Leadership

Leadership a critical prospective

Introduction

The self-assessment of key leadership strengths has outlined the propensity of greater task oriented performance capabilities of mine where operational flexibility remains identical in both favourable and unfavourable circumstances. Another effective strength has been my inclination towards utilisation of intelligence and rationality based careful approaches to understand existing issues so these could be effectively resolved. Furthermore, the efficient capacity to concentrate individualised attention through utilisation of existing work standards is another of the strengths of my leadership abilities. Apart from these, the capability to manage effective and sustained commitment based focus on the work responsibilities is another identified key competency of my leadership abilities. I have managed to identify the particulars of my leadership faculties to be related to those of the Transformational Leadership style. According to (), Transformational Leadership involves the previously mentioned intellectual stimulation of myself and those of my subordinates and individualised considerations concerning the concurrent issues. The final strength of leadership competence is the behavioural faculty of effective negotiation undertaking. This could become a significant trait of my leadership style while having to manage work groups which could be semi-autonomous in nature. The two subsets of this leadership faculty, are the traits of consulting with and informing the subordinates regarding the responsibility objectives and their performance outcome improvement criteria.

The most intractable weakness identified in my leadership ability has been the dearth of effective meaning management capacity. According to (), this involves the aptitude of making the task objectives apparent to the subordinates through effective communication metaphors so that the developed ideas could be made tangible and clarified to the subordinates. The paucity of the capacity of developing instantaneous corrective actions concerning deviations is another of such weaknesses. I have to further concentrate on my abilities of forecasting and planning regarding contingency based performance.

Assess the need for more information on your behaviours

Though self-assessment and leadership ability based reflection have been assistive in terms of determination of the weaknesses and strengths of mine as a leader, further and multidimensional information is required to further the leadership development prospects and this could be obtained from the colleagues of mine. The necessity of such extensive information could be immediately recognised in terms of the requirement to assess my competence regarding three distinct leadership parameters. The first one is the interpersonal management factor, which, involves, leading the subordinates and liaising with the different workgroups which I could have to supervise as a leader in future. According to (), this is primarily an interpersonal approach of leadership which involves acting as a figurehead of different task groups. I further require feedback from my colleagues concerning my decision formulation competencies and regarding my level of appropriateness in proper resource allocation within my subordinates for them to perform their tasks. My colleagues could further assist me concerning my abilities to respond to any contingency or similar events in the most constructive manner. The methods which could be resorted to in this context are mostly casual conversations which I could undertake with selected colleagues, informal sessions of feedback obtained from both my superiors and those from by subordinates which could be off the self information gathering and through a systematic review of my previous performances in terms of tangible outcomes. In this context, I presume, that, the perceptions of my colleagues would be extensively divergent from those of mine concerning my performance as a leader so far. Such divergence of perceptions could be concern factors such as exertion of leadership based influence in all of the directions related to my responsibility profile, securing proper understanding concerning the individual work commitment measures and my ability to operate under even severely stressful conditions.

Articulate your vision for developing as a leader (25-50 words)

IMy vision of leadership prospect development could be identified as the development of inclusive leadership competencies which could ultimately supersede immediate task objectives and entail reliability and consistency based, non-hierarchical structural progression of the abilities of subordinate personnel who could be subjected to shared responsibility management under my leadership.

Specify your developmental objectives (125-150 words)

The specifications regarding my leadership development could be outlined in the measure of fulfilment of a range of different objectives. These are as the following:

• To achieve greater capability to motivate and inspire subordinates.
• To obtain greater ability to effectively enhance communication improvement within the team.
• To undertake better identification of data points through which leadership success measures could be outlined.

The above demonstrated objectives are reflective of the extensive dimensions of Transformational and Inclusive leadership traits. These objectives have been formulated with the purpose of attaining these through Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-bound (SMART) measure. The emphasis of mine would be to enhance and improve the leadership abilities of mine to the extent where the subordinates of mine could benefit from my leadership abilities in terms of becoming able to enact self-directing changes to both their performance measures in terms of teamwork and to their immediate working environment.

Specify actions to achieve each developmental objective (500 words)

In terms of the fulfilment of the first objective of enhancement of the ability of motivating and inspiring team members, the specific actions are as the following:

• Verbal impetus provisioning to the subordinates to enhance productivity by 25% and obtainment of team member feedback concerning such efforts.
• Increment of productivity which could be indicated by 25% less time consumption in terms of completion of the projects as well as the evaluation of team member satisfaction survey based reports.
• Provisioning of the team members with the training and tools for project management. Fostering the most conducive and collaboration based atmosphere within the work conditions and provisioning of the most accurate feedback to the team members on a weekly screening basis.
• Reduction of the time extent taken expended by each team member while they could be unfocused on any particular task. Providing the team members their quarterly work reports concerning performance evaluation.
• Achievement of 25% of improvement in terms of time consumption.
• The fulfilment of the second objective of communication improvement would involve the following actions:
• Development of project presentation skills which could contribute to 40% less emergence of inquests from team members.
• 40% reduction in the formal questions forwarded by team members.
• Improvement of presentation capabilities through attending workshops.
• Outlining of the fast pace of team meetings through increasingly clarified presentation skills. This would also increase comprehensive abilities of message recipients.
• 40% less time requirements in individual meetings which could be held in the next half a year.

Actions required for fulfilment of third objective are as the following:

1: 30% increment in success in terms of feedback obtainment from both the senior leadership of the organisation under consideration and the subordinate colleagues in terms of the individual feedback surveys conducted after each of the work performance evaluation meetings could be completed for the next 6 months. 2: 30% reduction in the number of meeting participants and audiences who could have requested to either reframe or clarify any particular or multiple points which could be explained by me as a team leader.

