Concepts

It is not necessary to supervise or be a manager to develop leadership skills. You can cultivate these skills on the job by thinking long-term about what would be profitable for your organization. Try to conceive ideas and commit to doing work that exceed the daily routine. Once you’ve been in a position for long enough to become an expert, you can share with your manager that you’re keen to grow your leadership abilities. To become a strong leader here are some leadership skills:  

• Creativity – Creative thinking is another leadership skill required to make several decisions that do not have a clear answer. Learning to try radical solutions, or approaching problems in nonconventional ways, will help you to solve an otherwise unsolvable problem. Most employees will also be impressed and motivated by a leader who doesn’t always choose the safe, traditional path
• Feedback – Leaders should regularly look for opportunities to deliver useful advice to team members about their performance. However, there is a slight difference between offering employees advice and assistance, and micromanaging. By teaching employees how to improve their work and make their own decisions, you will feel more confident assigning tasks to them. Employees will also respect a leader who provides feedback in a clear but compassionate way
• Responsibility – A leader is responsible for both the successes and failures of his employees, so they should be willing to accept blame when something does not go right. If your employees see their leader finding faults and blaming others, they will lose respect for him. Accept mistakes and failures, and then find solutions for improvement
• Commitment – It is important for leaders to pursue what they agree to do. You should be willing to put in the extra hours to complete a task. When you promise your staff a reward,  you should always pursue it. A leader cannot expect employees to be committed to their jobs and their tasks if he cannot do the same
• Flexibility – Misfortunes and sudden changes always occur at work. Leaders need to be flexible, embracing whatever come their way. Employees will appreciate your ability to accept changes and creatively solve problems. Leaders must be open to advice and feedback. If your employee is displeased with an aspect of the workplace environment, listen to the problem and be open to making the required changes. Employees will appreciate a leader’s ability to accept suitable feedback.  

If you have a specific skill that you want to enlarge , be it creative thinking or communication, aim to improve your abilities in this area. This could mean taking a training, looking for a mentor to help, reading books, or setting a small goal that compels you to develop this skill. Taking help of managers, co-workers, and friends outside of the office, can help develop your plan to improve.

Each employee has a part to play in the time spent and the process of changing organizational culture, however by the day’s end, leaders are the ones who can have the deciding moments; the decisions they make cause a ripple effect on employee engagement, recruitment, and performance that intensely impacts an organization’s performance.  

The greatest differentiator between the winners and the remainder of the candidates is employees’ trust in senior administration. By setting up the mission an association and enabling employees to accomplish that mission, leadership forms the foundation of organization culture and plays a significant job in transforming it when it should be changed. It’s one thing to talk about it. It’s something else to see it in action. 

Changing Organizational Culture through Leadership

Culture is made up of following three layers: 

• Behavior, policies, systems and processes encompassing the way things are done 
• Goals, values, ideals and aspirations set by leadership 
• Fundamental assumptions that guide behavior  

With regards to driving organizational change, leaders play an important role in utilizing their behavior by establishing the tone for what’s acceptable inside a company. The minute you found an organization, culture comes into the discussion. In the beginning periods, you’re concentrating on building a core team and taking what you value and applying that to your employing techniques. As you develop from those beginning periods, leaders have a duty to help define, instruct, live, measure, and reward the culture they need to build.”  

As a business develops, it’s up to the founders and CEOs to show association between the organization’s beliefs and the practices that the administration team reinforces while changing corporate culture. 

Changing organizational culture with focus

As indicated by the Harvard Business Review, over 70% of change efforts fall flat. So, what’s a leader to do when the chances are against you? The appropriate response is focus. As leaders, employees, and managers, we have such huge numbers of everyday responsibilities that it’s basically not practical to attempt to change one or two behaviors at a time. Focus is the primary piece, and at exactly that point would you be able to make sense of which points of change will be the most beneficial for a company. 

Leaders should be extremely mindful of when efforts in changing corporate culture are going amiss or not turning out to be what they need them to be. They should be observant because they have the ability to help vital changes to recover the culture back or improve it. Empathy, listening, communicating, and transparency are all significant leadership attributes, however leaders alone can’t change or fix a culture or cause it to perform at its highest potential. It’s binding on everybody inside a company, not simply leaders and managers, to take responsibility for company culture and make it what they want. 

As a leader, it’s not your business to fix everything and get the awards — you must be intentional about changing company culture and the practices you need to see and enable your team to live and participate in the way of culture as a group. 

With the help of a coach, a leader can further develop their skills and talents while achieving a goal through the process of leadership coaching. It is a procedure that increases a leader’s capacity to meet both immediate and long-term organizational objectives. Even when a leader possesses the necessary technical expertise and resources, they may fall short of making the impact they need to have on the environment in which they operate. Leaders want a coach who will foster an atmosphere that encourages contemplation and introspection in order to clarify and form goals. The coach helps the individual in finding their solution and committing to the action that will move the goal forward. The coach makes sure the leader sees the goal through and if not achieved, invites more communication and learning on this issue. Each one has the capability of developing leadership skills in some way or the other. Here, a good leadership program helps.  

The Concept of Leadership Coaching –

You have a lot of obligations as a leader. It might not be your top priority to alter the way you do things. The value of leadership coaching cannot be understated. It’s important to strengthen your leadership skills and understand efficient business-upgrading tactics, not just to improve your management and leadership abilities. Executive coaching, also referred to as leadership coaching, is a partnership between two people in which the coach offers the client advice on the managerial and other skills required to be a successful leader. Coaches assist their mentees in acquiring strong leadership qualities and achieving their organizational and professional objectives. 

Leaders can work with coaches on a one-on-one basis, or their companies can hire coaches to work with their staff. When you begin a new job, advance to a leadership position in an existing one, or at any other stage in your career, you or your organization may decide to hire a coach. Depending on the objective and results of the partnership, a coach may work with clients for weeks, months, or even years.  

Methods Of Leadership Coaching-

Various methods are used by your coach to help you realize your leadership potential. Some of them include- 

• Gathering and examining information about the leader’s actions and those of the group as a whole, including manager and team performance
• Frequently meeting with the leader to talk about plans and issues
• Providing direction and assistance, as well as attending to both specific and general concerns 
• Supplying tools and materials such reading materials, technology, and learning chances
• Aiding in the setting and accomplishment of goals
• Delivering expert feedback on the leader’s development and personal skills

Companies now place a lot of importance on leadership development in order to maintain their teams’ competitive advantage. This makes it easier to finish difficult jobs. The best way to develop these skills would be joining any one of the leadership training programs without any further delay.

While some people develop into leaders over time, others are born leaders No matter where you fall on that scale, everyone can improve their leadership style and grind their skills. Sometimes companies get stuck. They see the competition coming up on them and they can’t figure out how to change things to their advantage. One solution is to take help of an executive coach. Leadership coaching can lead to unexpected benefits. The following are some examples of how leadership coaching enhances CEOs’ skills:  

• Gaining A New Perspective – It’s natural to be caught up in your organization’s daily concerns, while losing sight of the bigger picture. An executive coach can provide you a fresh viewpoint and assist you in developing your own. The executive coach has experience working with clients from a variety of businesses, so he has knowledge of what works and what doesn’t. He’ll be able to tell you if a plan won’t work and suggest other methods to try instead and can also help you discover new ways of handling problems
• Better Performance – The success of your business depends heavily on effective leadership. An organization’s ability to function hinges on strong leadership. Each coaching session you attend doesn’t just help you grow on an individual level; it also benefits your entire company. You’ll create new tactics and discover how to establish longer-term objectives for your business that can increase overall success. As a result, your workers might be happier and your business might make more money
• Gaining Confidence and Self-Awareness – Particularly new leaders could be concerned about their abilities and if they have what it takes to lead effectively. Whether you’ve had a job for a week or five years, learning is a need. Since no job is ever completely the same, you should always seek situations that might teach you fresh strategies for handling your work
• Becoming A Better Leader – Depending on the approach your coach uses, he will probably guide you to become more self-aware about your decisions and why you make them, the way you can improve, how you can represent and utilize the skills of your team members well, and you know what to do to advance your career and the course of your business. This way you’ll become better at your job
• Free Thinking – Leadership coaches increase your ability to think in varied and innovative ways. Probing questions open thought patterns. An outside view point offers fresh perspectives that assist your leaders in enhancing the worth of your business. Since the best leadership coaches work with multiple businesses and industries, they bring in best practice concepts that your executives might otherwise miss

Coaching is specifically designed, usually carried out over a set period of time, and done with a specific business goal in mind. Initially established to save managers going out of track, leadership coaching now typically focuses on enhancing performance for leaders at all levels.  

There are many organizations that provide coaching for leaders. These leadership development programs aid managers in understanding various leadership techniques. These programs come in different lengths, but a long-term leadership development program would be the most thorough and hence the most helpful. A leader must establish a vision, a goal, a course of action, and inspire others. The ideal strategy a business may employ is to train and assist the leaders in acquiring these qualities and abilities. Some more benefits of leadership coaching are mentioned below: 

• Empowerment – The way individuals, co-workers, and an employer sees an individual might not enclose all their abilities. The skill and experience of a trained coach show the people their unrecognized strengths. They can give leaders the confidence to speak up, form teams, and work through problems rapidly. Coaches help executives pick out the best ways to lead their organization
• Clearer Communication – Sometimes executives expect people to think and act in the same way that they do. They assume their communication is clear but it is not so. When other approaches to assisting leaders have failed, leadership coaching may be a viable option. Executives become much more skilled at communicating when they comprehend how various personalities hear, react, and act. They can communicate well across cultural, age, and other lines to build harmony and motivate teams to succeed
• More Insightful Analysis – Leadership coaching brings about the best of management approaches and styles. Coaches encounter various business models and observe successful applications in unconnected contexts. They bring these strengths to your team. Your leaders will develop the skills to mingle and draw in dissimilar concepts to analyze and solve your difficult problems
• Strategies – The blend of fresh ideas, inquiries, and analyses a leadership coach brings to your team creates room for new tactics as well. Your executives will look beyond their ingrained approaches to problem-solving and adopt tactics that can inspire, motivate, and enhance the business
• Understanding – Sometimes companies get stuck from lack of understanding. Perhaps they don’t fully understand new issues, shifting marketplaces, genuine client concerns, best delivery procedures, etc. Your key personnel will learn new leadership techniques with the aid of the coaches. Ingrain their thinking with a deeper understanding of people, skills and performance options and you’ll create leadership skills that produce the perfect answers needed in this fast -changing market. 

A company’s workforce can be enhanced, employee morale can be raised, and organizational goals can be achieved with the aid of leadership coaching. The leadership development programs offered by Strengthscape assist in developing leaders’ abilities to manage and influence the workforce. It helps you arrange and combine difficult concepts into a tapestry of words and visuals. It also helps in improving the visioning process and aiding in analyzing the past, understanding the present and finding options to build a clear future vision. Strengthscape provides leadership training which reforms the skills of leaders by helping them increase their individuality, approaches and analyze their strengths and weaknesses before helping other team members do the same. 

One of the duties of leadership that leaders sometimes belittle is the role of the leader as a coach, mentor and developer of people. Before you are a leader, prosperity is all about yourself, when you become a leader, it is all about developing others. As you speculate on goals for yourself, you should consider not only plans for your own advancement, but also how you are going to support the growth of your team. Much research has been done on mentoring in leadership coaching and it really comes down to three things: 

• In the short term, people whose growth is encouraged are more engaged. There is a strong connection between people who answer positively when asked if there’s someone at work who supports their development. Engagement turns into profitability and results
• In the medium term, the reward to the manager is that people who have been successfully coached and mentored develop the ability to do more alone, without as much direction or help from their manager. They will develop greater ease in making decisions, and initiating action to achieve targets
• Over the long term, organizations with an elaborating focus develop talent and are able to advance internally. They develop a strong culture with people who understand the business from different angles. They are able to profit on business opportunities because they have capable people ready to take on a new challenge

Practices to Coach Others –

Many leaders have a strong focus on coaching and developing others, and have sighted their best practices. Here are some notable ones: 

• Tuning Into People – They tune into people in a purposeful way. They shine in an environment where they can be creative and have other people to plan with. Doing so, they come up with wonderful ideas that others don’t see
• Strategic Planning - Leaders who are strong people developers can see the future of business and anticipate the talent and skills they’re going to need. They work out strategies for developing the people who will serve as the future generation of leaders
• They Spend Time On it – Strong people developers will hold confidential discussions with their team members throughout the year, not just during the yearly mandatory performance regulation conversation. They try not to focus only on immediate issues but will spend time discussing performance trends, and career orientation

Mentoring is a comprehensive technique that helps in leadership development. It is a multi-faceted role that helps in the complete personality development of a person. The long-term impact of mentoring in leadership coaching can influence a person’s career to a great extent. Mentoring is viewed as an effective way to boost learning and leadership skills. 

Leadership is a quality that does not crop up suddenly. It takes time to develop the knowledge and skills to become an effective leader. It requires mentorship, role models and making errors and learning from them. With the growing interest in mentoring in leadership coaching a lot of organizations invest considerably in developing leaders across levels where mentoring plays a key role. Mentoring is seen as a valued method for both, career and personal development. 

Most of the leadership development programs mainly concentrate on making the participants learn new skills and teach them how to practice those in the workplace. The instantaneous application and guidance through mentors truly help participants to sharpen their existing skillset and aid future growth. 

What is a Good Mentorship?

Good mentors are an essential part of leadership development. A good mentor should not only possess knowledge but also should be able to transmit that knowledge in an effective manner. They are expected to show sincerity and zeal to help others succeed in life. Even though they are skilled in their respective fields, they should respect the mentees. A good mentor will always understand the specific skill that each person has and help them to excel in it. Mentoring concentrates on the growth and development of a person.  

How does a Mentor Help?

If the participants have a possible talent, mentors can hasten their readiness for leadership development. Mentoring can be used as a strategic device to build people so that they can fit to an organization’s culture. Leadership in development coaching ensures that mentors will aid the employees on how to associate with the business and strategic goals in an organization. 

Mentoring in leadership coaching generally includes people with years of knowledge and expertise in specific fields. So, learning skills from these people is very profitable. Mentorship gives a primary experience of what leadership should look like. Mentors show leadership qualities like effective communication, responsibility and the ability to counsel other people. 

In a leadership development coaching, a mentor plan activity for the mentees and also provides the tools to perform them. A good mentor can help a person come out of his comfort zone by creating different leadership schemes. Another great benefit of mentorship is that it aids in networking. Mentors help people to gain more confidence and develop people skills.   

