...Leadership Decision Making In this article, the authors provide a brief summary of the objectives, methods, and results of research pertaining to both normative and descriptive models of decision processes used in organizations (described in detail in Vroom and Yetton, 1973). On one hand, the normative (or prescriptive) decision making model aimed to provide a rational basis for selecting among alternative courses of action. In this model, operational research and management science are concerned with how to improve the decisions which are made. On the other hand, the descriptive decision making model aimed to understand the decisions and choices that people make. In this model, the goal is to understanding rather than improvement. To understand decisions and choices that people make; psychologists, sociologists, and political Scientists attempt to answer the following questions: how do managers really behave? What decision rules underlie managers willingness to share their decision making power with their subordinates? Both normative and descriptive models focus on the set of alternative decisions or problem solutions from which choice is, or should be made. The normative models are based on the consequences of choices among alternatives, the descriptive models on the determinants of these choices. Making good decisions is one of the main leadership tasks. These involve determining the most efficient and effective means of reaching the decision...
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...Leadership and Ethical Decision-Making Sharon and Marcia share some parallels with their work history. Both women have been in the human resource field for almost 20 years. Both women seem to have been successful in their positions. Sharon seems to have an alpha personality. She will “jump” to get things done in the fastest way possible. I am concerned however, by her stating that she does not want to waste time by planning out anything with a lengthy implementation. UWEAR is going through a merger and although people tend to resist change, it cannot be avoided at this point. Also, considering Sharon is the HR manager for UWEAR, it should be noted that she was hired directly out of college with no prior experience. She also has not been kept abreast as to the legislation that is currently required for publicly traded companies, which can be seen by not having a whistleblower protection policy that should have been implemented after the SOX Act. Sharon’s style relies heavily on her intuition. She believes she can assess the environment around her and know what needs to be done. This is a great strength if she indeed can accurately assess her situation and see the path that needs to be followed to get the job done. Her weakness is her lack of enthusiasm for having a predetermined plan with an implementation timeline. Another strength that Sharon has, is her experience in being a part of a company that has grown into a larger, publicly traded company. She would be able to assist...
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...ETHICAL DECISION MAKING AND ETHICAL LEADERSHIP To improve ethical decision making in business, one must first understand how individuals make ethical decisions in an organizational environment. Too often it is assumed that individuals in organizations make ethical decisions in the same way that they make ethical decisions at home, in their family, or in their personal lives. Within the context of an organizational work group, however, few individuals have the freedom to decide ethical issues independent of organizational pressures. ETHICAL – ISSUE INTENSITY The first step in ethical decision making is to recognize that an ethical issue requires an individual or work group to choose among several actions that various stakeholders inside or outside the firm will ultimately evaluate as right or wrong. Ethical issue intensity, then, can be defined as the relevance or importance of an ethical issue in the eyes of the individual, work group, and/or organization. it is personal and temporal in character to accommodate values, beliefs, needs, perceptions, the special characteristics of the situation, and the personal pressure prevailing at a particular place and time. Ethical – issue intensity reflects the ethical sensitivity of the individual or work group that faces the ethical decision – making process. Research suggest that individuals are subject to six “spheres of influence” when confronted with ethical choices – the workplace, family, religion, legal system, community...
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...AN EXAMINATION OF LEADERSHIP TO DETERMINE A DIRECT CORRELATION BETWEEN LEADERSHIP STYLE AND ETHICAL DECISION MAKING Michael S. Huckaby BBA 4751 Business Ethics Professor Fernando Chavez Leadership is a complex and ever evolving skill-set. Good leaders not only guide behaviors of followers, but lead them and their organization to achieve common objectives. Good leaders have an ability to adapt to any setting so everyone feels empowered to contribute creatively to solving problems. Leaders of various levels of success have been studied throughout history, some good, some bad, but everlasting questions are always at the forefront of studying leadership: What is a good leader? What is the right approach to leadership or style of leadership? Do certain types of leaders produce better results? Are ethical leaders always the best leaders? If a single answer to these questions existed, perhaps society could build the mold of the perfect leader and distribute it throughout the world to solve the greater problems of society. However, this approach is unrealistic, so society is left to explore leadership in an effort to understand what makes a good leader. The primary purpose of this research paper is to critically examine whether a direct correlation exists between leadership style and ethical decision making. To answer this question, the author will examine each leadership style in terms of its definition, its multi-faceted dimensions or characteristics, and the associated...
