Barclays Bank Leadership and Management

This assignment examines the role of leadership and management within Barclays Bank. It explores various theories such as situational, contingent, systems, chaos theory, and management by objectives, analyzing their application in creating a successful work environment and achieving organizational goals.

Human Resource Manager
for Barclays Bank

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
P1. Various roles and characteristics of a manager and leader...................................................1
M1. Differentiation between role and function of a leader and manager...................................3
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................3
P2. Application of role of a leader and function of a manager in various situations..................3
P3. Applying various models and theories including situational leadership..............................4
M2: Strengths and weaknesses of various approaches...............................................................5
D1: Analyse and evaluate various approaches and theories to leadership..................................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7
.........................................................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
Human Resource Management (HRM) plays an important role in achieving success and
growth in an organisation. HR manager is responsible to manage and direct the employees to
achieve organisational goals in an effective and efficient manner by conducting training and
development programs for them. Apart from the manager, leader also plays a crucial role in
supporting employees through motivating them to perform well (Kaynak, Fulmer and Keys,
2013). Main purpose of this project report is to identify the importance of manager and leader in
achieving organisational goals and objectives. Various leadership and management theories
which are helpful in improving the performance of employees are also covered in this report.
''Barclays Plc”, a UK multinational bank which deals in providing financial services is chosen for
the purpose of preparing this project report.
TASK 1
P1. Various roles and characteristics of a manager and leader
Manager is the one who is responsible to delegate roles and responsibilities to their
employees on the basis of their skills and knowledge by which employees can be able to
contribute their maximum efforts in achieving desired goals and objectives. On the other hand
leader also play an important part in achieving desired objectives of an organisation through
motivating employees to work as a team and contribute combined efforts in order to achieve the
best possible outcomes. Therefore, there are different roles and characteristics which the
manager and leader performs:
Role of a Manager:
Formulating effective plans and strategies: In order to achieve the desired targets
company should follow effective plans and policies which are required to be formulated by
managers of Barclays Bank using their knowledge and experience and after analysing working
environment manager should be required to implement such effective pre-determined plans and
policies in order to gain positive results (Hernez-Broome and Boyce, 2010).
Providing training: Employees working in Barclays Bank play an important role in
achieving the desired targets and therefore it is necessary for company to improve their skills and
knowledge to perform well. The manager is held responsible to conduct such development
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programs for them after analysing their actual performance which help them to know about their
strengths and weaknesses and accordingly plan training programs.
Monitoring and controlling: Manager is only a person who is liable to give answer to
top authority if performance of company falls. So the manager is required to monitor and control
all business activities in order to achieve expected result.
Role of a Leader:
Building team: If the employees work together and give their combined efforts in
achieving desired targets of Barclay's Bank then, chances of getting positive result will be more.
Leader is the only one who brings employees together and motivate them to work as a team to
achieve expected results.
Motivator: The employees of Barclays can perform their roles and responsibilities in an
effective and efficient manner only when a leader increase their motivation level through
adopting various techniques (Millar and Poole, 2010).
Supportive: Leader should be supportive in nature through which they can collect
feedback and problems from the employees faces in working environment and accordingly
provide corrective actions to resolve such employee's issues which help employees to perform
their delegated task without any interruptions.
Comparison between manager and leader:
Basis Leader Manager
Meaning It refers to a person who has an ability
to influence their employees to perform
better in order to achieve the desired
target.
It refers to one who formulate
effective plans and strategies that
their employees need to follow
while performing their delegated
tasks.
Subordinate Leader is liable to follow directions
given by the top authority of company.
Manager is an employee of
company who perform their task for
the benefit of company.
Decision Leader only needs to follow the
decisions taken by manager to achieve
set targets.
Manager is responsible to make an
effective decision regarding
achieving set objectives in an
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effective manner.
Risk Leader mainly focuses on applying
various methods and techniques to
minimise the risk at workplace.
Manager is one who takes risk in
order to gain better possible results
in the future.
Approach to
task
He motivates employees to resolve
problems through using their charisma
and commitment.
Manager creates strategies to build
team that helps in getting combined
efforts to achieve the success.
M1. Differentiation between role and function of a leader and manager
Both managers and leaders plays different roles and responsibilities to achieve common
desired goals. Manager is one who makes effective planning, controlling, directing and
monitoring of business activities in order to achieve set objectives. On the other hand leader
perform his roles in form of conducting motivational programs which encourages employees to
work as a team and put combined efforts in achieving target set by the managers of Barclays
Bank (Rogers, 2016).
TASK 2
P2. Application of role of a leader and function of a manager in various situations
The manager and leader of Barclays Bank should perform their roles and responsibilities
in different situation to achieve common desired goals. They both need to put their maximum
efforts while dealing with complex situations arises that arise in working environment which
affect the overall performance of company. Application of role of a leader and function of a
manager are described as follows:
Customers: Customer is one which company target to influence in order to achieve
success. Barclay Bank has an objective to improve the financial health of people living in UK by
providing financial services such as loans, credit cards, investment opportunity etc. Therefore in
order to achieve their objectives the manager need to formulate effective plans and policies
which can easily attract and influence the interest and behaviour of customers to transact with
their bank. For achieving this leader should communicate customers regarding policies of Bank