The long-term impact of mentoring in leadership coaching can influence a person’s career to a great extent. Mentoring is viewed as an effective way to boost learning and leadership skills. 

A strong leader’s presence in the workplace is important for a company’s success. The world’s top firms are led by outstanding executives who care about recognizing, accepting, and improving their company’s worth. A firm that lacks adequate organization would eventually devolve into anarchy. Thus, in this article we are going to discuss about some effective business leadership activities.  

Business Leadership Activities

A true leader does not expect events to occur on their own. Surprisingly or not, an efficient and conscientious company leader accepts responsibility for the team’s efficiency and the firm’s performance, understanding that without his consistent involvement, everyone would suffer. Some effective business leadership activities can help in such a case: 

1. The Leader’s Task: The initial stage in this activity is to organize a debate or an essay competition on leadership issues. Create the contest such that just a few people may win the top spots. Form a few teams (two or three) and select the workers who won the contest as group leaders. Every team leader will be assigned a task, and his duty will be to arrange his team according to his own preferences. The regulations are as follows: teams that achieve the aim will be awarded. Teams that do not comply will be required to perform additional responsibilities or work more hours for a month.
2. 30 Seconds Left: Gather your whole workforce and ask them to close their eyes and envision the happiest moment of their lives. Explain that they should not exclude personal successes, professional accomplishments, thrilling excursions, or experiences shared with lovers, friends, or family. Allow them one minute to reflect on their most interesting life experiences. After that, ask them to restrict their search and seek the finest 30 seconds experience that they’d like to share if they only had 30 seconds remaining in this life (assumed). Allow them two minutes to consider before telling them they can open their eyes. The final stage is to provide them the opportunity to communicate the finest 30 seconds of their lives. Request openness and honesty. This team development activity can help your employees learn more about themselves while also helping others understand what they love or care about the most. This is a private conversation that will foster genuine bonding.

In the workplace and in other community organizations, leadership is crucial. Business benefits from leadership activities include improved performance and productivity. Leadership activities are used to support the growth and development of a leadership team as well as to assist people in learning crucial leadership qualities. Team cohesion, workplace communication, and improved teamwork can all be achieved through leadership activities. 

Good leadership habits can be maintained by taking part in activities that foster further leadership development. You can modify special leadership-development exercises to meet the demands of your business by doing some research on them. In this article, we define leadership activities and examine 15 different activities you may utilize at work to improve team morale and foster more effective leadership.  

1. The Race of the Leaders: The leaderboard race is a simple yet effective game for assessing your employees’ self-confidence and self-esteem. This is a leadership activity that helps your staff to stand out from the crowd. Make a list of leadership characteristics on a piece of paper. Ten to twenty sentences expressing leadership traits should suffice – for example, “I’m accountable for what happens within and without.” Everything that happens to me is entirely my fault, and I never blame anyone for my problems.” Read each phrase aloud to the participants, and ask them to take a step forward if any of the statements they hear apply to them. Each step must be justified, therefore they must be prepared to explain why they feel they have those traits. Continue until you’ve found a winner. This practice will help your staff get to know themselves and their coworkers better

1. The “What If” Game: This is a basic task that tests your workers’ critical thinking and problem-solving skills. Gather your workers for a one-on-one private discussion and offer various potential problem scenarios. Make your queries challenging and don’t give your staff too much time to consider. If the question is truly difficult, give them five minutes. You may monitor your employees’ critical thinking and probing abilities by planning this leadership exercise. You may also observe how reasonable your staff are

1. The Survival Game: Create groups of 5 to 10 people. Present a life-threatening situation: their plane crashed, they survived, and they discovered the plane’s wreckage. Make a list of 20 to 30 items and ask each group to select only 5 items that will help them survive. Allow your teams 10 minutes to ponder on the issue before asking them to present their responses. Every team must explain why they picked the items they did and propose the approach that would help them survive. This activity encourages participants to develop critical thinking, creative thinking, problem-solving abilities, and strategic thinking.  

It is difficult to be an excellent leader who manages his team, projects, duties, time, and personal life all at the same time. However, if you do not realize your full potential and engage in the aforementioned business leadership activities, as well as the efficiency of your team, you will never experience bountiful success. You’ll barely be able to tackle the obstacles ahead of you, and you’ll barely be able to keep your squad under control.  

There are certain leadership specific qualities and the games are to be planned in a way that develops those skills. Leaders are generally great orators, creative, diplomatic, knowledgeable about different group functions, systematized, and compassionate.   

Minefield:  In this game participants are divided into groups and one member is blindfolded. Other members have to guide him through the minefield with limited set of instructions. This activity can be set in outdoor spaces or in regular office space; it is helpful for enhancing communication skills and building trust within the team. For a competent leader having a cohesive team and being a great orator are greater assets.  

Assigning Company Values: The individual who best represented a certain value of the company for a month’s period will be awarded and acknowledged publicly. This would be done by peer voting method. It assists in encouraging employees to keep in par with the goals of the organization. It is essential that a leader is focused and work towards company’s vision. 

Recognition: It is a key to keep the employee remain focused or even take extra efforts. If the employee had worked hard, or came up with innovative ideas that helped the company, identifying and acknowledging their act would make them work extra as it gives a feel good effect. This develops an attitude to go the extra mile or to take a little extra effort, which is essential in a leader. 

Feedback: As humans, we look for comments or inputs from others for betterment of ourselves. A proper feedback helps to know our strengths and weakness, improves our performance in future. Giving and receiving feedback is an art. One should give feedback with a proper intention, based on evidence, clarity in their content, and should help for individual betterment. One should also be open to criticisms and work at improving them. This helps in self-growth. Being able to give appropriate feedback makes a leader stand out and also it reflects in the production of the organization. 

The Human Icebreaker: This activity helps in bonding and encourages participants to open up and lead to discussion. It is essential for a leader to develop inter-personal skills and communication skills and this activity aids that. The participants must generate a chain of questions relating to people in a general way. The participants then have to look for answers to their questions and get to know their team members.  

Leaders You Admire: Participants are grouped into teams and they have to come up with one leader they admire the most by discussing their opinions. And they have to identify the leadership qualities and style of the person they chose. This helps gaining what leadership style the team admires. 

Round Tables: This is a group activity, with each group assigned with a different task.  Then the team choses a leader who would assign different steps of the task to each member of the team and they must coordinate with each other to complete it. This is an activity that helps develop leadership and delegation skills and helps to understand various strengths of each member. 

Tallest Tower: Participants as a team are required to build a tower using newspaper. Participants are required to build the tallest freestanding structure using the newspaper. This is an ideal activity for creative problem solving and improving collaboration skills, which are essential for a leader. 

Plane Crash: This one is quite interesting where participants are in a position to imagine them to be in a trip. They have to come up with most essential items for the trip, say 5 items in total.   The activity proves to be an excellent problem solving and collaboration activity.  

The various traits of a leader include will to inspire others, to be dominant, having faith in self and confident about one’s decisions, accountability, gel to different situations, volunteering to take responsibility, energetic, resilient to stress and assertive. 