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...Organizational Leadership Name Institutional Affiliation Introduction The term paper will cover the summative learning about the broad topic of organizational leadership. The paper will tackle the real organizational leadership aspects and state how important concepts, rules, and rules can be applied when correcting the problems of a given organization selected by the student. This paper will also give a case study on decision making in a specific organization selected by the student and give the solutions that can be set by the given company selected by the student. The paper will also illustrate a theoretical framework for organizational decision making. The selected topic for this term paper is organizational leadership. This topic is significant as it addresses organizational problems and challenges that the firms face and tries to give alternative remedies for those challenges. This topic is broad and helps managers in achieving the required level of production that is set for them by the board of directors and the top most managers. Although the majority of the organizations enjoy huge and healthy profits in their investments, optimal profits cannot be attained if they don't invest in organizational leadership (Zaccaro and Klimoski, 2001). This implies that the organizational decisions made by both the middle level and the top managers influence the productivity of the organization to a larger extent. The topic was also selected to give the student...
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...Participative Leadership: Strengths and Weaknesses The simple act of making decisions is an essential task leaders must perform effectively to succeed. Behavioral theories of leadership focus on how leaders approach a situation and whether they dictate orders or involve others to encourage support. Research into decision-making behavior has identified three broad categories of leaders: autocratic, democratic, and laissez-faire (Changing Minds, 2011). This paper will focus on these behavioral theories of leadership, primarily concentrating on participative leadership. An autocratic leader tells employees what to do and how to do it. On the opposite extreme, a laissez-faire leader allows employees to make their own decisions with little leader involvement. In the middle lies participative leadership where the leader includes employees in the decision-making process and lets them take part in determining what to do and how to do it (Big Dog & Little Dog's Performance Juxtaposition, 2010) . My preferred leadership style is participative leadership, confirmed by a 30-item leadership style self-assessment focused on leadership style beliefs (Big Dog & Little Dog's Performance Juxtaposition, 2010). I identify least with a laissez-faire leadership style as my organization expects leaders to be more intimately involved in most matters. In addition, I feel the need to be involved and am not comfortable completely relinquishing control, at least for important matters. I strongly...
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...LEADERSHIP - SAT TASK 1 A1. LEADERSHIP STYLE Leadership is the ability to organize a group of people in order to achieve a common goal. My leadership style is participative leadership and it is to share decision making with each member of my group. A Participative style of leadership encompasses consultative, consensus, and democratic. As a participative leader who is consultative, it is very important that I confer with members of the group before making final decisions on issues concerning the group. In addition, as a consensus leader, it is important to build consensus among the group in order to encourage group discussions concerning an issue and finally make decisions that fully reflect the agreement and support from the members of the group. Consensus leader ensures that all members of the group are involved to support a decision before it is considered final. Also, a participant leader is a democratic leader who ensures that final authority in decision making lies on the group. In this case, the group deliberate on issues and collect group opinion, and then cast votes in order to determine the final decision to make. DuBrin, A. (2010). Leadership. The advantages of the Participative style of leadership are that it operates on bases of management openness which allow leaders to accept suggestions from group members to manage the operations. The participative style also allow welcoming ideas from workers since the workers are closer to the market and know how the products...
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...http://psychology.about.com/library/quiz/bl-leadershipquizbc.htm Quiz - What's Your Leadership Style? | | Leadership Quiz - Your Results | | | | | | | Your results indicate that your leadership style is both: Participative and Delegative Participative Leadership Participative leaders accept input from one or more group members when making decisions and solving problems, but the leader retains the final say when choices are made. Group members tend to be encouraged and motivated by this style of leadership. This style of leadership often leads to more effective and accurate decisions, since no leader can be an expert in all areas. Input from group members with specialized knowledge and expertise creates a more complete basis for decision-making. Delegative Leadership Delegative leaders allow group members to make decisions. This style is best used in situations where the leader needs to rely on qualified employees. The leader cannot be an expert in all situations, which is why it is important to delegate certain tasks out to knowledgeable and trustworthy employees. Remember, good leaders utilize all three styles depending upon the situation. For example: * Use an authoritarian style if a group member lacks knowledge about a certain procedure. Autocratic leadership, also known as authoritarian leadership, is a leadership style characterized by individual control over all decisions and little input from group members. Autocratic leaders typically make choices...
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...Behavior Leadership Approach Each person is uniquely and individually made. With this in mind, people do not think, look or even respond alike all the time. Leadership is a skill that individuals display using different techniques. Some leaders are received better than others. There are many forms of leadership. The common key to all approaches of leading is to understand what the definition of leadership is as it relates to the organization. Trait, behavior, power-influence, situational, and integrative approach have been examined by researchers in the study of leadership. This paper will provide an overview of the behavior approach study of leadership. Leadership has been defined in terms of traits, behaviors, influence, interaction patterns, role relationships, and occupation of an administrative position (Robbins & Judge, 2011). The meaning or explanation of leadership is an area that has been debated for years. Today most definitions of leadership reflect the assumption that it involves a process whereby intentional influence is exerted over other people to guide, structure, and facilitate activities, and relationships in a group or organization (Robbins & Judge, 2011). Behavior Approach The behavior approach is the result of researcher’s inability to produce steady results connecting individual’s traits with effective leadership. The shift moved from examining leaders traits to examining leader’s behaviors, in the early 1950s. Researchers began observing managers...
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...to his leadership characteristics and behaviors. I have been with the organization for five years and before our current Controller came on board we were considered the worse accounting department in the organization, and now we are the best accounting department. We’ve improved as a department on many levels ranging from having the top employees, streamlined processes, improved turnaround time, increased accuracy, and improved synergy among the department. J.R. Hipple, managing partner of Albright Group says; “effective leaders must have the courage to be honest, responsible, respectful, fair and compassionate” (Neumeier, 14) and our Controller has definitely exhibited those behavioral traits. Theoretical Framework A highly effective leader combines various leadership styles to encourage team work and motivate employees to strive towards the common goal of the team or organization. An effective leader has innate characteristics that make them an effective leader. Most effective leaders that I have come across are extraverts, confident in themselves, cope with stress, adaptable, self-motivated, and hard working. Simply combining leadership styles will not make an effective leader if they do not have natural leadership characteristics. A leader should use a combination of decision making styles to be effective, with the exception of autocratic style. An effective leader adapts to various thoughts, opinions and experience; but the autocratic decision making style...
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...SAT2 Leadership Task 1 A1.) I am a Participative/Consultative leader. My style on the Leadership Grid is Sound Leader. I believe in empowering my team to participate in the decision making process both as a team and as individuals. My team members are experts in their particular functions, and as such have valuable skills and experience to add to the decision making process. In order not to slip into the Human Relations leadership style, I maintain control of the final decision after getting input from the team, and manage the insignificant day-to-day decisions with an understanding of the needs of the team and the requirements of the project. I set incremental and final goals for the team after we have discussed a project and determined the appropriate path to successful completion. I am aware of personal goals of my team members, and support them while keeping in mind the organizational objectives. a.) One strength of the Participative/Consultative leadership style is that the team members feel heard and are invested in the outcome as they have contributed to the project development and structural process. This means that there is less complaining, more focus on the goals of a project, and generally more willingness to cooperate with other team members in order to reach objectives. Another is that in utilizing my subject matter experts in a given area, I do not myself have to become an expert in each area. I trust my subject matter experts to know their area of expertise...
