Dynamic Leadership: Applied Leadership Development Assessment Answer

Introduction:

Leadership is among the prime factors that help organizations to achieve sustainable growth in this competitive market (Zepeda, 2012). I believe effective implementation of leadership style is crucial for the organization to remain competitive in the market. For that reason, I feel that an individual need to go through a systematic procedure in order to gain all the attributes of the leadership style. Thus, I feel that utilization of professional and personal development plan is necessary for the identification of all the strengths and weaknesses as a leader. Now, I believe that self-evaluation is necessary for constructing effective personal and professional development plan. Now, I have already mentioned that I really enjoy the role of a leader, as I feel that I have capability to influence others effectively. I also was very successful as a leader in my school’s soccer team. I feel that it has helped me a lot to recognize my potential as a leader. Presently, I am leading a startup organization that provides cleaning services to the people of my locality. Now, I have already mentioned that I like use democratic leadership style. However, I feel that leadership is an extremely vast concept that requires continues up-gradation. Therefore, I also have to develop personal and professional development plan to improve as a leader.

Personal and professional development plan (PPDP):

As per the article by Waite et al. (2014), development of goals is important in order to improve continuously as a leader. From the personal assessment and feedback from my friend Dora, I have identified many strengths and weaknesses as a leader. Therefore, my PPDP also will have to develop on specific goals that are described as follows:

S-Specific	I have to identify the best possible way to deal with the negativity
M-Measurable	I will have increase my managerial effectiveness by up to 20% as a leader
A-Attainable	I will have to focus more on developing strategies that could motivate all the employees
R-Realistic	I will have to develop strong relationship with all the stakeholders
T-Timely	I will have to give myself 5 years time to grow up as a leader

Table 1: SMART goals

(Source:  As created by the author)

In order to develop my skills as a leader, I will have to develop plan that could help me to fulfill all the goals. As mentioned by my friend Dora, I have not able to deal with the negativity issue effectively. Therefore, I will have to focus on the development of skills that could deal with the negativity in the organization. For that reason, I will have to talk with my subordinates in order to identify the prime reason that is creating negativity in the working environment. Furthermore, I will also have to focus on the development of positive attitude regardless of the situation. From Dora’s feedback, I have identified that dealing with the negativity in the organization is one of the prime leadership gap. As a result, it also has created adverse impact on the effectiveness of my managerial decision-making style. In order to deal with the negativity issue in the organization, I have developed an action plan that is described as follows.

Action plan
	Dealing with the negativity issue
				Start date	End date
		Milestone 1: Identification of prime factors that is creating negativity		2016	2017
			Step 1: I will have to utilize previous data from the organizational history
			Step 2: I will have to conduct an survey for the employees
		Milestone: 2 development of plan for reducing negativity		2018	2019
			Step 1: I will have to focus more on increasing the motivational level of the employees
			Step 2: I will have to create atmosphere where all the employees can create strong bonding among each other
		Milestone: 3 eliminate negativity		2019	2020
			Step 1: My democratic leadership style will have to encourage all the employees to share their thoughts and perspectives
			Step 2: I will have to develop positive working environment for the employees

Table 2: Action plan

(Source: As created by the author)

Thus, it can be assessed that my leadership style has to improve in an effective manner in order to create positive impact on my startup businesses. Therefore, my PPDP will have to focus on covering all the gaps in my leadership style. For instance, Dora has mentioned that I have able to maintain diversified workforce effectively. However, I feel that my leadership style will have to focus more on the maintenance of workforce diversification effectively. Thus, I have to include opinions of all the employees in the decision-making style (Leung, 2015). However, I also have to consider that my organization has able to fulfill all its objectives effectively. For that reason, I believe that it necessary to include model and frameworks regarding the leadership style, as it will definitely help me to grow up as a leader. Now, I also believe that my PPDP plan will have to focus more on the proper evaluation of national and organizational culture. I have identified that culture plays a crucial role in the effectiveness of the leadership style. Now, as I am associated with a startup business, my prime focus is to establish the organization in the Australian market only. Therefore, my PPDP will have to include proper analysis of Australian culture as well as culture of the organizations present in the Australian market.  

