Month: October 2018

There are two critical functions of team effectiveness: Performance, defined as “task accomplishment” and Development, defined as “team maintenance” (Northouse, 2019, pg. 369). Interestingly, as noted by Northouse, many characteristics Larson and LaFasto have identified of successful teams overlap with Hackman’s “enabling conditions” of a good team (as cited in Northouse, 2019, pg. 368).

Larson and LaFasto’s list eight “characteristics of team excellence” are (as cited in Northouse, 2019, pg. 368-372):

1. Clear, elevating goal, which means having a “compelling purpose” (pg. 368)
2. Results-driven structure, which means finding “the best structure for accomplishing … goals” (pg. 369)
3. Competent team members means having “the right number and mix” of people (pg. 369)
4. Unified commitment is a team that “has developed a sense of unity” (pg. 370)
5. Collaborative climate is the ability to work together (pg. 370)
6. Standards of excellence are the “norms of conduct” (pg. 370)
7. External support and recognition includes having the necessary resources to accomplish the task and rewards when they are accomplished” (pg. 371)
8. Principled leadership means having leaders that are assessed using the above criteria (pg. 372)

Hackman’s six “enabling conditions of group effectiveness” are (as cited in Northouse, 2019, pg. 369):

1. Compelling purpose, which means having a “clear, elevating goal” (pg. 368)
2. Right people, which means having “competent team members” (pg. 369)
3. Real team, which means
4. Clear norms of conduct, which means
5. Supportive organizational context
6. Team-focused coaching

Of these 14 conditions or characteristics of group effectiveness or team excellence, three I have experience with are: Compelling Purpose, Results-Driven Structure and Collaborative Climate. If a team has these three aspects, they have, there are, by definition, a Real Team. If a team has a collaborative climate, this means they also have Team-Focused Coaching.

First, an example for helping my team to have a Compelling purpose is my frequent reminder to them during meetings, when we are discussing technical and detailed explanations of ideas, that we have to keep refocusing on the goal of producing a new product that we are able to manufacture.

Next, an example for having a Results-driven structure is my monitoring of the team member to consistently record failures, experiments, negated ideas to drive the focus of our discussions. This eliminates repetition, revisiting failed ideas and focusing on the goal. Each team member is responsible for contributing knowledge or insight on previous jobs, whether profitable or unprofitable.

Lastly, I try to develop a Collaborative climate by doing three things within my business leadership context. First, talking one-on-one with team members when I have found their responses to colleagues being overly negative or done with a demeaning tone. Second, continually directing the conversation to ensure that each team member is heard equally. Thirdly, I try to affirm and encourage people that even though their ideas might have been rejected, I really appreciate their enthusiasm and energy.

Principled Leadership are four processes that influence team effectiveness. Zaccaro et al. (2001) note these are “cognitive, motivational, affective, and coordination” (as cited in Northouse, 2019, pg. 371). The Cognitive process means a leader has clarity to define “the problems confronting the team” (Northouse, 2019, pg. 371). The Motivational process means setting high team standards. The Affective process means the leader enables the team to navigate difficult circumstances. The Coordination process means the leader evaluates strengths of individual members and assigns roles based on these.

In my team setting, the Cognitive process shows itself in marketing planning meetings. For instance, in a meeting where the goal is to establish which marketing method is most effective among four types, website, direct mail, magazine and trade shows, my role is to supply financial data for each strategy, marketing data from competitors, the complexities of each and the difficulty and skill required to execute each option. We discuss this information the team is able to determine which methods to use.

Question

Zaccaro et al.’s Affective process is not something I would immediately think of as being important to team effectiveness. Overcoming adversity, however, is one of life’s important challenges. Is there a specific instance you can think of where a leader either helped or hindered the team in navigating difficult circumstances?

