1.0 Introduction
Leadership and management practices are useful to individual’s success and that of our organisation. For the benefit of this training programme which is to improve leadership and management in the organisation, this material will equip us on ways to obtain professional information on leadership and management and serve as a self-study exercise for us to have knowledge of basic management and leadership skills which can be applied at various departments in our organisation. It will also make us understand the theories of leadership and management, how to improve motivation and performance through the application of relevant leadership skills and the development and effectiveness of teams. At the end of the training programme, I expect us to see leadership and management skills and practices as a tool of driving the organisation to further development and success.
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1.1 Analysis of the concepts of leadership and management
Leadership can be defined as a process by which a person influences others to accomplish an objective and directs the organisation in a way that makes it more cohesive and coherent. If you have the desire and willpower, you can become an effective leader. Good leaders are developing through a never ending process of self-study, education, training and experience. While leadership is learned, the skills and knowledge possess by the leaders can be influenced by his or hers attributes or traits such as beliefs, values, ethics and characters.
To inspire someone working under us into higher ground of teamwork, there are certain things we must be, know and do. These do not come naturally, but are acquired through continual work practices. Good leaders are continually working and studying to improve the leadership skills in them.
Directors of banks do set-up sales target for each of the branches at the beginning of financial year and new products are normally added to the services of the organisation. This shows that goals and objectives have been put in place for followers to work towards. Through this, the sales will be improved and new customers will join the service of the bank considering the new products introduced by the leadership teams.
Managers are important group involved in business activity. We normally believe that managers are responsible for ‘getting things done’ usually through other people. When job roles are giving to us, our respective line managers normally help us in achieving this either through supervision or working together with us. The term manager may refer to a number of different people within a business. Some job titles include the word manager, such as personal manager. Other job holders may also be managers even though their titles do not say it. Managers act on behalf of the owners of a company which is leader. They are accountable for the activities of the company either to the director or shareholders, set objectives for the organisation; make sure the business achieves its objectives, by managing others and ensure that corporate values are maintained in dealing with other business, customers, employees and the general public. It is the act of getting people together to accomplish desired goals and objectives using available resources efficiently and effectively.
As a manager in one of the branches, a lot of means will be laid down to achieve the target that has been put in place by the leader such as help (conference/lecture or training) to make other staffs see the big picture of how they are fitted into the plan and achieving it.
Management texts contain leadership. Actually, leadership is an important function of management and it is mentioned as one of the five functions of management (Planning, Organizing, Staffing, Leading or Directing and Control). Both roles are very much tied to human interactions and thus personalities and traits are essential requirements. Also, leadership and management exists at every level of management, however, the amount of each varies according to the management hierarchy.
For example, the board of this organisation has more of a leadership task which is to provide vision to the company and plan to achieve it, while the head of any department rarely goes beyond determining what the next task should be. Leadership and management task within the organisation depends upon ‘how much it allows for leadership in a particular role?’
As we all know, our organisation was established to provide effective, efficient and affordable health care delivery services to the people in this locality and beyond. The location also positioned it to become a notable centre for the treatment of accident victims. Also, our objectives include making provision for: A full range of hospital and specialist services to the community; clinical facilities for the education of medical and other students; facilities for medical research etc.
For, Irrua Specialist Teaching Hospital to grow and remain healthy, we have to know some elementary skills of management and leadership-skills that will assist us to avoid the crisis situation where we need to do whatsoever that will make us excel in all our services. These elementary skills of management and leadership consist problem solving and decision making, planning, meeting management, delegation, communications and managing ourselves.
These basic skills are also fundamental from which to develop more advanced practices in management and leadership. Whenever organisation’s leaders struggle, it’s often because they do not know the basics – not because they aren’t doing what they supposed to do in implementing basic practices in management and leadership.
Knowledge and skills contributes directly to the process of leadership and management while other attributes give the leader and manager certain qualities that make them different. Skills, knowledge and attributes make the leader or manager, which is one of the factors of leadership and management. The leadership and management process of an organisation involves-developing a vision for the organisation; aligning people with that vision through communication; and motivating people to action through empowerment and through basic need fulfilment. The leadership process creates uncertainty and change in the organisation. In contrast, the management process involves-planning and budgeting; organizing and staffing; and controlling and problem solving. The management process reduces uncertainty and stabilizes the organisation.
Paul Hersey and Ken Blanchard give better explanation of the difference between leadership and management. Leadership is not a concept exclusive to or within management. It is a broader concept on its own. Management is thought of as a special kind of leadership in which the accomplishment of organisational goals is paramount. Leadership is influencing the behaviour of someone. Management is planning an objective and achieving that objective. Leadership requires a follower and a leader has to figure out how to influence the follower. Manager has to figure out an objective and theoretically, he may do the job himself and manage the objective. Managers have large number of people under them and they have to lead them to do the work assigned them as part of the organisations plan to achieve the objectives while one can accept leadership as a concept which has utility as a concept separate from management.
