Most effective Leadership & Management Styles & approaches

Introduction

According to some researches, the topic that what is the best way to manage a team has been argued for so many years. This blog will firstly compare the leadership and management to find out both their similar and different points. Then, some specific examples will be given to support the most effective approach for leading I choose. At the end of the blog, I will response the theory that CMI 2013 suggested and give my own opinion about leading.

Part 1

It is undoubted that leadership and management are two different concepts but have similarities in respective area. To be specific, leadership is a ability to promote people to accomplish the common achievements (Yukl, 2010). However, management is a process that getting results though other members (Mullins, 2016). Based on a journal, the following points are the main differences between leadership and management (Young and Dulewicz, 2008). Leadership focus on long term strategy and leading people. However, management emphasizes managing work for short term tasks. Moreover, as leaders, they attract followers by heart. But as managers, they appeal to head because others are their subordinates. Furthermore, leadership will direct people to a new road and management may plan individuals more detail work in the exising siuation. It is clear that the common factor for leadership and management is the motivation to be the better one in strong competition nowadays. To summarize, as a sentence said by Peter Drucker, “Leadership is doing the right things; management is doing things right.”

Part 2

Absolutely, Kouzes and Posner’s 5 Practices of Exemplary Leadership provides five different effective managing approaches (Kouzes and Posner, 2013). From the point of my view, enable and encourage others are two best ways to manage subordinates. Specifically, “enable” means leaders trust their employees and provide them a chance to show the strengthes. For example, Ricardo Semler, a famous entrepreneur from Brazil, used his unique managing style to create his own business (Semler, 1993). In his company Semco, he respects each worker and give them the freedom that any other companies can not provide. One of the amazing ideas from Semler is he allows his subordinates to apply a holiday for maximum three years in any reasons. Because of this special management, all his staff work hard for him and gain great achievements together. Furthermore, “encourage” is an approach that to appreciate subordinates and make some rewards if possible. For instance, Jack Ma, the CEO of the most successful e-commerce company Alibaba, has made the encouragement as an important managing skill in his business history. In addition, Jack Ma prepared the bonus of RSU for most of his employees every year (Liu and Avery, 2009). It is undoubted that this method help Jack retain the excellent subordinates and promote the relationship between the leader and members. Definetely, the working passion of staff in Alibaba might increase to speed up the development of this organization. So, both “enable” and “encourage” are the suitable ways to lead a team.

Conclusion

To conclude, though management and leadership have similarities in the development of organizations, some specific differences may distinguish their function in each area. On the other hand, it is said by CMI 2013 that the most effective way to do the management is according to the different siuation and different people. In my opinion, I agree with this suggestion because each organization has its own running style (Ardagna and Lusardi, 2008). What it means is the leader or the manager should to look for the best approach for managing their members in different period. For instance, if a team performs well but disbands finally, the managing approach the leader used before is hardly to say can exactly fit next group. The main reason caused this might be the circumstances and individual characteristics. As a member of a team, I would like to be led as a leader similar with Ricardo Semler. As I mentioned above, he is a irregular leader who believes all of his workers and give them much more freedom. To be honest, I enjoy freedom and are willing to cooperate with a leader who can always appreciate others. It is easily to say that if I can apply a holiday anytime and start working anywhere, I will be full of passion in my job. In another word, I promise I can try my best for the company which has a leader holds that managing style in the future.

References

Ardagna, S. and Lusardi, A. (2008). Explaining international differences in entrepreneurship. Cambridge, Mass.: National Bureau of Economic Research.

Kouzes, J. and Posner, B. (2013). The five practices of exemplary leadership. San Francisco: Wiley.

Liu, S. and Avery, M. (2009). Alibaba. New York: Collins Business.

Mullins, L. (2016). Management and Organisational Behaviour 11th edn. Pearson Education Limited.

Semler, R. (1993). Maverick. New York, NY: Warner Books.

Young, M. and Dulewicz, V. (2008). Similarities and Differences between Leadership and Management: High-Performance Competencies in the British Royal Navy. British Journal of Management, 19(1), pp.17-32.

Yukl, G. (2010). Leadership in organizations. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson.