LEADERSHIP

Leadership can be described as the ability of an individual to influence, motivate,

and enable others to contribute toward the effectiveness and success of an
organization or group of which they are members. A person who can bring about
change, therefore, is one who has this ability to be a leader. It is a process of social
influence in which one person can enlist the aid and support of others in the
accomplishment of a common task.

Qualities of a leader:
1. Integrity: Integrity refers to being genuine and honest and deciding to do the
right thing at all times. A strong sense of integrity is important in leadership
because your team members need to know they can trust and respect what you
say and what you do. They also need to know they can count on you to keep
your promises.

2. Courage: The strength to act in accordance with your own values and the
greater good despite pressures pushing you in other directions. The ability to
put the cause before the desire to be popular. They have a sense of self-
assurance and self-esteem and, most importantly, believe that they can make a
difference.

3. Self-Confidence: A belief in your ability to meet most challenges that come

your way. Confidence in him is important to earn the confidence of the
subordinates. He should be trustworthy and should handle the situations with
full willpower.
 4. Trust: Building trust is considered an essential activity in leadership.
Trustworthy leaders are approachable, accept responsibility for their actions,
and are mutually supportive of everyone, not just the people that they like.
Employees that trust their leader work effectively and have a high level of
commitment. In addition, they share ideas and knowledge. Trust in the
behaviour of other people grows when cooperation is reciprocated.

5. Values: Leadership values are the core beliefs and principles that guide us in
our personal and professional lives. Your values can be defined as the things
you believe are most important to achieving your goals and being happy.
Leadership values are closely connected to both your personal core values and
the values of your company. Having a strong set of core values as a leader
helps build respect and trust among your team. This creates the foundation for
you to influence your team in a positive way that encourages high-
performance and excellence.

Leadership style is the results of a leader’s philosophy, personality, and experience

and value system.

Some of the important leadership styles are as follows:

1. Autocratic Leadership Style: In this style of leadership, a leader has

complete command and hold over their employees/team. The team cannot put
forward their views even if they are best for the team’s or organizational
interests. They cannot criticize or question the leader’s way of getting things
done. The leader himself gets the things done.
The advantage of this style is that it leads to speedy decision-making and greater
productivity under leader’s supervision.
Drawbacks of this leadership style are that it leads to greater employee
absenteeism and turnover. This leadership style works only when the leader is
the best in performing or when the job is monotonous, unskilled and routine in
nature or where the project is short-term and risky.
2. The Laissez Faire Leadership Style: Here, the leader totally trusts their
employees/team to perform the job themselves. He just concentrates on the
intellectual/rational aspect of his work and does not focus on the management
aspect of his work. The team/employees are welcomed to share their views and
provide suggestions which are best for organizational interests. This leadership
style works only when the employees are skilled, loyal, experienced and
intellectual.
3. Democrative/Participative leadership style: The leaders invite and encourage
the team members to play an important role in decision-making process, though
the ultimate decision-making power rests with the leader. The leader guides the
employees on what to perform and how to perform, while the employees
communicate to the leader their experience and the suggestions if any.
The advantages of this leadership style are that it leads to satisfied, motivated and
more skilled employees. It leads to an optimistic work environment and also
encourages creativity.
This leadership style has the only drawback that it is time-consuming.

4. Paternalistic Leadership Style: Under this management style the leader

assumes that his function is fatherly or paternal. The relationship between the
leader and his group is the same as the relationship between the head of the family
and the members of the family. The leader guides and protects his subordinates as
members of his family.

As the head of the family he provides his subordinates with good working
conditions and fringe benefits. It is assumed that workers will work harder out of
gratitude.

One of the downsides to a paternalistic leader is that the leader could start to play
favorites in decisions. This leader would include the workers more apt to follow
and start to exclude the ones who were less loyal.
EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE
Emotional Intelligence is the measure of an individual’s abilities to recognise and
manage their emotions, and the emotions of other people, both individually and in
groups.

Emotional intelligence can be measured by how an individual progresses through

life - developing meaningful relationships with others, their interpersonal skills and
understanding, their ability to manage their own emotions, and their personal
skills.

Components of Emotional Intelligence

In the book “Emotional intelligence: Why it can matter more than IQ”, one of the
most popular psychologists Daniel Goleman lays out five key components of
emotional intelligence.

