2. Leading and Managing Groups
• Unit No. 5
• Leading and Managing Groups
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• Objectives
• Unit 5 Leading and Managing Groups
• 5.1 Defining Leadership
• 5.2 Trait Approach to Leadership
3. Leading and Managing Groups
• 5.3 Behavioral Approach to Leadership
• 5.3.1 Leadership Functions and Styles
• 5.3.2 Managerial Grid
• 5.3.3 The Managerial Grid
• 5.4 Contingency Approach to Leadership
• 5.5 Leadership Situations and Decisions
• 5.6 Personal Characteristics of Employees
• 5.6.1 Environmental Pressures and Workplace Demands
• 5.6.2 Deciding when to Involve Subordinates
4. Leading and Managing Groups
• 5.7 Future of Leadership Theory
• 5.8 Types of Teams
• 5.9 Characteristics of Teams
• 5.10 Making Teams Effective
• 5.10.1 Guidelines for Committees
• 5.10.2 Focusing Teams on Performance
• 5.10.3 Conflict within Teams
5. Leading and Managing Groups
• Introduction
• Management and leadership are important for delivery of goods and services. Although the two
are similar in some respects they may involve different types of outlook, skills and behavior. Good
managers should strive to be good leaders and good leaders need management skills to be
effective.
• In this unit we will study about leading and managing groups and different approaches to
leadership. We will also discuss about personal characteristics of employees and future of
leadership theory. Finally, we will study types, characteristics of teams and how to make teams
effective.
6. Leading and Managing Groups
• Objectives
• The study of this unit will enable the student to:
• Differentiate between a manager and a leader.
• Compare and contrast early theories of leadership.
• Understand the difference between groups and teams.
• Understand how to organize effective teams.
• Build and maintain cohesive teams.
7. Defining Leadership
• Defining Leadership
• What is leadership? A simple definition is that leadership is the art of motivating a group of
people to act towards achieving a common goal.
• This leadership definition captures the essentials of being able to inspire others and being
prepared to do so. Effective leadership is based upon ideas (whether original or borrowed), but
won't happen unless those ideas can be communicated to others in a way that engages them
enough to act as the leader wants them to act.
• Put even more simply, the leader is the inspiration and director of the action. He or she is the
person in the group that possesses the combination of personality and leadership skills that
makes others want to follow his or her direction.
8. Trait Approach to Leadership
• Trait Approach to Leadership
• Leadership consists of leaders, followers and situations, but trait approach only focuses on
leaders. Trait approach was one of the first systematic attempts to study leadership in which
research started by focusing on leader's traits that differentiate between leaders and non-leaders.
Trait theory assumes that people are born with inherited characteristics. In other words, leaders
were born, not made and leadership is rooted in characteristics of leaders. This assumption that
leaders are born not made was taken from "Great Man Theory". The underlying concept of this
theory was that leaders are from upper class. Great Man theory was named so because in those
days, leadership was thought of primarily as a male quality.
9. Behavioral Approach to Leadership
Task behavior focus on goal accomplishment and help subordinates in achieving their behavior
while relationship behavior help subordinates to feel comfortable at workplace. Central focus of this
approach is to examine how leaders combine these two types of behavior in order to make
subordinates to put their efforts to reach a goal.
10. Leadership Functions and Styles
• Leadership Functions and Styles
• Four Functions of Management
• You come across a broad range of personalities every day. Some people have an innate ability to
inspire, while others are gifted with building a group. As the leader of your company, you have
your own, unique leadership style. If you can learn to manage your own natural style and to
adjust it for certain situations, you can maximize your management results in these functional
areas.
• While there are many other functions to effective management; planning, organizing, directing
and controlling are the four main functions of management that should be considered the most
important. Learning how to balance each of the four functions simultaneously will lead to
effective management.
11.
12. Behavioral Approach to Leadership
• Behavioral Approach to Leadership
• In beginning of 1950s, focus of leadership research shifted away from leader traits to leader's
behaviors. Purpose of this research was that the behavior exhibited by the leaders is more
important than their physical, mental, emotional traits or internal state. Behavioral theories
differentiate between effective leaders from ineffective leaders. Behavioral theories of leadership
are based on the belief that great leaders are made, not born. According to this theory, people
can learn to become leaders through training and observations, thus, anyone can become a
leader if they want to. Leadership is composed of two general kinds of behaviors: task behavior
and relationship behavior.
•
13. Four Functions of Management
Planning: The manager’s main duty is to determine what the organization’s goals are and what
actions to take in order to achieve those goals. Think of it like a football coach creating a playbook
to help his team reach the Super Bowl (or something like that). A manager is responsible for
creating a ‘game plan’ to reach a specific goal. For example: A weekly plan may include meetings,
creating employee schedules or receiving a report that details statistics. These are all actions that a
manager plans to implement on a weekly basis.
