Transformative Leadership Styles for J&J Furnishings Limited

This article discusses the appropriate leadership style for J&J Furnishings Limited, which is a combination of transformative and participative leadership styles. It also provides insights on how to motivate and influence the project team and the steps project managers should take to alleviate challenges before they devastate the organizational environment.

Running head: TRANSFORMATIVE LEADERSHIP STYLES
Transforming and Leading Teams
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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Answer A:
The most appropriate leadership style which J&J Furnishings Limited can use is a
combination of participative and transformative leadership styles. This is because the given case
study J&J Furnishings is undergoing a total transformation and up gradation of its modus
operandi to streamline it with the market to a greater extent. The furnishing house has set
particular goals which wants to achieve in order to achieve this streamlining of business and
higher market competitiveness. The first goal which the furnishing house has to achieve ins
sustainability in its operations by introducing furniture from recycled wood and develop a tree
planting initiative to replenish the trees harvested for timber (Kerzner & Kerzner, 2017). The
project also include restructuring of logistics systems to reduce consumption of coal and petrol,
thus causing less pollution. The second project includes advancement of the software system and
launch of social media marketing. The second project also includes relocating employees
towards areas where there are shortage of employees. The third project included launching of
new lines of furniture in response to the newly involving market demands. The project also
includes expansion of manufacturing facilities to manufacture new lines of furniture. The
analysis of the three projects would would reveal certain salient features (Larson & Gray, 2015).
The first project requires achievement of high grade of sustainability without
compromising on quantity and profits. In fact, the project furnishing house is launching a range
of pool and outdoor furniture models aiming the upper class and middle class customers. Thus,
the public limited company is aiming to achieve profitability and sustainability simultaneously,
both of which require huge capital investment. The firm is a public limited company domiciled
in Australia. This means it has to obtain support of the investors by involving them in the
process. Similarly, the firm would need to acquire support of the customers to persuade them to

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use furniture made from recycled wood (Harrison & Lock, 2017). The firm is also required to
restructure its supply chain management and persuade suppliers to supply recycled wood. The
company also requires training its employees to operate in these areas. Thus, it is clear from here
that J&J Furnishings is transforming its manufacturing towards innovative and sustainability.
This means the company has to adopt transformative leadership to bring about this
transformation. A salient feature of transformative leadership style is that, it requires
participation of a committed team of followers who execute the strategies of the transformative
leader. It is clearly shows that the company requires cooperation and support of both internal
stakeholders and external stakeholders (Marchewka, 2014). Thus, the, here the management
needs to apply participative leadership style. Thus, it can be pointed out clearly that the
appropriate style of leadership that J&J Furnishings can use is a combination of transformative
and participative leadership styles as it is evident that none of the styles alone are sufficient to
propel the company in its first project.
The second project would require advancement of the entire software system right from
inventory to supply chain management. The management amalgamated the plan to launch social
media marketing with this up gradation. It clearly means that the company is transforming its
entire resource management and marketing strategy. This requires transformation leadership
skills. However, transformation leadership skills alone cannot help the management of J&J
achieve it’s the goals of the second project (Walker, 2015). For example, in order to launch the
social media page, the marketing department, technological department, finance department and
several other related departments need to participate. Similarly, advancement of the software
would require integration of departments like supply chain management and technical
departments. Further, such advancements might have temporary effect on the productivity of the

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company which means it would result in falling of the profits. This means the company on
temporary basis would have to pay the investors less return on investments. Thus, the company
needs to obtain the consent of the investors. This clearly shows, just like the first project goal, the
company would require to obtain participation of internal and external stakeholders. Thus, once
again the company needs to combine both transformative and participative leadership style.
The third project goal aims to achieve commencement of simultaneous projects to
introduce new products and expand its manufacturing facilities in tune with those products. This
objective can be considered extension of the previous two objective which is more concerned
about the manufacturing process advancement of J&J. Thus, once again it would require use of
innovation in product manufacturing once again inviting participation different departments like
finance and technological department (Nicholas & Steyn, 2017). Thus, again, the company
needs to combine the two leadership styles. Thus, it can finally be decided after the
discussion that the most appropriate style of leadership which J&J should apply is a
combination of transformative and participative leadership styles.
Answer B:
The project should use several tools and techniques to influence and motivate the team of
forty member under him. The first project requires the company to shift towards use of recycled
wood to make furniture and launch new style outdoor furniture. The project manager here should
first communicate with the marketing department and obtain its support in promoting use of
recycled wood. This would create market for furniture made from recycled wood and the
customers would place orders from these models of furniture. This marketing activities would
create customer support form furniture made from recycled wood which would in turn motivate

