Managing and Developing a Small Business What do Leaders really do

Introduction Leaders and managers of an organization play incredible roles in the endeavour to ensure that organizations succeed in attaining their aims and objectives, as stipulated in their strategic plans. A dominant argument among scholars is that, leaders can also serve the roles of the managers.Advertising We will write a custom report sample on Managing and Developing a Small Business: What do Leaders really do? specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More On the other hand, other scholars argue that, leaders cannot act as managers of an organization. Consequently, there is unresolved debate whether managers can be leaders and the vice versa. For instance, Kotter posits, â€Å"leadership and management are two distinctive and complementary systems of action† (1990, p.103). This argument implies that, leadership and management have two differing traits and functions within an organization. The main question remains: which of the two is more appropriate for being given more consideration to enhance better success of an organization? Increasing body of literature places a strong argument that, the two are significant towards this end, especially when the volatilities and complexities of the modern day organizations’ operation environment are considered. From this position, this paper seeks to address the two aspects, which may immensely enhance the performance and hence the success of an organization. This goal is achieved through conducting a summary of Kotter’s article appearing on the journal of Harvard Business Review in 1990 titled: â€Å"what leaders really do†, and then articulating it with the existing body of literature on the position of leadership and management in enhancing success of an organization. Difference between management and leadership Management entails dealing ardently with organizational complexity. According to Brungardt (1996), â€Å"management controls or dire cts people or resources in a group according to principles or values that have already been established† (p.83).Advertising Looking for report on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More In the absence of cute organizational management strategies, complex business establishments may get chaotic in numerous ways hence creating the risks to the existence of the business establishment in question. In this context, Kotter (1990) laments that, â€Å"good management brings a degree of order and consistency to key dimensions like the quality and profitability of products† (p.104). On the other hand, leadership entails putting forth new visions and or directions for people working within an organization. In the journey towards achievement of this vision and direction, the leader work principally as the spearhead. This implies that leadership is all about deploying appropriate measures to deal cutely with organ izational change. Leadership is the tool that can be deployed, within an organization, to help it deal proactively with various factors that make conducting business a challenge. Such factors includes technological sophistication, volatility of the markets, increased international competitions, rapidly varying demographic characteristics, changing capital markets characteristics coupled with deregulation of capital markets among other factors. Consequently, as management scholars would suggest, doing what was effective yesterday and/or at ten percent better, can help in improvement of organizational performance. In case of leadership, this scenario is no longer a formula for realizing organizational success. Amid the cited functions of management in enhancing organizational success, it is necessary to point out that when the two are employed independently in an organization, differing results are produced.Advertising We will write a custom report sample on Managing and Developi ng a Small Business: What do Leaders really do? specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More When management is applied without leadership, incredible results are obtained in control of resources in a manner that ensures that, the status quo is maintained and/or facilitates achievement of aims, goals, and objectives in accordance to an initially re-established plan. On the other hand, when leadership is applied alone, it â€Å"sets a direction or vision that others follow, without considering too much how the new direction is going to be achieved† (Rost Baker 2000, p.9). However, when both are applied, both the management of resources and setting a new direction of the organization, in the future world of uncertainty, are realized. Budgeting and planning are two plausible tools for ensuring that complexity is well managed by organizations. This accomplished through â€Å"setting targets or goals for the future, establishing detailed step s for achieving those targets and then allocating resources to accomplish the plans† (Kotter 1990, p.104). Arguably, this aspect is different with leadership. Leadership is initiated by direction setting. It entangles development of a vision through generation of wider perspective of future, coupled with adopting strategies that are critical in ensuring production of changes, which are vital in the achievement of the vision. Another striking difference is that, in case of management, the capacity for achieving the preset plans is dependent on strategies for