14. Four Functions of Management
Organizing: Whether it is the employees or resources, the manager is responsible for organizing the
daily functions of it all. What shifts are needed? How many employees per shift? Are the employees
reaching their set goals? If not, why? These are only a few of the questions asked in the organization
process of the management functions. This process can also be considered the backbone of all the
management functions due to the fact that this step is more direct. In other words, this is the
process employees actually see and are affected by. If a manager is disorganized there is a ripple
effect. Employees will lose respect for management; making the next function of management
harder to achieve.
15. Four Functions of Management
Directing: Company objectives cannot be achieved if the manager doesn’t provide direction;
however, if you haven’t planned or organized you will not succeed with this function. Direction and
motivation are the key factors in directing. A clear plan that is organized and dispersed to
employees is what employees are seeking. A manager will find themselves to be an effective leader
if their workers understand what is required of them and why.
16. Four Functions of Management
Controlling: The controlling function of management, in large part, is about monitoring the
organization’s performance to ensure the ultimate goals are being met and correcting any areas of
the process that are restricting the outcome desired. Praise and recognition are controlled at this
level. Since the final data is gathered here the manager generally knows who is and who isn’t
excelling in their role of the processes. You will ensure continued success if you acknowledge those
that are exceeding expectations while at the same time affecting another to strive for the same
recognition. It is a win-win for everyone.
17. Different Types of Leadership Styles
• Different Types of Leadership Styles
• Different types of leadership styles exist in work environments. The culture and goals of an
organization determine which leadership style fits the firm best, while personality differences
often dictate which is most often used. Some companies offer several leadership styles within the
organization, dependent upon the necessary tasks to complete and departmental needs.
18. Managerial Grid
• Managerial Grid
• Developed by R. R. Blake and J. S. Mouton, the Managerial Grid Model helps Managers to analyze
their own leadership styles through a technique known as grid training.
• Also, Managers can identify how they with respect to their concern for production and people
with Managerial Grid Model.
• The two dimensions of leadership, viz. concern for people on ‘vertical’ axis and concern for
production on ‘horizontal’ axis have been demonstrated by R. R. Blake and J. S. Mouton in the
form of Managerial Grid Model.
• They identified five basic leadership styles of practicing managers representing various
combinations of the aforesaid two dimensions as shown in the following figure;
19. Managerial Grid
• Managerial Grid Model is based on two behavioral dimensions:
• Concern for people: This is the degree to which a leader considers the needs of team members,
their interests, and areas of personal development when deciding how best to accomplish a task.
• Concern for production: This is the degree to which a leader emphasizes concrete objectives,
organizational efficiency, and high productivity when deciding how best to accomplish a task.
• As shown in the figure, the model is represented as a grid with concern for production as the X -
axis and concern for people as the Y- axis; each axis ranges from 1 (Low) to 9 (high).
• The five resulting leadership styles are as follows:
20.
21. Contingency Approach to Leadership
• Contingency Approach to Leadership
• The Fiedler Contingency Model of leadership, developed by Fred Fiedler in the mid-1960s,
suggested that the success of a leader isn't determined only by abilities. Other factors related to
the work environment, company culture and employees impact a manager's success in leading
and motivating. In essence, the success of leaders is contingent on their roles.
22. Leadership Situations and Decisions
• Leadership Situations and Decisions
• The theme in early approaches to understanding leadership was the desire to identify traits or
behaviors that effective leaders had in common. A common set of characteristics proved to be
elusive, however. Researchers were continually frustrated by the lack of consistent support for
their findings and conclusions. As a result, research began to focus on what style of leadership
was most effective in a particular situation. Contingency or situational theories examine the fit
between the leader and the situation and provide guidelines for managers to achieve this
effective fit.
23. Leadership Situations and Decisions
• The theorists in this section believe that managers choose leadership styles based on leadership
situations. Managers adjust their decision‐making, orientation, and motivational approaches
based upon a unique combination of factors in their situations: characteristics of employees,
types of work, organizational structures, personal preferences, and upper‐level management's
influences.
• The following sections describe the three most well‐known situational theories.
24. Personal Characteristics of Employees
• Personal Characteristics of Employees
• The characteristics that employers look for in employees are the same traits that make for
successful workers. Good employees obviously are important in any business, but small
businesses often feel the impact of employee behavior — both good and bad — more acutely
than larger companies. One bad apple can have a much greater impact on morale in a small
organization than in a large one and, conversely, a good employee’s attitude and work ethic can
be infectious.
25. Environmental Pressures and Workplace Demands
• Environmental Pressures and Workplace Demands
• Companies spend too little time really understanding what makes their people unique and how
this impacts their everyday work experience. In fact, many employees are faced with strong
pressures to change who they are in order to meet the expectations of their job, manager, team,
or culture. This pressure can cause great strain, disengagement, and eventual turnover.
• You can successfully improve engagement when you address disengagement at the individual
level. Once you understand an individual, you will realize how he/she actually fits into the
workplace, on the team, and in a specific role. And, you can learn how he/she has become
disengaged by exploring how environmental pressures in the workplace are impacting that
individual.
•
26. Environmental Pressures and Workplace Demands
There are many environmental pressures that individuals face which can impact overall employee
engagement at your company. We’ve boiled them down to four specific pressures – job fit, manager
impact, culture, and team dynamics.
27. Environmental Pressures and Workplace
Demands
1. Job fit – Misalignment between someone’s natural tendencies and key job responsibilities
• Job fit is truly the most important element in all of human capital management (HCM). The
disengagement forces are at play here when someone is a poor fit for the job. One way to avoid
this when hiring or promoting someone is to understand the person’s personality and behavioral
characteristics so you can determine if there’s alignment between the person and job role. No
surprise, when you hire the right person for the right job you’ll find they have higher
performance, higher job satisfaction, they stay longer, and are generally more engaged. In
addition, due to the rapidly changing work environment, jobs often take on new roles and
responsibilities. What a person was hired to do on day one may very well shift over time. So while
it’s important to hire right, it’s equally important to keep a close eye on how the behavioral
demands of the job role might evolve. It’s possible that if the role changes too much, it could be a
stretch for the behavioral characteristics of the employee.
28. Environmental Pressures and Workplace
Demands
2. Manager impact – Misalignment between manager and staff
• As the saying goes, people don’t leave companies, they leave managers. While not always true,
it’s true most of the time. And after all, if a manager is not focused on inspiring their
employees to be their best, they are not managing at all. Managers need to adapt their
management style to each employee’s needs, drives, and behavioral preferences in order to have
maximum impact, engagement, and productivity out of each employee. To do this successfully,
you have to understand what your employees’ needs and drives include. Yes, this is easier said
than done – management is hard work. Remember the golden rule “Do unto others as you would
have them do unto you?” Well, that does not apply to good people management. If you’re a
manager, here’s a new golden rule: “Do unto others what motivates, excites, and engages them.”
29. Environmental Pressures and Workplace
Demands
3. Culture – When employees feel like what the culture expects of them isn’t who they really are
• Everyone dreams about a perfectly aligned culture – one where the decisions, actions, and
behaviors that people take at all levels in an organization are rewarded and valued by the
leadership and the overall organizational culture. Does this utopian company really exist? No,
there really is no such thing as a “perfectly aligned” culture. That said, a major disengagement
force is at play when people work in a culture that expects them to be a lot different than who
they really are. When they feel this burden, it’s a recipe for feeling like a disconnected misfit and
ultimately provides a good reason to leave
30.
31. Leadership Styles
• 1. Autocratic Style
• The phrase most illustrative of an autocratic leadership style is "Do as I say." Generally, an
autocratic leader believes that he or she is the smartest person at the table and knows more than
others. They make all the decisions with little input from team members.
• 2. Authoritative Style
• The phrase most indicative of this style of leadership (also known as "visionary") is "Follow me."
The authoritative leadership style is the mark of confident leaders who map the way and set
expectations, while engaging and energizing followers along the way.
32. Leadership Styles
• 3. Pacesetting Style
• "Do as I do!" is the phrase most indicative of leaders who utilize the pacesetting style. This style
describes a very driven leader who sets the pace as in racing. Pacesetters set the bar high and
push their team members to run hard and fast to the finish line.
• 4. Democratic Style
• Democratic leaders are more likely to ask "What do you think?" They share information with
employees about anything that affects their work responsibilities. They also seek employees'
opinions before approving a final decision.
33. Leadership Styles
• 5. Coaching Style
• When you having a coaching leadership style, you tend to have a "Consider this" approach. A
leader who coaches views people as a reservoir of talent to be developed. The leader who uses a
coach approach seeks to unlock people's potential.
• 6. Affiliative Style
• A phrase often used to describe this type of leadership is "People come first." Of all the leadership
styles, the affiliative leadership approach is one where the leader gets up close and personal with
people. A leader practicing this style pays attention to and supports the emotional needs of team
members. The leader strives to open up a pipeline that connects him or her to the team.
34. Leadership Styles
• 7. Laissez-Faire Style
• The laissez-faire leadership style is at the opposite end of the autocratic style. Of all the
leadership styles, this one involves the least amount of oversight. You could say that the
autocratic style leader stands as firm as a rock on issues, while the laissez-faire leader lets people
swim with the current
35. Environmental Pressures and Workplace
Demands
4. Team dynamics – When an employee feels like he/she is unlike the team
• Feelings of not belonging on a team can cause friction and lead to isolation and disengagement.
