Study on the concepts of leadership
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[edit] Abstract/ Introduction
Much has been written on the concept of leadership, in particular what is leadership and what qualities create a leader. As well as a well established collection of writings on the roles and qualities of a leader, we also each have our own ideas about what leadership is, based both on our own experiences and intuitive concepts.
The ideas of Complex Systems, particularly those of scale, and networks can give a new lens to look at the idea of leadership. This study takes the approach of looking at the role of a leader and its position within a team or organisational structure, we also analyse and structure a list of properties for leadership.
[edit] Methodology
The initial approach taken with this study was to attempt to frame a question from the initial title of Leaders and teams. In effect this turned into a more complicated question than initially expected raising an enormous number of potential leadership and team dynamic issues, far more than could be answered in a single study. It was this realisation that led to the final approach which was taken, that rather than studying a single aspect of Leadership the study would instead concentrate on proving the complexity of the concept of Leadership.
This new approach was formalised through asking the following questions:
- What were the study group's personal experiences of leaders and the qualities required to be a leader?
- What are the formal lessons on leadership that the study group had either been taught or were aware of?
- What were the intutive beliefs that the study group had on leaders?
The findings from the above questions were used to form the basis of a discussion around the concepts of leadership and the complexity of the subject which is summarised below.
[edit] Results
Our results are presented in the format of the questions found above.
[edit] Personal Experience
The personal experiences of individuals often define their view of a leader, the propoerties below are the result of the study group's personal experience:
- In a small organization a leader could be the one who believes strongly in his idea and knows how to communicate it.
- Leader has experience dealing with resources needed to complete task.
- Leaders often have a dilemma of delegating work or doing it themselves.
- If a leader steps forward, then he often delegates to those they know will get the work done.
- Leaders work best when they have tight group of friends or an entourage.
- When too many leader emerge in a group no is a follower (so there are no grunts that get the work done).
- Directive: leaders that exercise strong decision making authority within the group.
- Participative: leaders that interact closely with their teams without losing their positional authority.
- Facilitative: leaders that see their primary role as providing a supportive environment in which the member of the team can interact.
[edit] Formal Lessons
Formal lessons are categorised within this study as lessons that have been taught or are part of an established mantra of leadership. The examples below are the results of the study team's own formal leadership education as well as a recent Leadership special in Fortune Magazine.
- Leader is highly organized.
- Leader is a good public speaker.
- Leader is a mediator and facilitator.
- Leader can delegate.
- Leaders lead from the front, but always eat last.
- Leaders never ask their subordinates to do anything that they would not do.
- Leaders are experts.
[edit] Intuitive Concepts
Intuitive concepts are the intuitive beliefs that people have around leaders, they are often what people would describe as "obvious" qualities of a leader, or those properties that people cannot attribute to either personal experience or their formal education, however the "obvious" qualities from different individuals can often be at loggerheads. The list below describes the intuitive beliefs about leadership that the study team had:
- Leadership in a small group may emerge from the group based on an iterative process of who is most productive (basically those individuals with vision and agenda.
- Leader needs to be adaptive to a teams personality and relationship dynamics.
- Individuals will look to someone who can articulate their ideas best to represent the group.
- Leadership in a team is a dynamic process that is based on the needs of the team at the time.
- Without a leader there needs to be a strong interdependence on each person's talent (heterogeneity leads to success).
- Leaders are humble.
- Leaders are fallible.
- Leaders are students.
[edit] Conclusion
Identifying how leaders emerge in a complex environment proved illusive primarily due to very different concepts of leadership. Leadership itself is a complex system. Our work, therefore, focused on identifying the qualities of a leader based on our personal experiences rather than treat leadership in an organizational context/contextual fashion affecting team performance. We also proposed the model that leadership in a small group environment evolves in the context of strength of intrapersonal relationships. Future work should explore the degree to which team size, aggregated team characteristics, and member homogeneity/heterogeneity affect leadership emergence (see Stewart, 2006).
[edit] Further Work
To what degree does the team leader’s approach depend on the personalities of the team?
What environmental conditions contribute to the emergence of a strong individual team leader?
To what degree does the existence of a strong individual leader depend on the size & diversity of the team?
To whom or to what do we associate the failure or success of the team? The ability of the leader? The environment? The quality of the people? The structure of the team, including the communication links among team members?
[edit] References
Stewart GL. A meta-analytic review of relationships between team design features and team performance. J Management 2006;32:29-54.