Model and framework for leadership development:

As mentioned by Zuber-Skerritt & Louw (2014) implementation of leadership style plays a crucial role in providing organizations competitive advantage in the market. For that reason, I believe it is necessary for the organizations to evaluate all the models and framework in order to implement effective leadership style. I also have to focus on the utilization of leadership models and framework so to cover up all the gaps in my leadership style in an appropriate manner. Furthermore, I feel that leadership style is even more crucial for the startup organizations, as they are expected to face more challenges in proper utilization of the operational processes. I have focused on three models in order to utilize my PPDP effectively. The utilization process of leadership models are as follows:

Leadership or Managerial grids:

As mentioned in the article by Lussier & Achua (2015) managerial grid focuses on the leadership skills in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the leaders. Firstly, it focuses on two factors namely consideration and initiating structure. Now, I have identified that consideration helps to identify relationship behavior among the employees and also the kind of trust they have on each other. Now, as I have identified that I need to work on eliminate the negativity issue from the organization to enhance my managerial effectiveness. I will have to utilize these factors consciously to improve the trust level among the employees. On the other hand, initiating structure focuses on the scheduling and organizing the operational process (Matthews, 2015). Now, Dora has mentioned that I was quite efficient in utilizing my different skills employees effectively. Thus, it actually is reflecting my strengths as a leader (McNamara et al., 2014). Now, other two grids are employee orientation and production orientation. I have already mentioned that I believe in the democratic leadership style. Therefore, my PPDP will have to focus more on the employee orientation perspectives, as it will help me to improve relationship among the employees, which eventually create positive impact on the enhancing my ability to reduce negativity from the workplace.

Four-framework approach: 

As mentioned by Forde et al. (2013) four-framework approach describes four framework including political, structural, human resource and symbolic. It also has mentioned that every leaders operates in one of these four categories. Now, as I am associated with a startup organization, I do not have face too much political, structural or symbolic challenges. Thus, it highlighted the fact that my leadership style will have to focus more on the human resource categories in order to provide competitive advantage to the organizations. Human resource framework leaders perceives that employees communicate regarding to their perspectives and believes (Heaton, 2016). Now, as my PPDP is focuses towards the enhancement of the managerial effectiveness, proper utilization of human resource leadership framework will help me to improve my skill as a democratic leader. Furthermore, I feel that it will also help me to utilize suggestions of the employees in an effective manner, which will create positive impact on the fulfillment of my leadership development plan objectives. I also feel that it will help me to enhance the motivational level of the employees. Therefore, it will to achieve attainable objectives of my personal and professional development plan.

Situational leadership framework:

As per the article by Huffman et al. (2014) situational leadership is based upon two continuums namely arousal and supervision. Thus, I believe it will help me to identify the best possible way to mix these two factors in my leadership style so that it can able to fulfill my leadership gaps. For instance, I will have to evaluate the knowledge and skill level of all the employees. I believe it will help me to determine the required amount of supervision is required to enhance the effectiveness of the operational process at the optimum level. Thus, it will help me to reduce the possibility of miscommunication and lack of coordination at the workplace. Therefore, it will help to develop positive working atmosphere (Carrillo & Chinowsky, 2013). Thus, it eventually will help my leadership style to deal effectively with the negativity.  

Influence of national and organizational cultures and social practices on the current leadership perspectives:

As mentioned in the article by Moore (2014) national and organizational culture is important factors that can create major impact on the effectiveness of the leadership style. For that reason, I believe that analysis of culture will help to achieve my PPDP objectives in an appropriate manner. Now, as I have associated with a startup organization, I will focus only on establishment of the organization within the country firmly. Therefore, I feel that my PPDP will only have to focus on the Australian market and organizational culture. Now, many studies have identified that Australian business culture is very straightforward (Pedler, Burgoyne & Boydell, 2013). Therefore, my PPDP plan will have to include utilization of clear communication technique. Furthermore, I also have to maintain punctuality so that it can able to create a positive vibe in the organization. I have also identified that present Australian business culture is focusing more on the maintenance of social responsibility. For that reason, my PPDP will have to focus on the effective utilization of CSR strategies so that it can able to gain competitive advantage in the market. I also feel that maintenance of CSR can create positive working environment. Therefore, it can create positive impact on the elimination of negativity from the workplace. Many studies have mentioned that Australia utilize collaborative business culture (Bolea & Atwater, 2014). As a result, it usually takes more time in implementing any decision. Therefore, I believe it will help me to utilize democratic leadership style effectively. I also feel that it will provide me enough opportunity to consider opinion of all the employees before implementing any decision. Thus, it helps to create positive impact on the effectiveness of the leadership development perspectives (Fullan, 2014). I think that effective evaluation of Australian culture will help me to develop skills in maintaining proper relationship with all the stakeholders of the organization. Thus, it will help to fulfill the attainable PPDP objective (Joyce, 2015).

Conclusion:

The above analysis highlighted the fact that leadership development heavily depends on many factors that organizations will have to utilize effectively. Thus, I believe proper utilization of PPDP requires in-depth knowledge about several perspectives of leadership. Firstly, it will have to evaluate strengths and weakness of an individual as a leader. Then it will have to develop a plan that can counter all the weaknesses of a leader in en effective manner. Thus, it requires implementation of systemic procedure. Now, I have just started as a leader, for that reason I have consider a five year time for the effective utilization of PPDP to eliminate all the negatives aspects from my leadership style.

References:

Bolea, A., & Atwater, L. (2014). Applied Leadership Development: From Conceptual to Personal: Nine Elements of Leadership Mastery. Routledge.

Carrillo, P., & Chinowsky, P. (2013). Graduate Leadership And Management Education For Professional Development.

Forde, C., McMahon, M., Gronn, P., & Martin, M. (2013). Being a leadership development coach a multi-faceted role. Educational Management Administration & Leadership, 41(1), 105-119.

Fullan, M. (2014). Leading in a culture of change personal action guide and workbook. John Wiley & Sons.

Heaton, T. L. (2016). Handbook of Instructional Leadership.

Huffman, J. B., Hipp, K. A., Pankake, A. M., & Moller, G. (2014). Professional learning communities: Leadership, purposeful decision making, and job-embedded staff development. Jsl Vol 11-N5, 11, 448.

Joyce, P. (2015). Weaving leadership longitudinally: a qualitative study on faculty development.

Leung, L. M. (2015). The construction of student leadership development model in HKIEd: Based on service leadership core beliefs advocated by HKI-SLAM. In Promoting Service Leadership Qualities in University Students (pp. 83-97). Springer Singapore.

Lussier, R. N., & Achua, C. F. (2015). Leadership: Theory, application, & skill development. Nelson Education.

Matthews, M. (2015). Student Leadership Development: A literature review and focus group interview on leadership education.

McNamara, M. S., Fealy, G. M., Casey, M., O'Connor, T., Patton, D., Doyle, L., & Quinlan, C. (2014). Mentoring, coaching and action learning: interventions in a national clinical leadership development programme.Journal of clinical nursing, 23(17-18), 2533-2541.

Moore, S. E. (2014, September). Network Like It's Your Job—Because It Is: 15 Tips for Personal and Professional Growth in 15 Minutes. In STTI Leadership Connection 2014. STTI.

Pedler, M., Burgoyne, J., & Boydell, T. (2013). A Manager's Guide to Self-development. McGraw-Hill Education (UK).

Waite, R., McKinney, N., Smith-Glasgow, M. E., & Meloy, F. A. (2014). The embodiment of authentic leadership. Journal of Professional Nursing, 30(4), 282-291.

Zepeda, S. J. (2012). Professional development: What works. Eye on education.

Zuber-Skerritt, O., & Louw, I. (2014). Academic leadership development programs: a model for sustained institutional change. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 27(6), 1008-1024.