staffing coupled with the power of organizing deployed by the organization. It is in this end that job design, job delegation, staff selection and recruitment and organizational communication becomes significant. On the other hand, as Kotter (1990) reckons, â€Å"the equivalent leadership activity is aligning people† (p.104).Advertising Looking for report on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More It encompasses putting in place mechanisms of enhancing clear communication of the new directions for adoption to ensure the realization of the aims, goals and objectives of the organization in the near future to all stakeholders who commit themselves and accept being guided by the established direction. Additionally, from the perspectives of management, plans are achieved through designing mechanisms of the solution to problems coupled with controlling them, which is opposed to leadership whereby visions are achieved through inspiration and ensuring that the team that is responsible for the realization of the vision is proactively motivated. Critical scrutiny of the differences between management and leadership evidences traits of a leader. Therefore, they also shed light on what leaders needs to do on a daily basis. Setting direction One of the fundamental roles of leadership is to set the organizational direction, which is necessary in the endeavour to attain the subtle objective of leadership: to produce change. However, setting of direction should not get confused with planning. According to Kotter (1990), planning entails â€Å"a management process which is deductive in nature and designed to produce orderly results, not change† (p.104). This implies that setting of direction is ideally inductive in its nature. For the leaders to be able to set appropriate direction, they garner an immense data and then attempt to derive patterns and linkages. Most importantly, they use the data gathered to determine relationships. This move is critical in making them able to explain things. In the context of leadership roles in an organization, setting of direction yields strategies coupled with visions, as opposed to plans. For the leaders to have the capacity to achieve commendable organizational direction, hard work, often entailing taking risks, is required because setting of direction is not achieved through magic. Kotter is also inclined to this line of tho ught when he argues that â€Å" people who articulate visions are not magicians but broad based strategic thinkers who are willing to take risks† (1990, p.105). However, it is crucial to note that strategies and visions do not necessary deserve to be brilliantly innovative. Indeed, many of the cute visions are not. Aligning people Upon the setting of the desired direction, the next objective of leadership is to see people moving according to the stipulated vision and strategies. In many organizations, people are normally tied amongst themselves by â€Å"their work, systems of management, technology, and hierarchy systems† (Kotter 1990 p.105). Consequently, in the endeavour of leadership to play its chief function of bringing about change, such linkages expose some challenges. This means that for people to move collectively in accordance to the strategies and visions, a leader aligns them, as opposed to organizing them. In this end, Kotter laments, â€Å"To executives who are overeducated in management, the idea of moving people in the same direction appears to be an organizational problem† (1990, p.105). From this dimension, it becomes crucial to argue that the challenge of aligning people is more of communication problem as opposed to design challenge. For a leader to be able to align people well to the visions and the strategies, he or she needs to talk much more than a manager would, in order to have people organized in accordance to the stipulated organizational plans (Hiebert Klatt 2000, p.98). The people that a leader must establish an ardent communication with include peer staff members, subordinates, bosses, and officials of the government, while not negating the consumers. Other relevant parties that the leader needs to talk to entails all those other organizational stakeholders who have the capacity to hinder or aid in the visions and strategies implementation. By enhancing ardent communication, a leader is able to empower all p eople dependent on his or her vision or strategies to achieve their targets, hence enhancing the performance of an organization coupled with its success. Motivating people In the attempt to induce change, a leader encounters myriads of impediments. Such impediments entangle development of the capacity to inculcate the need to develop an energized code of behaviours among the people who are being led. Motivation serves to make the people develop the requisite energy demanded to make people overcome various obstacles in the path of attempting to realize the visions and strategies of change. Kotter amplifies this argument when he comments, â€Å"Achieving grand visions always requires an occasional burst of energy† (1990, p.107). In comparison to controlling, motivation does not push people to the desired direction. Rather, it does it through satisfaction of essential human needs, creation of a feeling of self-belonging, amplification of self-esteem of people and recognition amo ng other things. Leaders can motivate people in a variety of ways. One of the chief ways of doing