Leadership Theories and Organisational Culture at Google

This project examines various leadership theories and their evaluation, as well as the analysis of organisational culture and diversity policies at Google.

Leading People

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
Leadership...................................................................................................................................1
Organisational culture at Google................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Leadership is a procedure of societal impact, which enlarge the attempt of opposite sides
towards the accomplishment of a communal goal. It is about determining people by what has
been said and what can be done by individuals. Superior quality leadership is influencing
someone to do something well or improved. Leadership is about to influence others to be at their
best they can be. This project will study about the leadership theories and their critical
evaluation with respect to different leadership styles and approaches. In addition to the
leadership styles, this project will also highlight the analysis of organizational culture and
diversity policies in the company with respect to its leadership approaches (Naimi, 2020).
Leadership
Leadership is an activity by which an administrator can direct, escort and impact the
behaviour and activity of others towards the accomplishment of a common goal towards the
organization (Fiaz, 2017). With the help of effective leadership, managers are able to stimulate
the quality to work with full confidence and passion into the subordinates. It defines the
capability to influence a group of peoples towards the realization of a common objective. A
person become a good leader by applying leadership theories at their workplace. Leadership
theories are educational institution of thoughts brought progressive to justify how and why
certain independent become leaders (Gandolfi, 2018). Key leadership theories includes:
 Great man theory: This theory explains that the ability to lead is intrinsic, which
describes that leaders are born by birth not made. Leaders who are born with just the
right attribute and quality for directing which includes intelligence, personal magnetism,
communication ability and societal skills. For instance, the Mark Zuckerberg is
considered a leader with analytical quality because he has built one of the galactic and
successful worldwide social group networks by being a college quitter.
 Trait theory: This theory is quite similar to the great man theory. It is completely
dependent on the characteristics of both successful and unsuccessful leaders. This theory
basically focus on phycological dimension such as visual aspects, demographics and
ability.
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 Contingency theory: This leadership style is supported on the rule that no one
leadership style is relevant to all situations. The best kind of leadership is one that finds
perfect equilibrium between action, necessity and linguistic context among individuals.
Good leaders are those who are able to measure the inevitability of their followers and
the condition at the right time. For example, Dallas Mavericks is a leader with the
combination of many key variables of leadership styles.
 Situational theory: This theory is similar to the contingency theory as it also suggests
that no particular leadership style replace other. As the name explains that the leadership
style is completely dependent on the situations. The situational theory is the combination
of two main elements i.e. leadership style and followers maturity level. According to this
theory, the leader adopts a particular type of leadership according to the maturity level of
the followers. For instance Mark Zuckerberg is an effective leader adopts leadership
techniques according to their employees and the situations.
 Behavioural theory: In this theory the focus is on the activeness and state of the leaders
instead of attribute or features. Leaders must have basic three skills to lead the followers
or subordinates i.e. technological, human-like and abstract. These three skills includes
the ability of complete knowledge of the process, quality to interact with individuals and
to come in front with the great ideas which helps the organization to run the business
effectively and efficiently.
Leadership can be explained with the help of different leadership styles followed by
individual leaders (Gumusay, 2019). For instance, Mark Zuckerberg adopts the
Transformational leadership style in their actions. He is an aggressive, competitive and inspiring
type of leader who demands continual invention and development from its employees.
Transformational leadership is the most effective style to follow by the leaders to run their
business effectively. The leaders who adopt this style are emotionally strong and intelligent,
energetic and fervent about their work. The leader of the Facebook not only helps the
organization to achieve its goals but also to individuals to achieve its objectives because the
individual goals and objectives are basically fulfilled the overall achievements of the
organization. The CEO of the Facebook is also adopts democratic style in their working style as
it offers guidance to their group members , encourage them to become part of the decisions and
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also became participant in the group decisions. These styles encourage the employees of the
organization to work effectively, sometimes even when the conditions are not favourable for
them then only the employees gives its support to such kind of leaders to accomplish their goals.