Think about someone with low extraversion in a sea of social butterflies, or a detail-oriented
person surrounded by a team of big-picture people with low attention-to-detail. When these
behavioral differences exist, it can be difficult to find common ground, form relationships, and
find the right way to work together. It’s important that both the team and the “outlier” be aware
of their behavioral differences and how learn how these can be used as an advantage to take the
greater team forward versus something that divides them. If you think you have some people
who are black sheep or potential black sheep, you need to uncover and unlock their value instead
of so quickly deciding they don’t belong.
• To address these issues, download our engagement kit to learn how you can improve employee
engagement at your organization. Our engagement kit will teach you how to decode your
employees and their work experience in order to make disengagement a thing of the past.
36. Deciding When to Involve the Subordinates
Deciding When to Involve the Subordinates
• When companies enter the decision-making process, the outcomes from the decisions made can
greatly affect both the company's health and its employees. Bringing employees onboard when
making decisions about the company's future helps strengthen your relationship with each
employee. You'll gain respect from your employees and instill a sense of responsibility in your
workforce when you let your employees voice their opinions
37. Future of Leadership Theory
Future of Leadership Theory
• 21st century leadership is not dependent on position. Leadership now means promoting a better
way. This is an ACT not a role. Front line employees can show leadership without even being seen
as informal leaders in the sense of taking charge informally of the group.
• Traditional leadership theory is narrowly concerned with top-down leadership in large
organizations
• Other kinds of leadership include: market leadership, leadership in a golf tournament, leadership
in a league of sports teams, i.e. football, plus the indirect leadership of every person who sets an
example for others every day without trying to persuade anyone explicitly to follow suit. For
instance, innovators in knowledge intensive industries are exhibiting a type of leadership that is
not associated with the top - down direction of subordinates.
38. Types of Teams
Types of Teams
• When individuals with a common interest, goal, attitude, need and perception come together, a
team is formed. Individuals need to come and work together to form a team for the
accomplishment of complicated tasks. In a team, all team members contribute equally and strive
hard to achieve the team’s objective which should be predefined.
• In any organization, no one works alone. Every employee is a part of a team and works in close
coordination with the team members to perform his level best and in turn benefit the
organization. The team members should complement each other and come to each other’s need
whenever required.
• Teams can be formed anywhere, anytime whenever the task is little difficult and complicated. Let
us understand the various types of teams in detail.
39. Characteristics of Teams
Characteristics of Teams
• A strong team are the foundation of high-performing business and a good team ethic can be held
largely accountable for the success and smooth running of the organisation. If employees do not
gel and work well together, problems can arise, such as poor organisation, missed deadlines and
conflict within the workplace.
• So what can teams do to ensure that they are collectively productive and drive the company
forward? Here are a few qualities that a successful team possess.
40. Making Teams Effective
Making Teams Effective
• Teams have always been, and will always be, an essential ingredient for building a successful
business. But building great teams isn't something that just happens. It takes planning and
ongoing effort to get them right--and to keep them that way.
• Smart leaders know that for their teams to work well, they must accurately identify employees'
skill sets and assign them tasks that are well suited to their abilities. When putting together
teams, they choose people they sense will work together well. The combined efforts of their team
members not only produce superior results, they also build a sense of solidarity within their
organizations.
• The next time you need to get something important done in your organization, and you want to
assign the task to a team, consider these five steps to building really effective teams:
41. Guidelines for committees
Guidelines for committees
• Key elements of an effective committee
• An effective committee is not a matter of chance. It is the result of good practice in each one of
the key elements which contribute to the committee's operations.
• An effective committee is an interdependent team, comprising chair, members and executive
officer, which has a clear role and keeps a critical eye on its own performance.
• Clear constitution / Terms of reference
• The effective chair
• The effective committee member
• The effective executive officer
• Regular review
42. Focusing Teams on Performance
Focusing Teams on Performance
• No one person is more important than the whole team.
• The best teams win together, learn together, adapt together, lose together, and grow together.
In high performing teams, their interactions and communications are fluid, relevant, and even
playful. Great teams are capable of achieving astonishing results, because, in part, their leader
intentionally shapes the conditions that help people do exceptional work together. When he or
she does, the following ten areas become more apparent paths to more meaningful work.
43. Conflict within Teams
Conflict within Teams
• Differences are inevitable when passionate people work together. Eventually, after a team gets
through an initial orientation with a new task, members usually come to the realization that
working together to accomplish a common goal is tough work.
• This occurs in the “dissatisfaction” stage of team development when the team recognizes the
discrepancy between what is expected of them and the reality of getting it done.
44. Conflict within Teams
It is not a pleasant stage.
• As a leader it’s important to differentiate between the different types of conflict teams
experience and to have a plan for helping the team move forward. Here are four examples of
team conflict and some advice on how a leader can intervene properly from Dr. Eunice Parisi-
Carew, teams expert.
