Deck 10: Leaders and Leadership

Question 1

Why do some employees try to make themselves seem irreplaceable during tough economic times?

Answer 1

Case summary:
In the current economic times, there are people in the organizations' workforces who are constantly reminding their leaders and managers that they are performing large amount of hardwork to accomplish firms' goals. The employees are putting hardwork so as to get noticed and recognized by the key people in the organizations. Everytime managers talk to the employees, the employees constantly remind managers about the kind of contribution they are making for the firm, and how it is helping the firm to achieve its objectives smoothly. However, the question is whether the employees are really putting up hardwork or they are simply pretending to be busy and working hard. Some organizations find this as a blessing because the employees can be made to work at every aspect of the business and can be asked to work for two to three people at once allowing the firm to cut cost.
During the tough economic times, the reason why some employees try to make themselves seemed to be irreplaceable is that the employees simply want to prove their importance in the firm, and how their existence is creating favourable conditions for the organizational activities. These employees behave somewhere irrationally because they did not want to lose their job in the tough economic conditions faced by the firm. If these employees will fail to prove their worth in the organization, there is a possibility that the firm might terminate them or remove them from their positions owing to their non-contribution in the firm. This is the reason the employees show how much they are doing for the organization helping it to overcome this situation in the tough economic times. When employees will constantly remind the managers and key people in the organization about the kind of contributions, they are making in the firm by working very hard, the managers will find their value and worth in the organization. This way the employees try to show themselves irreplaceable in order to obtain job security.

Question 2

What sources of power did this leader have? Did the leader have enough power to influence his or her followers?

Answer 2

Power refers to the ability of the individual to influence the behaviour of others due to the position he or she is in. Sources of power of a leader are those which will help the leader to execute their power.
Sources of power for a leader are classified into legitimate, coercive, reward and expert power. The source of power the manger utilised in our group was coercive power. Coercive power is considered as an ability of the manager to punish their subordinates for not doing a task. These punishments can vary from verbal to dismissal from the job or action.
Yes, the leader has enough coercive power to influence his followers. But the reasons he failed is that coercive power is a very dangerous power as it creates demotivation immediately in the subordinate's minds when it is misused. Coercive power needs to be followed with in the boundary lines made by the management. The effectiveness of the leader can be achieved only when coercive power is used where ever necessary with in the limits of its usage. When this is misused, employees are demotivated and fail to perform their daily activities effectively which will affect the organisational effectiveness.
Therefore, it is very important for the managers to follow any power within its boundaries and make use of it effectively.

Question 3

You are the CEO of a medium-size company that makes window coverings similar to Hunter Douglas blinds and Duettes. Your company has a real cost advantage in terms of being able to make custom window coverings at costs that are relatively low in the industry. However, the performance of your company has been lackluster. To make needed changes and improve performance, you met with the eight other top managers in your company and charged them with identifying problems and missed opportunities in each of their areas and coming up with an action plan to address the problems and take advantage of opportunities.
Once you gave the managers the ok, they were charged with implementing their action plans in a timely fashion and monitoring the effects of their initiatives monthly for the next 8 to 12 months.
You approved each of the managers' action plans, and a year later most of the managers were reporting that their initiatives had been successful in addressing the problems and opportunities they had identified a year ago. However, overall company performance continues to be lackluster and shows no signs of improvement. You are confused and starting to question your leadership capabilities and approach to change.
What are you going to do to improve the performance and effectiveness of your company?

Answer 3

The process by which the leaders exert influence on the employees to inspire, motivate and direct their activities to achieve the organizational activities is known as leadership. In this case the leader has tried to improve the performance of the organization by asking the managers to find the problem areas in their areas and implement actions to improve with their teams.
However, here the various teams performed individually to achieve their goals, but not as a group to achieve the organizational goals.
There exist some problems inside the organization where the CEO needs to act. The leader can use the transformational leadership in such situations by focusing on either one or more of the following:
•By making his subordinates aware of the importance of their job roles for the organization and how necessary it is for them to perform those jobs as best as they can so the organization can attain its goal.
•He can also try to make his subordinates understand them their own needs for personal growth, development and accomplishment and make them understand that if they will perform these needs can also be fulfilled when organization will achieve its goals.
•By making the subordinates understand that they have to work for the benefit of the organization as a whole and not only for personal gain or benefit.
Also they can use the powers he poses as a leader to motivate, inspire and direct the subordinates working so as to achieve organizational goals. They are the low cost leaders so can use some rewards for the jobs well done. He can also use his legal power of appraising the jobs done effectively and referent power so that his subordinates can admire respect him and follow him to achieve organizational goals.

Question 4

Either alone or in a group, think about the ethical implications of the use of coercive power.

Question 5

Analyze the sources of power that Caruso has available to her to influence the decorators. What advice can you give her to either increase her power or use her existing power more effectively?

Question 6

Describe the steps managers can take to increase their power and ability to be effective leaders.

Question 7

How would you describe Phil Kent's personal leadership style?

Question 8

What type(s) of leader power may be causing employees to act in this manner?

Question 9

What kinds of behaviors did this leader engage in? Were they appropriate for the situation? Why or why not?

Question 10

To what extent do managers and organizations have an ethical obligation to put limits on the extent to which coercive power is exercised?

Question 11

Given what you have learned in this chapter (for example, from the behavior model and path-goal theory), does Caruso seem to be performing appropriate leader behaviors in this situation? What advice can you give her about the kinds of behaviors she should perform?

Question 12

Think of specific situations in which it might be especially important for a manager to engage in consideration and initiating structure.

Question 13

What traits do you think he is high on?

Question 14

What kinds of behaviors do you think leaders should engage in when they think that employees are trying to impress them during tough economic times?

Question 15

From what you know, do you think this leader was a task-oriented leader or a relationship-oriented leader? How favorable was this leader's situation for leading?

Question 16

What steps would you advise Caruso to take to increase the decorator's motivation to deliver high quality customer service?

Question 17

Discuss why managers might want to change the behaviors they engage in, given their situation, their subordinates, and the nature of the work being done. Do you think managers are able to readily change their leadership behaviors? Why or why not?

Question 18

What behaviors do you think he is likely to engage in?

Question 19

How might emotional intelligence help leaders deal with employees who are trying hard to be, or look like, model employees in tough economic times?

Question 20

What steps did this leader take to motivate his or her followers? Were these steps appropriate or inappropriate? Why?

Question 21

Would you advise Caruso to try to engage in transformational leadership in this situation? If not, why? If so, what steps would you advise her to take.

Question 22

Discuss why substitutes for leadership can contribute to organizational effectiveness.

Question 23

Do you think Phil Kent is a transformational leader? Why or why not?

Question 24

What signs, if any, did this leader show of being a transformational leader?

Question 25

Describe what transformational leadership is and explain how managers can engage in it.

Question 26

Imagine that you are working in an organization in an entry level position upon graduation and have come up with what you think is a great idea for improving a critical process in the organization that relates to your job. In what ways might your supervisor encourage you to actually implement your idea? How might your supervisor discourage you from even sharing your idea with others?

Question 27

Interview an actual manager to find out how the three situational characteristics that Fiedler identified are affecting the manager's ability to provide leadership.

Question 28

Find an example of a company that has dramatically turned around its fortunes and improved its performance. Determine whether a transformational manager was behind the turnaround and what this manager did.