Reference

Northouse, P. G. (2019). Leadership: Theory and practice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

 

 

In the article for this activity, the Speers lists ten important characteristics of servant leaders (Spears, 2010, pgs. 27-28). Among these ten characteristics of a servant team leader, three that I value highly are: Listening, Awareness and Conceptualization. When coordinating a group project, a leader should at all times be listening to all conversations and ideas. Spears states that a servant leader should not only listen to what is said, but also “listen to what is unsaid” (Spears, 2010, pg. 27). This means a leaders should take time to reflect on conversations and meeting dialogue. This process “is essential to the growth and well-being of the servant leader” (Spears, 2010, pg. 27). In my opinion, listening further enables empathy, healing and commitment to the growth of people. Listening facilities the servant leader’s thinking and gives him or her more time to be more articulate and gain insights.

Awareness enables the servant leader to better focus, to more accurately analyze and be more discerning. Awareness is the opposite of “solace” because when the servant leader is aware, he or she is “sharply awake” and alert (Spears, 2010, pg. 27). When coordinating a group project, a servant leader can demonstrate Awareness by asking precise questions, evaluating body language, by being objective, analytical, flexible and teachable.

Conceptualization is the ability to analyze a situation by viewing it from “beyond day-to-day realities” (Spears, 2010, pg. 28). Servant leaders must, when coordinating a group project, think longer term and more “visionary” than conventional leaders (Spears, 2010, pg. 28). The servant leaders needs to combine both the day-to-day processes and the vision of the group. This helps group members stay on task while protecting them from becoming overwhelmed.

The servant leader, by being cognizant of daily processes and long-term goals and objectives, must consistently convey the same balance to team members. The team members are more aware of the value of the project, in and of itself, at the same time being appreciative of the value of the results in the big picture. Seeing the value of the project, in the big picture of the entire organization, enhances the perceived value of the individual group project.

Question

What are practical ways a Servant Leader can balance thinking about the day-to-day processes and the long term? Do you have an example of a leader who had achieved this balance?

Reference

Spears, Larry C. (2010). Character and Servant Leadership: Ten Characteristics of Effective, Caring Leaders. The Journal of Virtues & Leadership, 1(1), 25-30.

 

Learning Activity 1 – Team Leadership

I read your post with interest because of your frequent references to a compelling purpose in your workplace. Your references to a supportive organization you worked in and your expressed concern that you received feedback rarely from leadership. I appreciate your succinct summation of the eight characteristics of team excellence followed by the four processes that teams need to have. You’re fortunate in having what you call “a compelling purpose” and your team’s “united commitment.” I believe that among the components of team leadership that the goal or purpose or vision of the team being front and foremost is crucial to a team’s success. You also refer to the “supportive organizational context” in which you worked. It is evident that this leadership component allowed you to build your team and supplied the team with the resources to be successful over a long period of time. Any organization that is not supportive of a team and supplied resources dooms the team to failure. Having outside support of the team is often outside the influence of the leader’s ability to acquire. It is predicated on the culture and decision of the organization. Lastly, you refer to the benefit of feedback. In my experience in Christina organizations, feedback is infrequent and I feel that feedback is often perceived as being critical, unsupportive and “un-Christian.”

Your experience with a lack of feedback from your superiors highlights to me the importance of feedback to not only growth within the position but also with maintaining morale. Thank you for the reminder that leadership isn’t just about getting a job done but also making sure people want to keep doing the job.

Emotional intelligence is “. . . the ability to perceive and express emotions, to use emotions to facilitate thinking, to understand reason with emotions and to effectively manage emotions within oneself in relationship with others” (Northouse, 2019, pg. 28). “Self-awareness” refers to the personal insights of the leader (Northouse, 2019, pg. 202). In a chapter on authentic leadership, Northouse states that one of the four components of authentic leadership is self-awareness (Northouse, 2019, pg. 202). In the context of the study of servant leadership, self-awareness differs from emotional intelligence in that awareness in a servant leader means that they are aware of a multitude of needs of their followers, from teaching, direction, affirmation, challenge and encouragement. In order to be aware of the needs of their followers, any servant leader needs to be a good listener, approachable, open-minded, kind and gracious.

A person who best exemplifies the servant leadership component of awareness is a former pastor of a large church. The pastor has great intuitive sense when someone was troubled or anxious. He was a remarkably good listener and always asked insightful and helpful questions. Working with him in a board context, I noticed his awareness of the motions of others, and this characteristic is one from which I continually learn. This pastor, because of his great awareness, was one of the most influential people on my leadership development.