1.2 Evaluation of the key management and leadership theories
Management and leadership theories focus on what qualities distinguish between leaders and followers in an organisation. For instance, development of the plan for our organisation started with a leadership and management retreat. The aims were to engender a harmonious industrial climate through inter-union, inter-association, inter-staff, and staff association-management interaction and to provide a forum for the leaders and managers to deliberate and proffer advice on pertinent issues of management to enable us move the institution forward. Participants were the Chairman, Board of Management, the Chief Medical Director and other members of staffs. There were lecture, workshop and group activities. The objectives were with the full realization because the staffs are not ignorant and fully participated. This practice looked at variables such as situational factor and skill levels. The participative style of leadership explained by Rensis Likart theories of leadership which encourages decision making by subordinates and their leadership style that involves employee-centred leader were employed. Our organisation also used Blake and Mouton theories of leadership that explained the degree to which a leader considers the needs of team members, their interest, and area of personal development, emphasises objectives, organisational work output and great productivity when deciding the best ways to accomplish a task. This plan would have been carried out without considering various union/staffs relations by our leaders/managers thereby having different management and leadership styles/theories differs from that stated above.
1.3 Assessment of the challenges of leadership and management practices
We are usually faced by some challenges such as low level of funding; recruitment exercise; opening of new hospital offices/complex; social policy directives; and developments in ICT. Our leaders and managers have the ability to sense change and respond to it effectively. They have been able to predict a decline of health care delivery services due lack of a new technique being available in other hospitals; anticipate possible solutions to changes that may affect the organisation; have a clear vision of the main objectives of the organisation during periods of change and be able to guide the organisation to achieve these; organise and motivate employees to accept challenges and ensure stability and minimise or prevent disruption.
For example, there were challenges of delivering adequate health care services to the people of the community some years back, the leaders and the managers quickly identified the symptoms that have caused these challenges. Among these were low productivity and high labour turnover. As soon as these challenges were identified, managers and leaders found the cause of the trouble and developed a strategy for better status of the organisation. Strategies they employed for good status of the organisation include changing people-through hiring and firing, reassignments of duties, training, pay increases or counselling. They also carried out restructure work through job redesign, job enrichment and redefinition of roles. Systems were also improved. These include communication systems, reward systems, information and reporting systems, budgets and stock control.
2.1 Analysis of the key motivational theories and how they influence organisational success
It is important for any organisation to motivate its employees. The motivational theories of Maslow, McGregor, McClelland and Herzberg explain content theories of motivation. They simply explained the specific factors that motivate people. They answer the question ‘what drives behaviour? Also, Vroom, Porter and Lawler, and Adams explain process theories of motivation. They are concerned with the thought processes that influence behaviour. If employees are watched closely, fear of wage cuts or redundancy may force them to maintain their effort even though they are not motivated. This is negative motivation. A lack of motivation may lead to reduced effort and lack of commitment. In the long run, a lack of motivation may result in high levels of absenteeism, industrial disputes and falling productivity and profit for the organisation. Irrua Specialist Teaching Hospital management has been acting according to Fredrick Herzberg’s theory of motivation by being giving recognition for effort of its staff. We are normally taking into consideration in everything the management of this organisation embark upon! This is a kind of motivation that simply gives us job satisfaction and thereby makes the workers more productive. Herzberg’s ideas are linked with job enrichment. This is where workers have their jobs ‘expanded’, so that they can experience more of their job process. Improved maintenance factors such as pay or conditions also remove dissatisfaction of staffs. For example, better canteen facilities within our organization make workers less dissatisfied about the environment. All these allow the workers to be more involved and motivated.
2.2 Evaluation of the role of leadership and management in employee motivation
It is important for leaders and managers to find out what satisfies the needs of its employees? Organisations have found out that even if employees are satisfied with pay and condition of work, they still complain that their employer does not do a good job in motivating them.
Motivation is vital because even at the most fundamental level, it is expensive to get another set of staff than that to keep existing one. Employees want to be involved and regarded and making them happy means they will be at service of the organisation for longer period. Have it in mind that at most not convenient time, leader and manager need to motivate staff.
If our employees are doing well and assisting to drive the organisation forward, In this case, we do let them know how much we cherish them on regular basis. Whenever we offer them any gifts or passed any information that is of their advantage across both works equally well. This shows, we put them in mind. If our staffs enjoy socializing with us like they do working with us, then we are doing something good and right.
It is important that you lead by good characters when there is an issue with staff, if you expect your employees to work late, then you should stay at work too for such period. At the same time, if you don’t want staff coming in at 10am on first working day of the week, then make sure you’re at work very early. It’s not always about hours of working; show your staff respect and you will hopefully get it back. They will observe you on the way you discus with people around and act in same circumstances, so it is important to behave in the way you will like them to behave as well.
Investing in employee is paramount, not only will it mean we are getting the best and latest in the organisation but they will appreciate us for being able to develop under our cares. We make sure we fully research courses to send our employee on to acquire the full training. It is equally good to get feedback from employee on how the course has improved their standard individually.
Communicating with our employee is high on our list of priorities. Most of them like a leader or manager they can easily reach whenever there are problems. We do hold frequent job discussion with our employee to make sure they are most happy, doing on good and aren’t confused about anything. Apart from this, we do communicate with our employee everyday. Exchanging greetings are simple motivational techniques but can make a world of difference.