and motivate them to make transactions with their bank (Aldrich and et. al 2015).
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Employees: It is the one whose contribution make business more successful. As Barclay
bank offers financial services to customers with some terms and conditions therefore it is
important for them to understand plans and policies of Bank and accordingly deals with
customers. For this, the manager need to conduct training and development programs to their
staff members which improves skills and knowledge of employees regarding policies
implemented by manager to achieve set objectives. A leader should also need to direct and
motivate their employees to influence people in order to transact with their bank. The leaders
need to identify the problems and issues that the employees faces and accordingly resolve them
in an effective manner which enable employees to perform their given task.
Society: The society is one who decide the growth of Bank in future period of time.
Therefore it is essential for the bank to implement specific policies for the welfare of the society.
For example providing loan at reasonable rate of interest etc. The manager need to focus on
attracting people of rural as well as urban areas through offering them effective financial services
which will helps in increasing their standard of living (Al-Zayyat and et. al 2010). The leader of
Barclay also need to execute business operations as per ethical and legal norms of society.
P3. Applying various models and theories including situational leadership
There are different approaches and theories which need to be used by Barclays in order
top achieve set objectives. Leader and managers perform their different and crucial role in
enhancing the performance of company. Following are such theories which need to be adopted:
Leadership Theories:
System leadership: This theory is mainly useful for resolving problems and issues that
the employees faces in working environment of company. Any disputed or problems occurred
happened between the employees then it is the liability of leader to resolve it carefully and
effectively without hurting anyone's interest. It will help Barclays in improving its productivity
and create healthy environment at workplace.
Situational theory: It means the leader cannot use single leadership style in every
situation. They need to focus and analyse complex environment carefully and accordingly apply
effective style of leadership which make positive impact on the performance of company. The
leader should have ability to handle such complex situation through adopting different leadership
style in different situations arise at workplace (Afram, 2011).
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Contingency leadership: As the environment exist at workplace is complex and
contingency in nature therefore the leader need to apply effective theory of leadership which is
helpful in resolving critical issues or problems arises at working environment. In this theory
leader need to develop working style which help them in attaining successful goals. Contingency
theory should be selected in order to change the environment where the staff members of
Barclays perform.
Management theory:
Management by objective: This theory is related with defining objectives to members
working in Barclays. It is important for the manager to communicate and inform their members
about their assigned task in order tp achieve desired target. This theory help in creating healthy
work environment by assigning task to their employees according to their skills and knowledge
which brings efficiency in result and improve productivity. This theory help employees to focus
on goals that to be achieved in future in an effective and efficient manner.
Chaos theory: This theory indicates the systematic structure to create healthy work
environment manager need to first identify problem and collect feedback from the employees
and accordingly implement corrective measures in order to overcome such issues. Later on
manager need to analyse whether the solution provided will be effective or not for resolving their
issues. This will help Barclay to achieve desired goals and objectives within limited period of
time without any interruptions (Dalziel, 2014).
M2: Strengths and weaknesses of various approaches
Contingency theory of leadership: Strengths: This theory of leadership help company in facing contingent environment
through adopting various techniques.
 Weaknesses: It becomes difficult for manager analyse working environment due to
complexity. therefore the chance of adopting contingency plan in successful manner will
be low.
System theory of leadership: Strengths: It is helpful in resolving problems and issues the employees faces at
workplace.
 Weaknesses: As this theory is not applicable and effective in all business situations due
to its complexity (Bravo and et. al, 2017).
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Situational theory: Strengths: Through this theory the manager can able to collect feedback and issues and
accordingly conducting training programs for their employees.
 Weaknesses: Lack of flexibility.
D1: Analyse and evaluate various approaches and theories to leadership
There are different management approaches and leadership style which need to be apply
by manager and leader to achieve desired objectives of Barclays in an effective and efficient
manner. Such leadership theories are situational, contingent, system and management theories
are chaos theory and management by objective.
CONCLUSION
As per the above project report it has been concluded that manager and leader play an
important and effective role in success and growth of business. It is important for manager to
implement effective plans and policies which direct the employees to perform better and leader's
efforts of providing motivation to the employees are also helpful in achieving desired objectives
of Barclay. Various leadership and management theory also play an effective role in creating
healthy work environment with the help of which employees contribute more.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Kaynak, E., Fulmer, R. M. and Keys, J. B., 2013. Executive development and organizational
learning for global business. Routledge.
Hernez-Broome, G and Boyce, L. A. Eds., 2010. Advancing executive coaching: Setting the
course for successful leadership coaching (Vol. 29). John Wiley & Sons.
Millar, C and Poole, E. eds., 2010. Ethical leadership: global challenges and perspectives.
Springer.
Rogers, D., 2016. The big four British banks: Organisation, strategy and the future. Springer.
Aldrich, P and et. al 2015. Establishing HR professionals’ influence and credibility: Lessons
from the capital markets and investment banking sector. Human Resource Management,
54(1), pp.105-130.
Al-Zayyat, A. N and et. al 2010. The effect of knowledge management processes on project
management. IBIMA Business Review.
Afram, P. D., 2011. An evaluation of the competitive strategies in the banking industry in
Ghana.: a case study of Barclays bank of Ghana Ltd (Doctoral dissertation).
Dalziel, N., 2014, July. Customer Complaints and Service Recovery on Social Media: An
Investigation into Barclays Bank Facebook Page. In Proceedings of European
Conference on Social Media (ECSM2014) (pp. 111-119).
Bravo, R and et. al, 2017. Managing brand identity: effects on the employees.International
Journal of Bank Marketing, 35(1), pp.2-23.
Online
Leadership theories. 2017 [Online]. Available through: . <http://www.vbsl.co.nz/leadership-
theories/>.
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