1. Self-Awareness: It is to have knowledge about oneself, mainly the strengths and

weaknesses. This enables a person to know how to react to different people and
different situations that arise in the workplace. People who are self-aware, are in
most cases, self-confident too. The only way to improve one’s Self-awareness is to
step out from their comfort zone.

2. Self-Regulation: It is the art of regulating one’s emotions to be able to manage

and have self-control over it. also, necessitates the need to manage one’s thoughts,
emotions, and behavior to get positive results.

3. Motivation: People with high EI tend to be more positive and optimistic in their

approach. Thus, making themselves highly motivated. Also, they are more flexible
with their work and possess the ability to handle any situation.

4. Empathy: Empathy is very important for every working person, especially for

people in leadership roles. It is very important to put oneself in the other person’s
shoes to ensure there is a good mutual connection between the employees.
Difference Between IQ and EQ

One’s intelligence quotient (IQ) is a score derived from standardized tests designed
to measure intelligence. IQ relates directly to your intellectual abilities, like how
well you learn as well as understand and apply information. People with higher IQs
can think abstractly and make mental connections more easily.

Emotional intelligence is very different. Sometimes called EI (for Emotional

Intelligence) or EQ (for Emotional Intelligence Quotient), emotional intelligence is
like using emotions to think and enhance our reasoning. Those with high emotional
intelligence are able to manage their emotions as well as use their emotions to
facilitate their thinking and understand the emotions of others.
PROBLEM SOLVING

What is a Problem?

Simply defined ‘Problem is deviation from expectation’. Something is not what

it should be. If a lift in your apartment breaks down, that is a deviation and a
problem. It is also true that there can be problems as obstacles in the way of what
we want to achieve. To succeed we must remove or overcome these obstacles.

In general, problems are matters we want to remove, solve or be without.

Problem solving

A systematic approach to defining the problem and creating a vast number of

possible solutions without judging the solutions

Problem solving process

1. Identify the Problem

2. Define the Problem

3. Analyze the problem

4. Developing Possibilities

5. Selecting the best solution

6. Implementing the solution

7. Evaluate the Results

Skills required in Problem solving
Analysis is a powerful tool for solving problems. All problem-solving techniques
depend heavily on analysis. What is the cause of the problem? What factors sustain
the problem? What prevents a solution?
Creative thinking is quite different. You cannot analyze something which is not
there. Most people like analysis because it is finite. You know what you are
dealing with. Your analysis may indeed be poor but that is obviously your fault.
Most people are uncomfortable with creativity because there is nothing there until
you put it there.
Decision making is required to choose the right solution to solve the problem. One
needs to have good planning skill to implement the solution.

Problem solving process in Detail

Step1- Identify the problem

First step is about “Finding the right problem to solve”. Think how much time you
spend on things which don’t demand attention. Identifying problem means being
proactive and finding right problem to solve; important and valuable problem.

Step2- Define the problem

After the problem has been identified, it is important to fully define the problem so
that it can be solved. Combining problems that are valuable to solve, with defining
exactly what you are trying to solve, can dramatically improve the effectiveness of
the problem solving process.

The secret to defining the problem is really about attitude. Try to see problem as an
opportunity. Define the problem in a way which focuses on the potential and
opportunity in every situation. Peter Drucker advocates that we should starve
problems and start feeding opportunities.

Step3- Analyze the problem

Analysis is a process of discovery of the facts, finding out what you know and
don’t know about the situation. It's critical to get input from other people who
notice the problem and who are affected by it. Analysis should be used to get to the
root cause of the situation. Ask lots of questions ( WHYs) in the step.
Write down a description of the cause of the problem and in terms of what is
happening, where, when, how, with whom and why.

Step4- Develop possibilities

At this point, it's useful to keep others involved. Brainstorm for solutions to the
problem. Very simply put, brainstorming is collecting as many ideas as possible,
and then screening them to find the best idea. It's critical when collecting the ideas
to not pass any judgment on the ideas -- just write them down as you hear them.

Step5- Select the best solution

When selecting the best approach, consider:

a. Which approach is the most likely to solve the problem for the long term?
b. Which approach is the most realistic to accomplish for now? Do you have the
resources? Are they affordable? Do you have enough time to implement the
approach?
c. What is the extent of risk associated with each alternative?
(The nature of this step, in particular, in the problem solving process is why
problem solving and decision making are highly integrated.)