this motivation is by articulating people with the organizational vision â€Å"in a manner that stresses the value of the audience they are addressing† (Kotter 1990, p.108). Another way is to aid people to make decisions on how to attain the vision of the organization. This may be done by making provisions of feedback, coaching, and even acting as role models. Where the leader recognizes that people are succeeding in achieving the visions and strategies, he or she does not hesitate to reward the success ardently. This makes the work done by all people in the organization become internally motivating. Leadership culture For an organization to succeed in the competitive environment, it is indispensable for executives to posses both leadership and management attributes. In fact, â€Å"some companies have consistently demonstrated an ability to develop people into outstanding leader -manager† (Kotter 1990, p.107). In the process of development of leadership culture in an organization, the first step is to recruit people who have leadership potential. The next step is to ensure that their leadership career is appropriately monitored. The goal is to ensure that all people charged with leadership duties are able to share numerous career experiences amongst themselves. Developing leadership For people to develop leadership experiences, it is significant that a leader in charge creates an environment that is dominated by challenging decision-making opportunities. Upon determination of the people and the necessary skills that need development, leaders normally spend a significant fraction of their time planning the mechanisms that they are going to utilize in order to ensure that the skills are developed in a manner that would advantage the organization in future (Northouse 2006, p.68; Schein 2004, 112). Sometimes, this development is accomplished through plann ing. This sort of planning is essentially formal or through a development process, that has high potential attributes: informal. However, in any of these ways â€Å"the key ingredient appears to be an intelligent assessment of what is feasible development opportunity fit for each candidate† (Kotter 1990, p.111). This way, young leader becomes prepared to assume leadership roles for both small and medium sized organization. Institutionalization of leadership culture In an attempt to foster institutionalization of leadership culture within an organization, many organizational leadership scholars contend that a means of rewarding leaders who have aided in development of leadership traits among the workforce is vital. However, â€Å"this is not done as part of formal compensation or bonus formula, simply because it is so difficult to measure such achievements with precision† (p.111). Arguably, in case people, in the top realm of organizational leadership, are informed that they could be promoted based on their capacity to develop leadership, even those who belief that leadership is not possible to develop may look for ways in which it can be nurtured. This way, it becomes possible to inculcate a corporate culture that can incredibly aid in building an immensely strong leadership culture, coupled with attempts to create it. This observation is largely consistent with Kotter (1990) argument that, â€Å"institutionalizing a leadership-centred culture is the ultimate act of leadership† (p.111). This means that, what leaders actually need to do is to ensure that leadership culture is developed from the top most to bottom most people, in the organizational hierarchical order. Conclusion Organizational leaders play vital roles in ensuring that organizations succeed in achieving their goals, aims, and objectives. It is crucial for people aspiring to become leader to understand the chief things that leaders do on a daily basis. It is from this perspect ive that the paper found it essential to scrutinize what leaders certainly do. After conducting a summary of the of Kotter’s article, â€Å"What Leaders Really Do† and conducting an intensive introspection of existing literature of the role of leadership in enhancing success of an organization, the paper discussed setting direction, motivation, aligning people, creating an environment where leadership culture can thrive, developing leadership, and institutionalization of leadership culture, as the key things Reference List Brungardt, C 1996, ‘The making of leaders: A review of the research in leadership development and education’, The Journal of Leadership Studies, vol. 3 no.3, pp 81–95. Hiebert, M Klatt, B 2000, The Encyclopedia of Leadership: A Practical Guide to Popular Leadership Theories and Techniques, McGraw Hill, New York. Kotter, J 1990, ‘What leaders really do’, Harvard Business Review, vol.1 no. 1, pp 103-111. Northouse, P 2 006, Leadership: Theory and Practice, Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks. Rost, J Baker, R 2000, ‘Leadership education in colleges: Toward a 21st century paradigm’, The Journal of Leadership Studies, vol. 7 no.1, pp 3–12. Schein, E 2004, Organizational Culture and Leadership, Jossey Bass, San Francisco. This report on Managing and Developing a Small Business: What do Leaders really do? was written and submitted by user Bennett Carver to help you with your own studies. You are free to use it for research and reference purposes in order to write your own paper; however, you must cite it accordingly. You can donate your paper here.