The video on Southwest Airlines was fascinating (KnowledgeAtWharton, 2008). What was particularly notable was the servant leadership style of the management team. Each employee is respected equally, recognized for their contribution and challenged to their strengths. In the airline industry, there are very few variables given that all the companies buy the same planes, fuel and use the same airports. Most airlines too often lose money, but Southwest Airlines stands out as the exception. Competitors could attempt to copy its model of servant leadership, but they do not. Why these other airlines do not copy Southwest Airlines is a paradox. In contrast, in other industries, such as the graphic arts, there are many variables. Some companies in this industry are successful because of the leader’s genius for technology, skill in refining processes to increase productivity or are very sales driven. None of them model servant leadership but are successful.

It is interesting that servant leadership might be more of a requirement for ‘success’ in certain industries. Given this example, is servant leadership a requirement for success in your industry or area of leadership experience?

KnowledgeAtWarton. (2008, July 9). Southwest Airlines’ Colleen Barrett on ‘Servant Leadership’. [Video file]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TgR95vnM0c

Northouse, P. G. (2019). Leadership: Theory and practice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

 

 

Transformation leadership (Northouse, 2019, pg. 161) is one of the eight leadership trends that Northouse identifies from the last 120 years (Northouse, 2019, pgs. 2-5). Is transformational leadership simply another trend or popular research topic? Transformational leadership will stand the test of time because it has one strong distinctive. Unlike other styles of leadership, the biggest and most important differentiation of transformational leadership is the great desire “to empower their followers and nurture them in change” (Northouse, 2019, pg. 175). The most important component of a transformational leader’s approach is their emphasis on individuals. Northouse also compares transformational, transactional and laissez-faire leadership styles. While the latter two styles impact followers in various areas, only transformational leadership impacts areas of personal growth. Transformational leadership will prove to be a more effective and lasting leadership trend because of its emphasis on the growth of followers.

My idea of a transformational leader of the past would be Dr. Henry Hildebrand, the founder and 45-year president of Briarcrest College in Saskatchewan. In my interactions with him over a span of four decades, he demonstrated interest in my well-being and growth. He was always vision-directed and pragmatic and was continually refining the management processes of the school. Additionally, he was remarkably open to new ideas, processes and options. In many senses, he was my spiritual mentor. Among the many things I learned from this man and, in my opinion, transformational leader, the most important was that when making a decision, analyze objectively the cost of failure.

Northouse, P. G. (2019). Leadership: Theory and practice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Response to Norm Benge – Rank, Think, Write

Wow! Thank you for your great critique of my post. You asked: “… what mechanism [would the] employer use to teach and  mentor employees to think for themselves while also upholding business standards?” For instance, my business is in manufacturing so we are always developing new products and modifying our machinery. On a regular basis, I task a large group of employees, from leadership to machine operators to figure out a way to improve a process, while maintaining our high standard of quality and service. I have learned to point out to new additions to the “thinking team” that each person should identify past attempts, failures, order of operations, etc. Then, we all meet and evaluate and rank the ideas based on cost, projected improvement, etc. We try several ideas, and often the best ideas are not from management!

You mentioned that in your education environment, it takes some time for some (or all?) or them to work out and fully understand their goal and settle on a process for completion. I think many people require structure and direction. Others, however, thrive on contributing their critical thinking in their workplace. You’ve given me something to think about it terms of whether it is desirable, possible or even feasible to shift the process of critical thinking to every employee. It might result in lower productivity for some and even prevent them from being their true selves. Thank you for giving me something to think about!

 

 

 

 

 

Learning Activity 2 – Rank, Talk, Write

What I particularly liked about your summary is Cooper’s contention that creative criticality helps “produce lifelong learners who are capable of creating new ideas that have been evaluated through critical thinking.” I like this idea because the process of creative criticality is important in and of itself, but the fact that it could be lifelong, infinitely multiplies its effectiveness. I find it encouraging that not only does creative criticality give the learner the ability to both create new solutions but it helps them critically analyze solutions before implementation. Implementation, to me, is the key because largely speaking, solutions that are not implemented I don’t think are as valuable.