The core of what leaders exist to accomplish is solve problems. As leaders, our objective is to reduce the recurrence of issues, which means we must have the guts to confront them head-on before circumstances compel us to do so. In order to build and maintain momentum for the organization and the individuals we serve, we must be tenacious. However, in the real world, we have to deal with individuals who muddle things up with their corporate politicking, self-promotion, power plays and ploys, and jealousy. Silos, a lack of funds and resources, and a variety of other unforeseen events make it difficult for individuals to be productive. Hence, in this article we are going to talk about problem solving strategies for managers.  

Problem Solving Strategies for Managers

Leaders who lack this knowledge approach situations with a linear vision, seeing just the problem in front of them and obstructing the alternatives that exist within the problem. As a result, they never understand the full scope of the problem, or how it may be used to enhance existing best practices, protocols, and standard operating procedures in order to develop and compete in the marketplace. They never comprehend that all problems are the same in the end – they’re simply packaged differently.  

A leader must never perceive an issue as a hindrance, but rather as a strategic facilitator for continual development and previously undiscovered opportunity. Managerial problem-solvers are critical to a company’s success. Issues come in all shapes and sizes, from little annoyances to major organizational disasters. Managers that can go through the facts, diagnose the issue, and come up with a precise and effective solution will help the company flourish and prosper. Effective problem-solvers may help teams accomplish their objectives by removing irritation, ambiguity, and misunderstandings before they become unmanageable. They promote individual cooperation and teamwork, decrease the need for rework, and promote continual development. The greatest managers have a sharp ability to detect issues. When the team’s plans go off the tracks, these managers instantly start the problem-solving process. 

Problem resolution necessitates open and honest dialogue in which everyone’s concerns and opinions are openly voiced. I’ve seen firsthand how difficult it is to get to the bottom of a problem in a timely manner when individuals refuse to speak out. At the end of the day, problem solving is about individuals cooperating to improve the organization and the people it serves. As a result, effective issue resolution becomes a lengthy and twisting path of pain if you are trapped dealing with closed-minded people. Change without strategy is just replacement rather than evolution. To address any problem, a strong plan must be executed. Many executives try to analyze an issue instead of identifying the change strategy that exists within the problem. 

Planning, doing, checking, and acting in a never-ending loop while also keeping an eye on the situation and the results is how managers solve problems. 

There are numerous approaches to problem-solving. Each is appropriate for a specific class of issues. Your particular problem will determine the best problem-solving strategies. Before you come up with a good answer, you might need to test out a few different approaches. 

Fortunately, all managers can learn to solve problems more effectively by using this four-step problem solving strategy for managers: 

1. Identify and Define the Problem – Managers on the lookout for signals, symptoms, and indicators of potential issues are always on the lookout. They consider if this is a problem they can fix and whether it will have a significant impact on the team or organization once they notice a possible problem. They produce a precise, quantifiable problem statement and describe the situation in explicit, objective words without making assumptions or rushing to conclusions once the problem has been designated as a priority
2. Analyze the Problem – The best problem solvers look for patterns and ask questions about what, who, when, where, and how much the issue has impacted the company. They are able to isolate and define the issue’s root cause, ensuring that it will not recur once it has been resolved
3. Develop Solutions – While some problems have simple solutions, managerial problem When issue resolution becomes a fluid process that allows individuals and the company to develop and improve, you know you have outstanding leadership in your business. If fixing problems causes turmoil, you may have a major leadership problem. The biggest facilitator of development and opportunity is problem resolution. This is why failure is regarded as the most important lesson in business and life. Be the leader who demonstrates maturity, acts boldly, and holds others accountable
4. Plan and Act – A smart manager produces a strong implementation strategy once the best option has been found. This plan should outline the measures that will be done to move forward, as well as contingency plans to assist the management in dealing with possible setbacks. He or she must also gain others’ commitment, mobilize them to take action, and keep them responsible for their obligations

Each of these problem-solving strategies for managers can assist you in becoming a great problem solver. Every encounter teaches us something new. Accept problem solving and all of the hidden gems it contains. Solving cannot be impulsive, as it risks making rash decisions. Instead, they assess the situation and design a long-term solution using techniques such as brainstorming ideas, creating prioritized lists, and evaluating the time, cost, and technology involved. The managerial problem-solving process is a never-ending cycle of planning, doing, checking, and acting, all while keeping an eye on the issue and the results. Managers change their plans as required so that the team may continue to work toward a solution that will lead to improved company results. 

To help organizations grow it is important to tap into people’s strength. Strengths-based leadership is a way to lead others which build on people’s strengths. Strength-based leadership empowers leaders and the employees, fosters a healthy and positive workplace culture. As the world is constantly changing, employees face an increased level of stress and uncertainty. This can lead to lowered productivity, absenteeism, lack of engagement at work, and high turnover rates. Under these conditions, leaders can not be just task-oriented, running effective meetings, delegating work, etc. It is important for leaders to find out the ways to engage, inspire, motivate, and develop people to become more resilient. Leaders should make people flourish despite daily challenges. 

Strength-based-leadership enables leaders to bring out the best in others by working on their core strengths. The main objective behind strength-based-leadership is to build on an individual’s best characteristics to increase the chances of success. 

Strength-based leadership style does not say that one should not work on weaknesses – however, it pays attention to the fact that organizations will gain the most when they build on people’s strengths rather than focusing on their deficits.  

Characteristics of Strengths-based leader.

1. Strengths-based leaders demonstrate hope, optimism, resilience – They invest in the strengths of people, direct them towards the goal, and influence them to follow the vision. They are optimistic and firmly believe in harnessing employees’ strong characteristics. 
2. Strength-based leaders recognise and hone on the strengths and skills of employees. – They are very transparent and authentic in their relationship with their employees. Have a strong guiding principle, create a positive impact and enable workplace environment which helps people to reach their full potential. 
3. Strength-based leaders build trust, confidence, and followership – They create an environment of doing and consistently follow that. This enables employees to be energized, engaged and motivated to go over and above what is expected of them. They also promote and align the strengths of others towards achieving outcomes, performance and organizational success. 

How to become a strength-based leader?

1. First, understand your top strengths. Know the way to harness the top strengths and work towards them. This will act as a leadership enabler. 
2. It is also important to recognize the shadow side of the strength. Sometimes, overusing a strength can also become a problem as it can act as a derailer in some situations. 
3. A leader should also understand that what motivates the staff. In order to lead effectively, the leader should need to know the people, what are their values, their strengths, and the difference they want to create. 
4. Create an environment where everyone gets a chance to be successful. A leader’s success is completely based on the success of their followers. 
5. A leader can also get a coach. The coach will help to reflect on your practices as a leader. A coach will assist you to set goals, work on strengths, gives an objective perspective about everything. A coach can act as a sounding board who can reflect back the things on which the leader needs to work.

Strength-based-leadership enables leaders to bring out the best in others by working on their core strengths. The main objective behind strength-based-leadership is to build on an individual’s best characteristics to increase the chances of success. 

Strengths- based leadership focuses on your team’s strengths to build better teams. It lays stress on identifying and making best use of your own and your members’ strengths and assigning tasks to those who are strong in areas in which you are weak. A strength- based leadership approach can improve your delegation skills, expand team diversity and create a more agreeable leadership style. However, the weakness of team members should not be ignored. If left out of control, they can destroy an otherwise united team. 

Most managers battle to handle their tasks, and those of their team members, in a way that derives the maximum benefit of everyone’s skills and abilities. Sometimes you have to collect data for an essential report, but data has never been your talent, but maybe someone else in your team has literally the skills you need, and they’d feel excited at the chance to put them to good use. 

Applying Strengths-Based Leadership –

The first step to using strengths-based leadership effectively is to take a step back and judge your own strengths. What are you good at and what are your weaknesses?  Use our personal analysis to measure your strengths and weaknesses. Discover your unique strengths. Online assessment is another useful way to analyze and make the most of your individual strengths.  

You also need to be aware of your employees’ strengths. Once you have a clear idea of where the strengths lie, you can adjust their work to suit their unique skill sets. Pay attention to what your team members talk about during performance reviews, especially if they are eager to discuss a previously latent skill. Stay open to feedback on your own performance. When hiring new talent, use the Competency Based Interviewing to make sure that you get the perfect blend of skills and knowledge. Ensure that whoever you hire will cover any skill gaps in your team.  

Strengths-based leadership means increasing the efficiency, output and success of an organization by focusing on and regularly developing the strengths of organizational resources. At the heart of the strengths-based leadership is the basic belief that people have much more potential for building their strengths rather than amending their weaknesses. Strengths-based organizations do not ignore weaknesses, but rather, focuses on building talents and reducing the negative effects of weaknesses. Strengths-based leaders are always focusing on their strengths and the strengths of their team members. 

Truly speaking, if we stop trying to amend our employees and rather focus on their strengths and their passions, we can create a zealous army of brand leaders who, when authorized, could take our brand and our products to the next level.  

Strengths-based leadership is the ability of determining and making the best use of your team members’ and your own strengths. Of course, this doesn’t mean that you, or your team, should ignore learning new skills. Infact, you should be capable of assigning tasks that you’re not so good at to others who are more skilled or experienced. This approach is that which works by focusing on your strengths, and delegating task.  

The most successful teams possess a wide range of abilities. When you are aware of each of your team members’ key strengths, you can apply them in a way that benefits the team as a whole. In this article, we are going to discuss how you can use this approach to develop yourself and your team members and also how it can make you a more effective leader.  

Importance of Strengths-Based Leadership –

A strengths-based leadership can profit your leadership and your team’s performance in many ways. Accepting that you need help, stimulates not only effective work experience, but also a qualified and noninterference leadership style. Asking for help is a symbol of strength, not weakness, and it helps you to ponder on what you do best. Sharing responsibility can also encourage creativity, modernization, and a sense of knowledge and purpose within your team. When you become aware of your team members’ strengths, you show them that you trust their abilities. As a result, they are likely to feel more confident to speak up and express their own views. They build accurate power, which can further increase their self-worth and interest  

Strengths-based leadership can promote team engagement and job satisfaction. Very few employees become disengaged if their managers actively focus on their strengths, while most of them back out if their key skills are ignored. What’s more, a strengths-based approach encourages you to hire employees based on their individual abilities and natural tendencies, not just because their skills and experience are similar to yours. This can lead to greater team unity, as team members complement one another rather than challenge one another for the same task. It can also produce a more diverse team, with a wider range of strengths, skill sets, attitudes, and cultural experience.  

Organizations that follow strengths-based development improve their business results in several appreciable ways. When compared with other organizations following other methods of employee development, strengths-based companies undergo rise in sales, profits, and customer and employee engagement. 

Strengths-based leadership is supported by years of research. Researchers have found that when strengths-based leadership causes individual team member competency to increase, but collective team performance to decrease, then it is not the best method. It is also in human nature to repair things. We are always looking for problems so that we can solve them and for gaps to fill them. Not only we use this procedure with the projects we work on, but we also use this in judging our employees since it feels natural and correct. Here is where we go wrong. This approach is the cause of not being able to build powerful and varied teams and is the reason we are not using human potential as much as possible. Thus, we are likely to have more average managers than we have true leaders. And at the end of the day, all this has an impact on our culture and ultimately our bottom line.  

The Risks of Strengths-Based Leadership –

Despite the benefits mentioned above, the strengths-based leadership approach does have some potential defects. Inspiring people to concentrate only on their strengths can restrict their opportunities to grow. Sometimes, encouraging your team members to deal with unfamiliar things can help to disclose skills they never knew they had. Be watchful that laying stress on individual talents and strengths doesn’t cause you to waive important knowledge or skills gaps. 

You can also risk rescheduling your team members. As a result, they may become frustrated or hostile that others are developing new areas of expertise, while they aren’t. On the other hand, they may become too comfortable, and therefore less creative and innovative. Sometimes, strong team unity can lead to forming groups, where team members with opposing views don’t speak up because they don’t want to go against the general agreement. 

This problem can extend when you only bring in people who think like you and have similar opinions, rather than people who bring genuine beliefs. In some cases, laying stress on individual strengths may lower team unity and effectiveness. If everyone leads in their respective areas, you might battle to define the team’s overall objectives.  

If you adopt the strengths-based leadership approach in your team, it’s important to cover the whole range of soft skills, as well as the specialized and effective abilities that are needed to get the job done.  

A situational leadership style allows one to change their approach depending on the circumstances or the requirements of the people they are trying to influence. The leader adapts his approach to the circumstance or the individual. It also implies that different situations call for different leadership styles, and that a good leader must change their approach depending on the situation. Using this paradigm, a leader can examine the prospects, evaluate the people they are leading, and acquire a perspective on the situation.  

Three factors need to be taken into account when implementing this leadership style: the employee’s competencies, their level of maturity, and the difficulty of the work at hand. In this paradigm, there are four different sorts of leadership styles: telling, selling, participating, and delegating.  

• Telling: This leadership style describes managers or supervisors that provide constant assistance to their staff by spoon-feeding them all relevant information and directions regarding the work. They would offer advice on methods, techniques, and strategies for carrying out the assignment
• Selling: This type of leader welcomes suggestions and contributions from their team. They engage in two-way contact and pay attention to their staff, which helps their followers feel valued
• Participating: This leader engages in conversation with the team members on the solutions or suggestions that should be put into practise. They consult the staff for advice on the best ways to carry out a specific work and make a clear choice. The manager works on building relationships with his team
• Delegating: This is a method of giving work and ownership to the team members while the manager keeps an eye on their progress. The primary function played in this situation is task delegation

According to the employees’ level of maturity, a leader can choose what kind of style to apply by looking at one of four categories: 

D4 – High Competence, High Commitment: These workers can occasionally outperform their superiors in completing assignments. 

D3 – High Competence, Variable Commitment: This includes workers that are extremely competent but inconsistent in their level of commitment. They are also unconfident, which makes them reluctant to perform.  

D2 – Some Competence, Low Commitment: It implies that the person possesses the necessary level of expertise but nevertheless asks for assistance from others to complete the assignment owing to a lack of commitment.  

D1 – Low Competence, High Commitment: They may not have the best skill set or capabilities, but because of their stronger devotion and confidence, they concentrate on finishing the task at hand and succeed.  

These two elements, leadership style and follower style thus have a relationship and form the cornerstone of situational leadership. 

Situational leadership theory is based on the inference that there is no single best style of leadership, the style must be suitable for the situation. Situational leaders change their style of leadership based on the goals and developmental needs of the organization and the team they manage. This kind of leadership involves the understanding and analysis of the business environment as well as the working requirements of the employees. It requires the practitioner to be dynamic and fast paced in order to adapt to changing requirements in business and in working relationships.   