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the project team, thus influencing their performance positively. Thus, here the project manager
should use promotion as tool to motivate the project team (Heagney, 2016).
The second project speaks about software up gradation and launching of social media
launching handle of J&J Furnishings. The project manager can use techniques like just in time to
order inventory. This would ensure that the firm orders stock of raw materials in appropriate time
and quantity to ensure interrupted production. Similarly, this would ensure that J&J maintain
liquidity of its working capital and deliver products to clients on time. This facilitation of smooth
production facilities would motivate the project team to achieve higher levels of productivity.
The third project requires J&J to manufacture new products and expand its manufacturing
facilities simultaneously. Thus, here project manager can use training of the project team staffs to
increase their skills and expertise, thus positive influencing their performances (Binder, 2016).
Answer C:
Part 1: Influence the team:
The project manager should use legitimate power to influence positive behavior in the
team. The project manager should use the power he is entitled to by the virtue of being the
project manager to lead the team of project personnel. He should not use coercion and reward to
lead the team. This is because, use of coercion to lead the team would create a situation of
tension and insecurity in the team which would have negative impact on their performances.
Again, use of reward power would have limited power. As discussed in the case given, J&J
Furnishings has adopted three projects (Gilbert et al. 2015). The first project aims to achieve
sustainability, the second project aims to achieve advancement of software whereas the third
aims to achieve NPD and manufacturing facility advancement. The explanation clearly mentions

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that the project manager needs to collaborate with other departments like finance and marketing.
Thus, the manager should use legitimate power to motivate the team members and boost their
performance.
Part 2: Motivate team members to work collaboratively:
The project manager should use expert power to motivate team members to work
collaboratively. The three projects require the project manager and his team of forty project staff
to collaborate with other departments like marketing, finance and technological department. This
shows that the project manager needs to display and use knowledge in diverse areas like finance
and marketing. The first project would require the project team to collaborate with the marketing
team and research and development team to develop new sustainability based products and
market them. The next project would involve advancement of technology at the J&J which
would require the project team to coordinate with the technological and marketing team. The
third project would require the project team to work closely with the manufacturing and
marketing department (Siebdrat, Hoegl & Ernst, 2014).This shows that during commencement of
all these three projects, the project manager requires to exhibit his knowledge and experience in
guiding his team in collaborating with all these departments. Thus, it can be justified that while
motivating the project team to work collaboratively with different departments, the project
manager should use expert power.
Part 3: Influencing success of the project:
The project manager should use this referral power to influence the success of the project.
The first project would require the project management team to aim to adopt sustainable methods
of production and marketing of new wooden furniture models. The second project revolves
around launching of marketing activities on social networking platform and advancement of

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technology. The third project would require NPD and advancement of manufacturing process.
This means the project manager would require to lead his team collaborate with different
departments like finance and marketing (Roy, Dan & Modak, 2018). The project would be
required to use his referral power over here to lead his team. His professional rapport and
understand with the departmental heads and managers of other departments would enable him to
gain more support from other departments. This would ensure higher degree of success for the
project.
Answer D:
The following are the steps the project managers should take to alleviate challenges
before they devastate the organizational environment:
Recognize the challenge and address them:
The project manager should recognize and address the challenges to the project
department. He instead of coercing his team to face the challenges must recognize the challenges
and the potential damage they can do to the organizational culture (Eng & Ozdemir, 2014).
Consult other departments:
The project manager should address the problem and consult other departments if he
perceives that the challenge cannot be faced by the project team alone. For example, launching
of recycled wood furniture would first require demand creation for the product in the market
which is a challenge for the project management team. The project manager must consult and
collaborate with the marketing department to promote the product in the market to create
demand. Thus, if required the project manager should seek cooperation of other departments to
face challenges (Anderson, 2010).

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Train the employees and empower them:
The project manager should train and empower the employees to enable them to face
challenges better. This would enable the team to handle challenges and take advantage of them
instead.
References:
Anderson, B. (2010). Project leadership and the art of managing relationships. American Society
for Training and Development, 64(3), 58-63.
Binder, J. (2016). Global project management: communication, collaboration and management
across borders. Routledge.
Eng, T. Y., & Ozdemir, S. (2014). International R&D partnerships and intrafirm R&D–
marketing–production integration of manufacturing firms in emerging
economies. Industrial Marketing Management, 43(1), 32-44.
Gilbert, Y. S., Medney, H. R., Mazzotta, S. G., Wu, C., & Drake, W. (2015). U.S. Patent No.
9,189,756. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Harrison, F., & Lock, D. (2017). Advanced project management: a structured approach.
Routledge.
Heagney, J. (2016). Fundamentals of project management. Amacom.
Kerzner, H., & Kerzner, H. R. (2017). Project management: a systems approach to planning,
scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Larson, E. W., & Gray, C. F. (2015). A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge:
PMBOK (®) Guide. Project Management Institute.

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Marchewka, J. T. (2014). Information technology project management. John Wiley & Sons.
Nicholas, J. M., & Steyn, H. (2017). Project management for engineering, business and
technology. Routledge.
Roy, S., Dan, P., & Modak, N. (2018). Effect of teamwork culture on NPD team’s capability in
Indian engineering manufacturing sector. Management Science Letters, 8(7), 767-784.
Siebdrat, F., Hoegl, M., & Ernst, H. (2014). Subjective distance and team collaboration in
distributed teams. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 31(4), 765-779.
Walker, A. (2015). Project management in construction. John Wiley & Sons.