As transformational leaders are great motivators and visionaries but it also has some negative
effects such as the influence of the leader may backfire the company or organization which
creates a situation of loss within the company (Ospina, 2017). Sometimes it leads to wrong
decisions because a lot of peoples are involved in the decision-making. It becomes risky for the
organization as well. In such type of leadership styles the changes are never constant which may
sometimes result in disturbance if changes happens too frequently and damaging if the leaders
take unreasonable or unneeded risks.
Another example of a great leader is Mark Cuban who also follows participative
leadership style in their organization. Undoubtedly, this particular style increases the control of
employees. With the help of this style leader increase the productivity of the organization as well
as their employees. A level of motivation has been raised within the company which results in
job satisfaction level of the employees (Rudolph, 2018). With the advantages of this leadership
style, there are some drawbacks which may affect the administration such as name suggests
participation of every possible employee may slow down decision-making. There are some
security issues which also effects badly the image of the organization as the information may
transform and a greater apprehension of information being leaked out. The failure of this
management is to understand that managers sometimes fail to understand that participative
management is not the same as parcel out responsibilities. Sometimes leaders fails to realize that
this style consider the proposition of workers with regard and dignity.
Organisational culture at Google
Google is an American MNC started in 1998. It started as an Internet search engine and has been
delivering services like online advertising, cloud computing, software and hardware.
The organisational culture at Google promotes creativity and innovative techniques in work
force. Since it is a large company it employs a diverse work force across nations. The
organisational culture encompasses these few characteristics:
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a) Suggestions are welcome: The company promotes interaction between the employees and
they are free to voice their opinions on matters concerning decision-making and also which can
support innovation. The company's approach is to spread valuable information which will not
only bring use to the company but also promote openness in the individual minds to interact with
their seniors comfortably (Dirisu and et.al., 2018.).
b) Creativeness: The out of box thinking is promoted in employees as the company deals in an
ever changing atmosphere of information technology. The new solutions help company to stay
as a leader in its field. The company follows a decentralised approach in transmission of ideas
where the novice and experienced can easily put their opinions and converse on decision-making
freely.
c) Striving for excellence: The company rewards employees for excelling in performance of
employees and also performs appraisals timely to motivate the employees. Training is given to
employees to better their performances and find out the specific areas where employees find
interest and excel in the same. Also, this helps in sorting out the problems faced by the
employees and ask questions (Kraśnicka, Głód and Wronka-Pośpiech, 2018).
 Ease of work access: Google has an employee-friendly approach in terms of working.
Employees can log in from place of their own choice where they feel comfortable for e.g.
it may be in the company garden also where employee can use their laptop. This helps in
employees getting to work with a free mind and mobility. This also helps in mind
refreshment and lessen the number of conflicts.
e) Recreational and Refreshment facilities: An employee in Google gets to enjoy refreshments
and meals at a small walking distance whenever they need. The variety of food items offered
just create a pleasant sight for the employees and motivates employees that their care is being
taken. Apart from this, employees are exposed to world class recreational facilities of gym, table
tennis and snooker. Employees can use them between breaks and gear up themselves for the next
task (Dirisu and et.al., 2018.).
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f) Practical application of knowledge: Google focuses on the employees getting a practical
approach in using the training modules for their grasp and success of the training programme.
This helps employees getting their skills brushed up and become confident in their learning and
knowledge base.