There are four leadership styles that situational leaders can follow given any business and supervisory requirement. The styles are directing, selling, participating and delegating which are in increasing order of giving autonomy to the employees and decreasing order of direct control. In order to be able to work dynamically but also analyze specific requirement and adapt quickly to the changing requirements, situational leaders should have certain characteristics. A situational leader must be able to change their leadership style with change in situations. If the employee developmental level is high then the leaders perform a majorly supervisory role whereas when the developmental level is low, the leadership become task-oriented and directive.   

A situational leader should be flexible to change their leadership style without assuming that one or two styles are superior and can handle all situations. A situational leader also must play a coaching role where they take inputs from the team, discuss the reason for decisions taken and assist in employee development. Integrity is one of the important characteristics since situational leaders have the liberty to change leadership styles. The change must be done in accordance with goals and needs rather than to take advantage of the scenario or of any individual. Situational leaders must have the courage to make drastic changes in their leadership styles when there is a need, even if the change is as extreme as shifting from a delegatory role to a directing role.   

Since the situational leader may have to practice different styles within a single team, they must have a clear vision of what they want to do and how to manage these different paths to achieve the respective goals. Humility is a characteristic that is essential for a situational leader since adapting to different situations is a learning process and mistakes when treated as learning opportunities are beneficial rather than working under the assumption that every decision made is right.   

The practice of situational leadership allows the leader to exercise freedom and flexibility in the approach they take while performing their leadership role. It allows them to analyze, adapt and be intuitive to changing situations and become effective at maneuvering the working relationships with the teams they manage in order to ensure that the goal is achieved. Leaders that practice situational leadership and have the characteristics discussed, allow the teams they manage to work within the preference of working styles and needs. It includes improved communication, good interpersonal relations and increased productivity in the workplace.  

Everything DiSC Assessments for Leadership Development 

Let us differentiate first between leaders and managers. Often, we are unable to differentiate between the two but create a development plan for both. Obviously, high potential managers can be nominated for leadership development but that is just 20-30% of the cases. One needs to ask and determine the target audience before creating a developmental plan for them. In that context, a simple difference between a leader and a manager is that a leader is involved in one-to-many communication and facilitation of group conversations whereas, managers are extensively involved in one-to-one communication. 

With that difference set, here are two extensively used assessments for leadership development – Everything DiSC Work of Leaders and Everything DiSC 363 for Leaders. Both the assessments are based on 8 leadership dimensions as described below. 

1. Pioneering: A leader that motivates to promote bold action, stretch boundaries and find new opportunities.  
2. Commanding: A leader that takes control of situations with utmost confidence and encourages others to focus on results. 
3. Resolute: A leader that sets high expectations, encourages to speak about issues and use methods that can increase efficiency. 
4. Deliberate: A leader that provides sense of stability through clear communication and monitors the group so that decisions are made with care. 
5. Humble: A leader who is modest, calm and composed and is looked up to for making fair decisions. 
6. Inclusive:  A leader that encourages collaboration, respects the opinions and feelings of others and gets everyone involved in decision-making. 
7. Affirming: A leader who can be approached in times of difficulty, who acknowledges contribution and creates a positive working environment hence making employees feel good. 
8. Energizing: A leader who knows how to enthuse the group to perform better and practices to develop professional networks to achieve goals. 

Basis these 8 dimensions, here is a brief description and application of the two assessments. 

Everything DiSC Work of Leaders

This assessment uses the 8 leadership dimensions as behavioral priorities of leaders and plots it around the DiSC model. It further combines this with the Work of Leaders model by Julie Straw which explains the three steps of leadership (VAE) along with its drivers – Crafting a Vision (V), Building Alignment (A) and Championing Execution (E).  

The profile begins with explaining the DiSC style of the leader and his or her leadership behavioral priorities. It then explains where does the leader stand in terms of the VAE model. The VAE model is further detailed out basis leadership drivers and leadership best practices. For example, under Crafting a Vision, the three leadership drivers are Exploration, Boldness and Testing Assumption. When exploring, a leader needs to prioritize the big picture and remain open which becomes the leadership best practices. The best practices are represented on a continuum like seeking closure vs remaining open or prioritizing details vs prioritizing the big picture. Similarly, there are 18 best practices explained on a continuum and the leader’s position on the continuum is represented with a dot. The report can be used to help leaders develop those best practices based on where they stand today and what are their leadership priorities. 

The report of this assessment does not give any objective scores and therefore, should be used majorly as a developmental profile rather than hiring at the leadership position. The assessment can be used for both leadership training and executive coaching. 

Everything DiSC 363 for Leaders

This is a behavioral 360-degree feedback tool majorly used with one-to-one developmental interventions like executive coaching. The assessment is called “363” because along with being a 360-degree feedback tool, it also gives three strategies for development. Along with that, another unique feature of this assessment tool is Comment Smart. 360-degree feedback can often lead to subjective feedback with bias and personal attack if open ended questions are asked. To curb that, the assessment asks the raters (managers, peers, direct reports and others) to rate the leader on certain behaviors that are derived from the leadership dimensions. The assessment then combines the rater’s feedback with the self-assessment of the leader and plots both on a cobweb like graph that indicates gaps and blind spots. Further the assessment report gives the top 3 strengths and areas of improvement for the leader along with 3 strategies for development with each of the area of improvement. The narrative and detailed report along with strategies and less biased responses from the raters, makes this feedback took a highly recommended assessment to be used for leadership development.  

Leadership development assessments must be selected after the purpose of development has been defined so that one can choose the appropriate tool and corresponding intervention based on that. 

Leadership is a very valuable concept when it comes to team building and business growth. There are many different leadership models that are prevalent across the globe. The most dynamic leadership model available is situational leadership.  

This model is given by Ken Blanchard and Paul Hersey. Blanchard and Hersey did not connect well with the argument that there should be rigid leadership styles and there is ‘one best’ leadership style for every situation faced by the leader. Situational Leadership entails that it is not just the leadership style that matters but also the nature of the situation. It includes the traits and abilities of the leader to handle the situation and not just the leadership guidance that the leader can follow. It is progressive and multi-dimensional. 

The model focused on two major components – leadership styles and maturity levels. Leadership style is dictated in terms of relationship with the members of the team/employees and the work given to them. The different styles are – telling, selling, participating and delegating.  

The traditional model also gave different maturity levels, ranging from M1 to M4, with M1 being the lowest and M4 the highest. The levels of maturity required can differ from task to task, thus it does not promote a monotonous leadership pattern. It says that a leader must match the levels of maturity with the task at hand and then accordingly work on a leadership style.  

Since it is a rather wide leadership style, many theorists have added a lot of frameworks within it. Daniel Goleman paid a lot of attention on situational leadership and recommended that it should comprise of further six more sub leadership patterns –  

• Coaching leadership – the leader focuses on the development of the subordinates as well 
• Pacesetting leadership – the leader guides and sets standards and deadlines for the members of his/her team 
• Democratic leadership – the leader shares the power of decision making with all the members 
• Affiliate leadership – the leader puts the subordinates first in most of the situations 
• Authoritative leadership – the leader commands the members of the team 
• Coercive leadership – the leader acts as a guide to the subordinates 

Goleman suggested that a leader should be a mixture of these six leadership styles and the styles should be followed according to the need of the situation. It is up to the leader to evaluate the situation accurately and choose the style accordingly. This philosophy of ‘leading according to the situation’ provides this leadership model an edge over the other authoritarian and authoritative leadership patterns. Also, the flexibility of this model makes it a successful style to follow.  

Situational leadership has been promoted in many workplaces all around the world. Organizations are now training their leaders according to its principles and concepts. A leader who can work through turbulent situations and match the needs of the situation with the abilities of the members of the team is a successful leader; such leaders are required for the growth of an organization. A leader who is trained as per this model can guide his/her team through any situation. Therefore, majority of the leaders and managers are trained to be situational leaders, for the effective development of the team and the organization.  

One of the biggest challenges that an organization faces on any level is to make everyone realize that they must be diverse to be the best. Diversity also means inclusion, wherein everyone feels that they are valued, respected and have the same opportunities. Diversity makes an organization effective as they work out on everyone’s strengths. It is about empowering people.  

Simply following the laws for diversity would not make an organization the best. To get ahead of the competitors, leaders should turn their groups into teams. This would help to create to synergy effect, which means every individual contributes more to the team. A team could accomplish wonders rather than an individual working alone. Because they understand and help each other in a way that everyone feels inclusive.  

Leaders should help employees realize that they would need to rely on everyone’s ability to be the best, no matter how different they are. Organizations would need diverse set of people as a team as same type of people would go nowhere. Leaders should see diversity as everyone’s uniqueness and using it for team’s benefit.  

If an organization is not diverse then it would be left behind. Most problems occur in an organization when employee’s differing vie points are not given due acknowledgment. Leaders must engage in conversations with their team members to bring out the best in them by leveraging their differences. Leaders should effectively train them in developing soft skills. As soft skills are going to develop their interpersonal thereby making them a valuable part of the team. 

Organizations must realize this also that people from all the cultures are their potential customers. Gone are the days when organizations focused only on a set of people for their customer base. And in order to attract this diverse set of culture, organizations must become multi-culture themselves. They should just not talk about it; they should implement diversity. Embracing diversity has various benefits for the organization: 

• Increased productivity – With diversity come different set of talented people who work together to achieve the common goal using different set of skills. Employees also get to learn from each other’s skills which creates a sense of inclusion
• Increased creativity – For a specific set of problem, there would be more diverse ideas to solve it. With diverse set of minds working together, more solutions will arise as they have different thinking style
• Reflects positively on reputation – Companies having diversity in their workforce have reputation as a good employer. Clients could feel valued and would do business with such organizations

Here are some ways by which leaders can manage diversity in the workplace:  

• Create diversity friendly policies – Through diversity lens review your workplace once. Create and implement inclusive workplace practices that respect diversity
• Reassess employee benefits – Review the benefits provided to the employees through diversity lens. Check whether the benefits are fair to everyone
• Provide diversity training – Decide a time and place for discussing diversity. Offer diversity training to employees on how to address diversity
• Build diverse teams – Ensure that your internal team is diverse. Build diversified teams and give them opportunities to work together

Diversity and inclusion are important elements of any successful and growth-oriented business. Diversity allies understand how strong diversity and inclusion strategy are important for bottom-line profit. Leaders who deliberately practice diversity inclusion and actively enhance their ability would see better performance of their diverse teams.  

For any L&D department, leadership development is a major area of concentration. Better business outcomes, a more unified organization, and effective business agility are all results of successful leadership. Therefore, it’s critical to guarantee that obstacles are properly addressed through development programs like coaching and training, and that leadership skills are fully utilized. Understanding leaders better is the first stage in leadership development. This includes learning what motivates them, their strengths and problems, and how others see them in relation to the leadership inventory. This is where leader psychometric tests are crucial. 

Business, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and team are the four main leadership perspectives covered by Everything DiSC by Wiley’s range of leadership examinations. Wiley’s three separate psychometric tests help to clarify these leadership perspectives. 

Everything DiSC Work of Leaders – The Everything DiSC Work of Leaders uses the DiSC Model and the VAE framework to make it possible for leaders to comprehend their own leadership styles, aptitudes, and difficulties, as well as to pinpoint where they are in relation to leadership ideals. The evaluation is based on four years of research on 300 CEOs from 150 organizations by Julie Straw and colleagues. According to the evaluation, leadership is a one-to-many connection that involves a three-step process. 

•  Developing a Vision 
•  Structure Alignment 
•  Promoting the use of force  

There are three drives and two behavioral best practices for each stage of the leadership process. The exam aids in determining a leader’s DiSC style. This enables them to comprehend their leadership styles, aptitudes, and difficulties. Specific information about where each leader sits in relation to international leadership best practices is provided by the VAE Model and its accompanying behavioral best practices. This aids in the establishment of a plan for leaders. A useful psychometric tool for leaders in business seminars is The Work of Leaders because it promotes effective vision, alignment, and execution. Additionally, it offers significant intrapersonal effectiveness insights. 

Everything DiSC 363 for Leaders – The 363 for Leaders is Wiley’s second leadership evaluation. This 360-degree survey offers insightful feedback to leaders on 8 leadership characteristics and the actions that go along with them. The survey solicits responses from the respondent as well as peers, managers, and direct reports. This aids leaders in determining how diverse stakeholders view their leadership style. To find weaknesses in the leadership brand, an examination of feedback from oneself and others is presented. The assessment is based on the DiSC Model, although the outcomes place more emphasis on the characteristics of leadership than the particular leader’s DiSC style. Instead of 360, the survey is referred to as a 363, as it offers 3 suggestions for improvement. The assessment also has elements like Comment Smart that let raters give helpful criticism on behaviors they would want to see leaders exhibit more or less frequently. The positive phrase narrows the emphasis of the survey development.   

The 363 for Leaders is an excellent tool for enhancing a leader’s leadership inventory by taking into account the perception of important stakeholders. At the same time, it offers crucial insights for enhancing teamwork and a leader’s personal brand. 

Five Behaviors of a Cohesive Team – Building cohesive leadership teams is the subject of Wiley’s third leadership assessment. The Patrick Lencioni Five Behaviors Model and the DiSC Model are combined in this examination. The exam is divided into two sections. The first part focuses on determining each team member’s DiSC style through a self-evaluation. The team survey, which includes responses from all team members, is the second component. It rates the team on each of the five behaviors—trust, conflict, commitment, accountability, and results—that make up a cohesive team.  

The paper also discusses how each team member’s DiSC style affects the five behaviors. In addition to being unproductive, dysfunctional leadership teams can harm an organization’s business prospects. This team evaluation for leadership teams enables them to recognize unproductive team dynamics and develop a strategy for becoming a cohesive unit.   

Leaders can gain unbiased, scientifically confirmed insights into their behavior through psychometric evaluations. Such perceptions are priceless and a successful starting point for leadership development through coaching or training. 

Change Management

Let’s start by understanding the definition of change management. One of the most popular definitions of change management was given by Prosci who defines change management as a process of handling human aspect of change with the help of required tools, process and methods to ensure business goals are not compromised. 

Introducing a change eventually impacts one of the four aspects of an organization, which is process, system, organization structure or people. Typically, a change is introduced to combat a problem or to achieve an aspiration. So, change management is basically supporting people with the necessary tools to aid in coping and adapt better to the changed environment. 

Change Leadership

Change Leadership is defined by Higgs and Rowland (2000) popularly as one’s ability to influence everyone using their drive or vision and to provide proper tools to manage and adapt to change better. One of the key aspects to a successful change management is leadership. 