The figure below explains how our leaders and managers make decisions for employees’ motivation, having first identified the employee’s needs.
Revise
Incentive
Identify the need/ motivation motivation
Result/ Outcome
Satisfaction If need is not satisfied
Identify the need/motivation – our organisation try as much as possible for employee to be involved in decisions so that they can feel wanted and recognised as important to the company
Incentive – Set up discussion with employees about goals and working practices of the organisation
Satisfaction – This is a situation where the employee feels their opinion and contribution is valuable
Result and Outcome – By meeting above condition, the employee are willing to take more responsibility
2.3 Analysis of the contribution of performance management techniques as organisational processes
Managers use performance management techniques to test employee’s working status on a regular basis. By examining each employee’s performance, our organisation also measures the overall effectiveness of its workforce and how well the company achieves its objectives.
Assigning roles to workers that improve their strengths is a difficult job. Workforce optimisation is a plan to put the right people in the best job roles to maximize their work output. By doing regular appraisals, our leaders and managers easily track employees’ performance and suggest if they need more training or if they could be more productive with different responsibilities.
Another performance management technique we usually employ is compensation package. Overall morale always increase most especially when the employee sees the process to be fair. A happy worker is a hard worker.
Incentive-based programs that permit the employee in using less paper or being energy efficient both save on our expenses and the employees are rewarded for putting forth the extra energy needed. The fewer costs our organisation has, the more profit it realizes.
3.1 Analysis of the development of teams
Organisations often try to improve the productivity and motivation of people working in groups/teams. The ‘planned, systematic process designed to improve the efforts of people who work together to achieve goals’ is referred to as development of teams. Team can be described as an internally organized set of people with specific roles for different members to achieve a specific goal while group can be referred to as a collection of people with something in common, such as being in the same place or having their individual’s interest.
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Meredith Belbin (1981) found that successful teams consisted of a mix of individuals, each of whom performed a different role. For instance, monitoring and evaluation team that was set up under the chief medical director’s office is a kind of team of different calibers and positions within our organisation. They work on projects with specific term of reference and present biannual and annual reports with veritable indices to the leadership of this organisation. This is not like working in a group; working in a team entails accountability rather than individual accountability and results in a joint work products. The characteristic and goals of the individual members of the team helped to determine the team’s characteristics and goals. .According to Belbin, each person has a preferred role and for a team to be effective, all the roles need to be filled. Our organisation selects people that are capable to fill one or more of the roles. Individual member of the team was influenced more strongly because of their role. This is unlike group with large number of people where very few people take part in the project while others are not and unable to participate effectively in team decisions. Effectiveness of team depend s on the blend of the individual skills and abilities of its members. Team development is based on the idea that before organisations can improve performance, team members must be able to work together effectively.
This exercise is used to help team members develop trust, open up communication channels, make sure everyone understood the goals of the team, help individuals make decisions with the commitment of all members, prevent the leader from dominating the team, openly examine and resolve conflicts and to review work activities.
3.2 Analysis of the roles and models of team leadership
Leadership of teams must get members of team to work with each other. This is one method that involves low levels of risk among members. The role of team leader include to be able able to organise joint projects or some form of exchange between members of the team. The leaders of the team work together or exchange roles with members for this approach to be effective. This is one method that involves low levels of risk among members. The working spirit was further developed by communication and swapping of team members. This technique was used when our organisation took over the challenges of training medical students from another medical institution and there is a need to avoid conflict. These ideas develop social interaction among the employees.
Keeping every single activity connected to the others help team leaders and organisation to achieve what they actually planed. Members are enjoying while performing their roles and are also discovering something new about themselves, their co-workers, and the organisation as a whole.
Researching and learning about the team current issues definitely help team leaders in creating the actual activities that the members can participate-in. This affords lapses of any kind for members not to participate in the activities of the team.
3.3 Evaluation of the role and usefulness of teams within the organisation
The leader of any team of an organisation aims to create team/group that is effective and efficient. If the team leader or organisation can motivate the team members to work harder in order to achieve goals, the sense of pride in the team’s own competence will create job satisfaction for the leadership of the team/team members and employees in general.
Looking at the opportunities given to the employees of our organisation and most especially in most units or teams that has so far set- up, the participants are willing to carry out responsibilities for the betterment of the organisation. In some instance, membership of units or teams can be made up of top officials of an organisation which may not interest ordinary employees of the organisation.
The introduction of different units or teams in our organisation has contributed immensely for the achievement of our goals and objectives. In term of motivation, employees in team situations are more satisfied and motivated than when we are working under more traditional regimes and have a positive influence on employee commitment and identification. The team work also serves to gain competitive advantage over other organisations.
Our organisations provide leaders and managers with legitimate authority to lead. There is need for individuals to imbibe this strong leadership and management trait for optimal effectiveness. In nowadays changing work environment, we need leaders that can challenge the status quo and inspire and persuade organisation members. We also need team leaders to assist in changing and improving a smoothly running place of work.
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