The leadership style follows a distributed pattern at Google. It can be said that google follows a
decentralised structure that empowers and encourages employees to share their grievances as
well as ideas. Innovative ideas are taken in consideration and some useful ideas end up being
rewarded too. Some of the leadership features being used in Google are:
a) Supportive approach of Leaders facilitating employees: The employees who have an out
of the box approach and want to try out something new for the company are given
encouragement by the leaders and are provided the resources which are needed for the
innovative approach. There is a hassle free environment in which the employees can directly
approach for any need to the leader instead of following a hierarchy (Dark and et.al., 2017).
b) New ways of rewarding employees: Leaders have made out new ways of appreciating the
efforts of employees like having a dinner with the CEO, composing of a five hour video in
which the employees themselves explain their tasks and the manner in which they achieved
them. The old way of rewarding through financial incentives has also been kept intact.
c) Performance appraisal: The employees at google are free to choose a senior who they think
is impartial and can do an honest appraisal of the employee efforts. This flexibility in leadership
style has an everlasting impact on employee minds where they remain free at their minds that
work done by them will be surely applauded and accounted.
d) Participative approach: The team leaders have a participative approach when the employees
have to face an altogether new task. They not only guide the directions but also delegate a part
of responsibility to themselves as to understand the exact challenges the team is facing. This
motivates employees to give out their best as their leader is available to them any time concerns
come up (Kraśnicka, Głód and Wronka-Pośpiech, 2018).
e) No micromanagement: Employees are left free to manage their own working schedules.
Micro management is not done which eases away the stress of employees and lets them own
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their problems and solve them. Help is certainly provided to come out of these problems as and
when employee needs to.
Diversity Management at Google
Google is widespread over the world across 60 countries with a work force of more than 100000
employees and expanding in 170 cities. This itself shows that they are employing a workforce
which belongs from different nations, having different academic backgrounds and different
cultures. Google has never discriminated in its employees and once they become a part of the
company, they have been treated like part of a family. Google has maintained the women and
men work force ratio balance by giving women equal opportunity to represent company at key
positions. People with disability are also a part of the work force and given responsible
positions. This in fact represents the vision of the company which focuses on a united work
force (Dark and et.al., 2017).
Speaking of the management part, Google's leaders are given the work force data to
manage the diverse team. Apart from this, people managers also remain in touch with diversity
experts of the company to identify the opportunities for the team with an objective to achieve an
inclusive and diverse Google. In addition, activities and events are regularly done at Google
which encourage employees to participate and mingle with each other.
CONCLUSION
It can be said that leadership style preferred in an organisation always has a certain impact on
the organisational culture. Leadership attributes have to be such that they help employees grow
in the organisation.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Chou, C.Y. and Naimi, L.L., 2020. A Discussion of Leadership Theories as they Relate to
Information Systems Leadership. Leadership & Organizational Management Journal.
2020(2). pp.1-10.
Fiaz, M., Su, Q. and Saqib, A., 2017. Leadership styles and employees' motivation: Perspective
from an emerging economy. The Journal of Developing Areas. 51(4). pp.143-156.
Gandolfi, F. and Stone, S., 2018. Leadership, leadership styles, and servant leadership. Journal
of Management Research. 18(4). pp.261-269.
GÜmÜsay, A.A., 2019. Embracing religions in moral theories of leadership. Academy of
Management Perspectives. 33(3). pp.292-306.
Ospina, S.M., 2017. Collective leadership and context in public administration: Bridging public
leadership research and leadership studies. Public Administration Review. 77(2).
pp.275-287.
Rudolph, C.W., Rauvola, R.S. and Zacher, H., 2018. Leadership and generations at work: A
critical review. The Leadership Quarterly. 29(1). pp.44-57.
Dirisu, J. and et.al., 2018. An integrated dataset on organisational culture, job satisfaction and
performance in the hospitality industry. Data in brief, 19, pp.317-321.
Dark, F. and et.al., 2017. The impact of organisational change and fiscal restraint on
organisational culture. International journal of mental health systems, 11(1), p.11.
Kraśnicka, T., Głód, W. and Wronka-Pośpiech, M., 2018. Management innovation, pro-
innovation organisational culture and enterprise performance: testing the mediation
effect. Review of Managerial Science, 12(3), pp.737-769.
Weerts, K., Vermeulen, W. and Witjes, S., 2018. On corporate sustainability integration
research: Analysing corporate leaders' experiences and academic learnings from an
organisational culture perspective. Journal of cleaner production, 203, pp.1201-1215.
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