To be an influential change leader one must be able to clearly present a business case highlighting the need for change and devise an action plan to manage through the change. Change leader should be able to communicate the change to everyone – up, down and across the vertical and align them to the vision and values. It also comprises the ability to describe the strategic plan to everyone and define everyone’s roles in the process. There needs to be interim follow ups to ensure everyone has understood the strategy clearly. Proper measurement and revisits to the change process is crucial and the leader must ensure everyone is working through the change to achieve the established goal.  

Change Management vs Change Leadership

These two terms change management and change leadership are not interchangeable, but both has substantial amount of connect. A good change leadership will aid effective change management. Change management, however, is about those tools and structures that aid in sailing through the process of change and keep the negative impact of change under control. On the other hand, change leadership is focused on the human aspects like the vision of the company, values and alignment to processes and systems that act as the catalyst for any change or transformation. Change leadership is considered to be the driving force for change management. 

Certain crucial aspects for success of change management are:  

Willingness to adapt to change: It is essential for the workforce to embrace the change at some point and start working their ways through the change. Everyone naturally tends to resist change as that’s the natural response. But it is also essential to slowly pass through that phase and adapt to change. This willingness to change will be very helpful in the entire process of working through the change. Leaders play an important role to help adapt to change by explaining the rationale for change and providing the right structure and flexibility to work with it.  

Rewards and Consequences: For anyone to adapt to change there needs to be well defined rewards and consequences communicated. The objectives and the process of measuring the results need to be well defined and the rewards need to be connected to their individual development plan. Similar process works for consequences as well. This provides a clear structure to the workforce and easier way to track progress for the management. For these to happen smoothly, there needs to be strong leadership which we refer as change leadership. Change leaders need to demonstrate the skills of communication, collaboration and commitment to help employees adapt to change. 

Most organizations have worked their way through change management but change leadership is where the focus is required. In order to develop leaders who are influential and can help the team transition through the change, leadership and personal coaching can be very helpful tools. 

It is quite evident that equal opportunities for leadership are particularly uneven across countries and nations. Even though women have an increased presence in corporate leadership roles, they are still demeaned on the leadership level. Inequality is often related to standard gender expectations and beliefs which define how men and women ought to be. The standard masculine construct of leadership can explain fewer positive attitudes toward females on the managerial level. 

Recommended Approaches

Below are some suggestions employers can take to encourage equal opportunity for leadership in the workplace: 

• Train Your managers – Make sure to provide your management team with detailed training on gender equality. They should be educated about both the evident and the indirect discrimination that takes place in the workplace. Teach them how to identify discrimination and deal with it when it takes place and how to prevent it from arising repeatedly
• Prioritize Your Employees’ Work/life Balance – One of the most significant obstacles that prevent women from accomplishing their careers’ potential is the lack of childcare assistance from their employers. Organizations should consider providing employees with quality childcare facilities and make sure that family leave is available to both men and women thus offering some relief to working mothers and also encouraging the fathers to be more actively involved in childcare duties. Companies need to encourage equal opportunities for leadership in the workplace by working towards building a fair workplace that promote productivity while also allowing resilience, possibly with remote working
• Remove the Gender Pay Gap – A new culture of clarity needs to be introduced that ensures that men and women are paid equally for performing the same work, and also treated fairly and equally in leadership
• Make Mentors Available to Everyone – Having an experienced mentor to help guide you through the various challenges and obstacles is very helpful and it should be an access that is available to everyone whatever their gender in order to encourage equal opportunity for leadership in the workplace. Lack of interest in mentoring female colleagues will certainly reduce the few career advancement opportunities women have at work. Men vastly surpass women as managers and senior leaders in the corporate world, so when they prefer to avoid or exclude women, those women suffer much
• Treating Women with Respect – To encourage equal opportunity in the workplace takes more than just treating women with respect and basic dignity. It also means not making them feel lonely or ignoring them and making availability of resources equal for them. The purpose is to give both the men and women in your organization equal opportunities to succeed
• Zero Tolerance Policy Against Harassment – Management should take the responsibility to step in early to both identify and stop harassment, but somehow, cases of harassment are often ignored in many companies. This has a devastating effect in terms of productivity, teamwork and company culture. Ignoring, tolerating or mismanaging cases of harassment clearly indicates that more intense and systemic gender inequality is approved and encouraged within the organization

You need to crush any signs of harassment happening to any employee, especially the women, within your workplace and ensure a proper process is carried out to provide justice to the sufferer and prevent such cases from happening again.  

Gender discrimination is shameful to both our workplaces and society as a whole. Interestingly though, whereas gender discrimination unfairly affects women, it turns out that both men and women gain when equal opportunities for leadership is practiced in the workplace. Promoting gender equality is not difficult, but it requires management to take the necessary actions, create guidelines and impose them in order to encourage equality. Beyond doubt, everybody and not just women will benefit from this equality.  

Studies show that there is a gap in performance reviews of female leaders, which adversely impacts perception of female effectiveness.  Even small changes to existing practices can reduce subjective bias and promote equal opportunities for leadership on both the social and organizational level. 

At times as a leader, you are not able to influence your employees in the organization consistently. You discover that your strategy for inspiring others doesn’t always work. Situational leadership means modifying your management approach to fit the demands of the team or individual team members in each specific situation or activity. Making an examination of the organisational condition will help a leader improve his problem-solving style and behaviour. In order to properly lead the organization, he needs to examine its degree of competency, motivating factors, staff abilities, and other aspects. This is referred to as situational leadership, where the leaders must modify their approaches and styles to best suit the circumstances within the organization.  

Key Objectives of the Situational Leadership Program

Organizations all over the world who desire to do the following choose the situational leadership model:  

• Develop individuals and teams
• Build a relationship with, and to bring out the best in, their staff
• Apply a consistent leadership approach to all organisational units, whether they are local, national, or multinational
• Gaining an insight and different approaches into leadership styles and behaviour and their impact in developing subordinate’s readiness
• Developing knowledge on leadership strategies in order to optimize the effectiveness of your collaborators
• Identifying the most impactful style to use in a range of situations 

As a leader each individual has his own unique styles, skills, traits and behaviours. However, the success of a leader does always not primarily depend on these factors alone. This is because there are other factors that affect the influence the leader has on his followers or the organization. The organization’s situation is one of these elements. By sharing the vision, standards, goals, and objectives of their organisation with the team, a leader serves as a representative of that organisation. An effective leader must be a motivator, a spokesperson, a decision-maker, a communicator of information, an organiser, and a link to the rest of the company. 

What makes Situational Leadership the most Successful?

All potential outcomes are under your control when you use situational leadership. Situational leadership refers to the ability to effectively impact your organisation in all directions in order to control results. You anticipate responses from your subordinates and think strategically. This is the most effective leadership. Since you are self-aware, you employ your leadership instinct and support it with years of experience and formal education. The situational leadership method enables the leader to see beyond what is immediately apparent to others.  

Strengthscape’s Situational Leadership programme is made to help leaders adopt the right style and behavioural approach based on the organization’s stage of development. The leader will have the methodology necessary to conduct an accurate analysis of the business. The leader is assisted in adopting a specific style based on the results of the analysis that will work best for the organization. Strengthscape’s head coach is an expert in helping leaders succeed with their approach, develop their less favoured approaches, balance their natural tendencies, and further design a personal action plan to enhance their leadership abilities in a realistic and efficient manner.