Step6- Implement the solution

Before implementing carefully consider
o "What will the situation look like when the problem is solved?"
o What steps should be taken to implement the best alternative to solving the
problem? What systems or processes should be changed in your
organization, for example, a new policy or procedure? Don't resort to
solutions where someone is "just going to try harder".
o What resources will you need in terms of people, money and facilities?
o How much time will you need to implement the solution? Write a schedule
that includes the start and stop times, and when you expect to see certain
indicators of success.

Communicate the plan to those who will be involved in implementing it or will be

getting affected by it.

Implementation process then can follow steps below –

o Define it
 o Design it
o Do it - carry out activities to implement
o Deliver it - test and ensure it has met the outcomes

Step7- Evaluate the results

Monitor the indicators of success:

o Effectiveness of the solution you implemented.

o Did it deliver the outcomes you expected?
o What further opportunities can be explored now!
ATTITUDE
“Attitude” is an individual’s way of looking or an individual’s point of view at
something.

To be more specific, an “attitude” may be defined as the mental state of an

individual, which prepares him to react or make him behave in a particular pre-
determined way. It is actually an acquired feeling.

Attitude is the mixture of beliefs and feelings that people have about situations,
specific ideas or other people.

Components of Attitude
Cognitive component
Represents the opinion or belief segment of an attitude. It consists of the real or
assumed knowledge, beliefs and information the individual has about the attitude
object. Cognitive element concerns the rational processes an individual uses before
taking a particular course of actions.

Typically these come to light in generalities or stereotypes, such as ‘all babies are
cute’, ‘smoking is harmful to health’ etc.

Affective component
Represents the emotional or feeling segment of an attitude. It consists of the
“feelings” or emotional response of the individual to the object; either positive,
negative or neutral. Affective component controls how much the person likes or
dislikes the attitude object. Emotional element refers to the non-rational
commitments an individual makes to pursue a particular course of action – his
feelings.
Example: I don’t like Sam because he is not honest, or I like Sam because he is
sincere. It is an expression of feelings about a person, object or a situation.

Behavioural component

Represents an intention to behave in a certain way toward someone or something.

It consists of the individual’s tendencies or predisposition to act (behave) in a
particular way towards the object. Behavioural component controls how the
individual acts on the basis of his cognitive and affective set.

Example: I don’t like Sam because he is not honest is an affective component, I,

therefore, would like to disassociate myself with him, is a behavioural component
and therefore I would avoid Sam.

Cognitive and affective components are bases for such behaviour. Former two
components cannot be seen, only the behaviour component can be seen. Former is
important because it is a base for the formation of attitude.

Characteristics of Attitude

1. Attitude are learned- This means attitude get formed on the basis of some
experience with or information about the object.

2. Attitude are predispositions and reside in the mind of the individual.

3. Attitude cause consistent response- This means attitude precede and produce
behaviour.

4. Attitude are different from values: Values are the ideals, whereas attitudes
are narrow, they are our feelings.
Functions of Attitude:

Adjustment/Instrumental Function
Attitudes often help individuals to adjust to their work environment.

Example: Well-treated employees tend to develop a positive attitude towards

their management or job.

Ego-Defensive Function
Attitudes help people to retain their self- image and dignity.

Example: Older faculty might feel somewhat threatened by a young and new
faculty member who is full of fresh ideas and enthusiasm.

Value-Expressive Function
Attitudes provide individuals with a basis for expressing their values.

Example, a manager who values honest and sincere work will be more vocal
against an employee who is having a very casual approach towards work.

Knowledge Function
Attitudes provide frames of reference or standard that allow individuals to
understand and perceive the world around him.

Example, If a student has a strong negative attitude towards the college,

whatever the college does, the student will be perceived as something ‘bad’ and
as actually against them.
 Attitude vs Values

Rokeach defines values as basic conventions that a specific mode of conduct or

end state of existence is personally or socially preferable to an opposite or
converse mode of conduct or end state of existence.

Values contain a judgmental element with moral flavour and thus they carry an
individual’s ideas as to what is right, good or desirable. Attitudes are specific
whereas values form a broader and more encompassing concept. For instance,
the statement that “discrimination against women for executive jobs is bad”
indicates one’s values.

On the contrary, “I am in favour of developing women for executive jobs in this

organization” is an attitude. None the less, despite this difference, attitudes and
values are found to be closely related. Values refer to the worth or excellence
ascribed to an object. Values, thus, relate to standards or yardsticks to guide
actions, attitudes, evaluations and justifications of self and others.