Tracking of the numerical value of the audiences who could put forward comments and inquests during such meetings. This could outline the measure of misunderstanding, ambiguity and lack of clarity which could have persisted. This process would have to be a continuous one till the next 6 months. The identified numbers could be then compared to establish a definite outcome value.

Formulation of a log chart to measure the actual extent of time based alterations of the parameters of performance indicators. Such gathered data would have to be regularly reviewed to determine any inherent pattern of occurrence in this context. Appropriate interim review periods would be established as per the situation.

The duration would be extended till the next 6 months. This would be subdivided into particular time periods such as interim reviews of relevance of the performance data after 5 days of each of the meetings.

Describe the resources that you will need to implement your plan (300 words)

The resources which could be required for the leadership prospect development scope to be realised, as per the above demonstrated objectives, would be multifarious in nature. The initial resource would be to undertake proper consultation with the organisational human resource management specialists so as to determine the best methods through which the motivational measures of the team members and subordinates could be improved. This could entail specifics as identification of the factors which influence the functionalities associated with employee engagement and could assist team leaders to meet the needs of higher motivational levels achievement. Further, organisational leadership mentors would have to be consulted as well for the purpose of development of charismatic leadership behavioural skills. Such skills would be significant to convey the sense of value to the team members under my leadership concerning their task engagements. This, according to (), could assist the team leader to instil the sense of making progress towards meaningful and shared goals in the subordinates.

Next, the resource regarding the required time measures would be vital concerning the implementation of the third objective. There are two significant segments of time requirement concerning the fulfilment of third objective related actions. The initial is the overall duration of next 6 months and the second one would be the individual periods required to evaluate the data point identification log charts. The log charts would have to be formulated on a tabular basis so that proper comparison between different data sets could become a possibility. Finally, specialist workshop programmes would be required to be attended so that presentation skill improvement could be realised. This would require additional funds to pay for the expenses which could be incurred regarding such workshop undertakings and associated study material, such as books and guidance manuals, would have to be purchased as well.

Describe the mechanisms you will use to get feedback on your (200 words) leadership behaviours and track your progress

If the work unit or project to which I could be assigned to as leader would include the option of administration of organisational employee surveys, then, such options would be most significant in terms of generation of vital feedback data. Furthermore, holding of useful and evaluative discussions with my mentors and supervisors would be essential from my perspective in the context of assessing the achieved development of leadership prospects of mine. Organisational peers could be requested to evaluate the performance measures of my leadership abilities and forward suggestions, if available, to me, concerning which parameters of my performance could be improved further. According to (), utilisation of preference assessment tools such as Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), could become significant on my part to track the progress in inter-personal communication methods. The outcomes of such assessments of preferences would be assistive in terms of providing greater insight to me about which leadership behavioural aspects could be necessary to be concentrated on for future improvement. A 3600 measure of feedback loop establishment would be required through informal engagement with the team members to garner considerably extensive inputs from the team members regarding their opinions about the changes, in my leadership competencies.

Describe your strategy to review and revise your plan in future (200 words)

At the initial stage, it would be required off me to determine a specific measure of time which would be necessary to review the development plan strategy. In this context, the initial leadership development plan would have to be preserved in the original form so that it could be utilised as a format of reference and as a frame of basis on which further modifications and revisions could be performed. Linking the future revisions and adjustments with the original plan would be vital for me so that the direction of progress of the plan could be maintained. The required measure of time would have to be disseminated at various intervals of the course of plan implementation so that effective review of the plan, based on achieved outcomes of implementation of the planned procedures so far, could be made possible. For the individual activities, the review measures would entail three specific parameters, namely, the extent of achieved development and success, the measure of achievement which had been estimated at the onset of the implementation of the plan and the discrepancy between the outcomes and such expectations. Finally, a synchronised cohesion of my leadership development plan with the organisational human resource development plans would have to be established.

Discuss your plan with your supervisor/mentor. What recommendations were made? What revisions did you make? (300 words)

The recommendations were as the following:

• The necessity to undertake greater flexibility in the planned approaches concerning the tangibility of outcomes. This would entail the utilisation of multipronged approaches through which any particular leadership plan performance objective could be achieved.
• Concentration of greater emphasis on all of the different forms of communication including verbal, non-verbal and written formats. This could outline the best method through which the engagement with different team members could be achieved since all of the objectives entail greater necessity to employ sharp communication skills as a leader.
• The necessity to define the end results for me. This would entail assessment of the external impression of the improvement of my leadership based communication skills within the overall organisational structure. The implications could be increased satisfaction amongst the team members and fewer numbers of confusions and inquests could be arising from within the teams. One definite indication could be the measure of time which could be curtailed in terms of project completion.
• Performed revision has been undertaken through the inclusion of the clause of utilisation of e-mails through which the key points of work assignment reports could be forwarded to the team members while assigning them with new responsibilities regarding new clientele or project initiation. This revision has been formulated as response to all of the recommendations since such written format of communications is meant to be achieving the following:
• Provide the opportunity for team members to give effective feedback through return mails on the points which they could consider to be significant.
• Commence work immediately.
• Less time would be required.
• Have the necessary clarification regarding the formal and direct work assignment notifications.
• Flexibility infusion could be undertaken since any further modification or amendment in the task measures along with necessary instructions could be promptly forwarded to the team members in a shared manner.