This week’s discussion focuses on the following:Burnes, Hughes, and By (2016) [required reading] suggested that “despite three decades of transformation and change leadership discourse, leadership

Analysis of Leadership

Kerene Hoilett

ORG – 561 Examination of Modern Leadership

Colorado State University – Global Campus

Dr. Phillip Jackson

November 19, 2017

Introduction

Leadership is a wide term that defines a range of real-time applications. Overview of leadership is never a problem as there is a lot of research available, but in this paper, more concentration is on the fact that whether author’s understanding of leadership evolves with time or not. As the author has got only one understanding of the term leadership, its definition has never been the one and has changed in every decade as per the needs of that time. So in this paper, a critical analysis will be carried out in between the author’s understanding of leadership and definitions from different decades and authors. The leadership style has been changing as per the need of time. This paper discusses and analyzes each decade and concludes whether author’s explanation with respect to leadership evolves with time or not.

Leadership Analysis 1980- 1990

The definitions from decade 1980-1990 have focused more on team building and team-work skills. A leader must be a role model for his team members, motivate his team members in every aspect, encourage them to think out of the box and provide them a comfortable environment as per looking at their desires (See Appendix B). The author believes that the definition from this decade is in coherence with his because as per author’s explanation, Leaders must be a trend-setter, they should more be more concerned with leading than following. A leader must understand the importance of team-work and must share his objective, vision with his team members and must empower them for the accomplishment of those (See Appendix A). Leaders are more pullers than pushers, inspire the others by giving an appropriate order, disperses achievable targets to others, give them rewards instead of manipulating them and enable the others to utilize their own experiences and initiatives rather than utilizing his (See Appendix B). This definition is not totally expressed as per my explanation and have got some coherence with my theory but author believes that the philosophy is same but with different understanding because as per author’s explanation, A leader is accountable for the performance of his team and should maximize all the available resources so to encourage team for the achievement of their goals. (See Appendix A). Leaders always look for opportunities, believes in the experimentation and taking a risk, share the vision with others, encourage collaboration, empower others, set an example, celebrates small wins and recognizes contribution from others (See Appendix B). This definition is in total accordance with my theory because as per my explanation, Leaders must never be afraid of taking risks and must have got sufficient courage for performing relative experimentation.

Second Decade of Leadership Analysis 1990 - 2000

The second-decade’s (1990-2000) definitions focus more on the interpersonal skills of the leader. Leaders are always good in listening, showing empathy, healing others, aware form surrounding, encourage others, having a conceptual logic for things, quality of fore sighting, stewardship, committed to contributing in the growth of others and believes in building community (See Appendix B). The last definition doesn’t seem to be totally incorporated in my explanation but some part of that resembles with my explanation that is a leader must be able to receive the ideas & suggestions from the others and should be able to implement suggestions from the others, if better than his (See Appendix A). Leaders believe that there is a supreme power and everything in the universe is being controlled by that power. All of mankind is interconnected, actions of one affect the other. It doesn’t matter that things are really bad, there is always something good hidden inside them. We are here to serve the mankind and others. Have got a great feeling of love, empathy, kindness, anticipation, and sanguinity (See Appendix B). This definition from the author is not have been dealt anywhere in my explanation and author believe that my theory of leadership has not been evolved by this definition (See Appendix A). Leadership means the creation of strategies for the others and development of strategies for its achievement. Aligns all the other people by delivering directions with proper communication through words. Encourage others to pass all kind of political, resource and bureaucratic barriers for the achievement of vision and objectives (See Appendix B). My theory of leadership shares a very little part from the last definition as in my explanation there has been a focus on the effective team-work but guidance and development of effective strategies is missing, but as per my explanation the leader must be aware of the right direction towards which he has to lead his team (See Appendix A). This is where author believe that author’s explanation shares some part of the last definition.

Third Decade of Leadership Analysis from 2000 - 2010

The definitions of third-decade (2000-2010) focus on the behavioral skills of the leaders. Leadership is basically a pattern of a leader’s behavior which is committed to enhancing affirmative psychological abilities and an affirmative principled climate to promote self-awareness, moral perception, a progression of knowledge in a balanced manner, transparency amongst the followers (See Appendix B). This definition shares a little part with the author’s explanation because as per my explanation, a leader must always be available for self-betterment in terms of taking suggestions and ideas from the others (See Appendix A). A leader is the one who is dominant in nature, has got a sturdy desire for making an impact on the others, high in confidence level and keeps strong grip over his own moral values (See Appendix B). This definition doesn’t match my explanation at all, in fact author believes opposite to it because as per author’s explanation, a leader must never be in dominant in nature as being dominant for author is like being self-obsessed and such person looks only for the credit and his own profits and is never beneficial for the overall productivity of the team. Last part of the definition matches my explanation but the philosophy is totally different as the researcher has taken confidence in terms of being dominant but for the author, self-confidence is trusting himself and his team for the successful accomplishments of the tasks (See Appendix A). Leaders are the one whose reality is not hidden behind any mask. They draw everything for improving their skills, competence and doesn’t stay in their lucid selves. They have devised the theories from their previous experience and utilize their experience for future works (See Appendix B). This definition from the writer is matching author’s explanation for leadership because as per author’s explanation, a leader must always be open minded and must not be shy to share his opinions regarding any matter. So some parts of the last definition like sharing of opinions without hesitation is what author believes is a vital asset of a leader but there is no such statement in my explanation which relates with the definition in terms of utilization of previous experience.