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...Leadership styles are a particular approach taken by a leader. These styles can either be participative or collaborative or directive or commanding. Leaders can either choose to shift their style depending on the situation or use the same style all together. Choosing the right leadership style can be very effective or ineffective depending on the group. It is important for leaders to know exactly what their main leadership style is so that they can better prepare to address situations and people or so they can know how much to alter their leadership style in order to get the best results. A1. Having worked in groups numerous times throughout my professional career as well as my educations career, I would have to say my leadership style fits more closely to the participative leader. Democratic leadership, also known as participative leadership, is a type of leadership style in which members of the group take a more participative role in the decision-making process (http://psychology.about.com/od/leadership/f/democratic-leadership.htm). Participative leaders tend to take everyone’s opinion into consideration before making the final decision. There are also subgroups to participative leadership and I would say I fall in to the consultative leader’s subgroup. Although I value every team member’s opinion and take into consideration everyone’s thoughts and Ideas I like to make the final decision. The final decision is usually based on weighing the pros and cons of each decision and...
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...Module 7 – Leadership and decision-making (13%) Leadership and ethics What is leadership? Identifying leadership attributes Transformational leadership Strategic Leadership The nature of strategic leadership The role of leaders in strategic thinking and decision-making The role of leaders in strategic analysis The role of leaders in setting direction The role of leaders in strategic formulation and selection The role of leaders in implementing strategy The Naked CEO Preview Leaders are required to develop the strategy, drive the change and align the organisation’s structure, resources and culture with the strategy. There are various viewpoints about what actually constitutes the leadership, the qualities required and its level of importance. The purpose of this module is not to present and analyse these arguments, but to provide a practical approach based on the transformational leadership that focuses specially on the role of strategy and strategic leadership. Irrespective of the approach taken to strategic leadership, there exists an important distinction between leadership and management. A leader is primarily involved in: setting direction, aligning and communicating, and inspiring and motivating. A manager is primarily in charge of: planning and budgeting, organising and staffing, and controlling and problem solving. Objectives You should be able to: (1) describe the role of ethics and corporate social responsibility in leadership; (2) identify and discuss...
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...S2, the High Support and High Direction Style S2 leadership style consists of directions from managers based on ideas that are solicited from members of the managers’ team. S2 leaders actively seek team member’s involvement in the process by encouraging them to speak their concerns and creating an environment that members feel they are able to voice their concerns and opinions involving organizational problems and active participants in the solutions. S2 leaders like to share problems with team members, listen to their points of view regarding problems before deciding on a course of action to correct the issue. S2 leaders meet only with the individuals that need to be involved, run effective meetings when required and are excellent at using input acquired from members to make decisions that will speed up the decision making process. S2 leaders typically use a systematic approach that can include the following. * Identifying problems * Clarifying goals * Generating alternatives * Choosing the best solution * Building an action plan * Monitoring implementation Strengths of the S2 leadership style: The S2 leadership style can benefit team members and an organization in many ways such as a positive work environment, successful initiatives or projects, increased creative thinking, and can reduce friction and office politics within the group. * Positive work environment: S2 leaders create a positive work environment by allowing team members...
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...and predictability in dealing with group members. Leadership style is the relatively consistent pattern of behavior that characterizes a leader. The study of leadership 112113style is an extension of understanding leadership behaviors and attitudes. Most classifications of leadership style are based on the dimensions of consideration and initiating structure. Phrases such as “he’s a real command-and-control-type” and “she’s a consensus leader” have become commonplace. DuBrin, A. (2013). Leadership [VitalSouce bookshelf version]. Retrieved from http://online.vitalsource.com/books/9781133614197/id/ch4lev1sec5 Here we describe the participative leadership style, the autocratic leadership style, the Leadership Grid,™ the entrepreneurial leadership style, gender differences in leadership style, and choosing the best style. Chapter 5 continues the exploration of leadership styles by presenting several contingency leadership theories. Participative leaders share decision making with group members. Participative leadership encompasses so many behaviors that it can be divided into three subtypes: consultative, consensus, and democratic. The participative style encompasses the teamwork approach. Predominant behaviors of participative leaders include coaching team members, negotiating their demands, and collaborating with others. Often the team member who has the most relevant knowledge for the task at hand slips into a leadership role. Research indicates that poor-performing teams...
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