Conclusion

There have been changes in the definition of leadership in every decade. Concluding that the explanation of leadership by the author has been evolved with the progress of definitions and time is not modest as could be observed in the analysis. There are definitions which match completely with the ideas of the author, some match partially and then there are some definitions which either gets nothing to do with the writer’s explanation or completely opposite to that of author’s explanation. Overall, the author believes that the leadership explanation has evolved a little with time as author’s explanation are more related to the first decade in all aspects, infrequent related with the second decade and partially related with the third decade. So author must go through over more research on leadership as per the current needs of time and must evolve his understanding regarding leadership.

Appendix A

Biographical leadership explanation

Jim is a native of New York City and has lived in the United States of America since 1990. He joined high school in 2000 where he got various opportunities for utilizing and improving his leadership qualities. His background and emphasis on the betterment of community enable him to lead numeral volunteer opportunities and leadership roles in the community. There was a wish hidden inside him of becoming a legendary leader due to a high impact because of Hollywood movies and Marvel Comics. He was always fanaticized by the ways, the leaders were perceived by the general community. It raised desires in him like “to be looked after” “to be given respect”. But this sort of feeling doesn’t exist always in him as sometimes he was broken, felt down, and felt lost, disbelieving, nervous and jealous. Leaders are never free from this kind of thinking as they are not high in confidence all the time, but leaders always try to overcome these sorts of feelings because leadership is what lies in the mind and the heart of the leader. Leadership is basically in the mind which encourages the leader to play their part in society and concocts an identity of him. A leader must be a trendsetter; he should more be more concerned with leading than following. A leader must understand the importance of team-work and must share his objective, vision with his team members and must empower them for the accomplishment of those. Leaders must never be afraid of taking risks and must have got sufficient courage for performing relative experimentation. A leader must be able to receive the ideas & suggestions from others and should be able to implement suggestions from others, if better than his. Leaders must be aware of right actions for incorporating the plan devised. A leader must always be open minded and must not be shy to share his opinions regarding any matter. A leader must constitute a high confidence level. This was the leadership understanding in Jim’s mind upon which he acted all of his roles in leadership during high school and college life.

Appendix B

Historical Overview of Selected Leadership Definitions with Timeline

Decade 1980 – 1990

1. 1. 1. 1. A leader must be a role model for his team members, motivate his team members in every aspect, encourage them to think out of the box and provides them a comfortable environment as per looking at their desires (Bernard, 1985)

         2. Leaders are more pullers than pushers, inspire the others by giving an appropriate order, creates achievable targets for others, give them rewards instead of manipulating them and enable the others to utilize their own experiences and initiatives rather than utilizing his (Bennis & Nanus, 1985).

         3. Leaders always look for opportunities, believe in experimentation and taking risks, share the vision with others, encourage collaboration, empower others, set an example, celebrates small wins and recognizes contribution from the others (Kouzes & Posner, 1987)

Decade 1990 – 2000

1. Leaders are always good in listening, showing empathy, healing others, aware form surrounding, encourage others, having a conceptual logic for things, quality of fore sighting, stewardship, committed to contributing in the growth of others and believes in building community (Spears, 1990: 12-2, cited in Spears, 2010).

2. Leaders believe that there is a supreme power and everything in the universe is being controlled by that power. All mankind is interconnected; actions of one affect the other. It doesn’t matter that things are really bad, there is always something good hidden inside them. We are here to serve the mankind and others. Have got a great feeling of love, empathy, kindness, anticipation, and sanguinity (Mitroff and Denton, 1999: 23–5, cited in Earl & Katz, 2007).

3. Leadership means the creation of strategies for the others and development of strategies for its achievement. Aligns all the other people by delivering directions with proper communication through words. Encourages others to pass all kind of political, resource and bureaucratic barriers to achieving the vision and objectives (Kotter, 1996)

Decade 2000 – 2010

1. Leadership is basically a pattern of a leader behavior which is committed to enhance affirmative psychological abilities and an affirmative principled climate so to promote self-awareness, moral perception, a progression of knowledge in a balanced manner, transparency amongst the followers (Walumbwa, Avolio, Gardner, Wernsing & Peterson, 2007).

2. A leader is the one who is dominant in nature, have got a sturdy desire for making an impact on the others, high in confidence level and have got a strong grip over his own morality values ”(Northouse, 2004: 26-2, cited in Western, 2013).

3. Leaders are the one whose reality is not hidden behind any mask. They draw everything for improving their skills, competence and don’t stay in their lucid selves. They have devised the theories from their previous experience and utilize their experience for future works. (Collins, 2001: 32-3, cited in Western, 2013).

References

Bernard, M. (1985). Leadership and performance beyond expectations (1st ed.). Newyork: New York: The Free Press.

Bennis, W., & Nanus, B. (1985). Leaders: The strategies for taking charge (2nd ed., pp. 244-248). Newyork: Harper & Row.

Earl, L., & Katz, S. (2007). Leadership in networked learning communities: defining the terrain. School Leadership & Management, 27(3), 239-258. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13632430701379503

Kotter, J. (1996). Leading Change (1st ed., pp. 35-49). Harvard Business Press

Kouzes, J., & Posner, B. (1987). The Leadership Challenge (1st ed., pp. 50-75). New York: Jossey-Bass.

Spears, L. (2010). Character and servant leadership: Ten characteristics of effective, caring leaders. The Journal Of Virtues & Leadership, 1(1), 25-30. Retrieved from https://www.regent.edu/acad/global/publications/jvl/vol1_iss1/Spears_Final.pdf

Walumbwa, F., Avolio, B., Gardner, W., Wernsing, T., & Peterson, S. (2007). Authentic leadership: Development and validation of a theory-based measure. Journal of Management, 34(1), 89-126. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0149206307308913

Western, S. (2017). Leadership - A Critical Text (2nd ed.). London: Sage Publications