Effective Leadership in Health and Social Care Teams: A Report

This report delves into the critical role of leadership within health and social care teams. It examines the multifaceted responsibilities of leaders, emphasizing their influence in managing, controlling, and organizing teams to achieve organizational goals. The report explores various leadership roles, including coaching, enhancing team strengths, identifying goals, resolving conflicts, and organizing initiatives. It further analyzes theoretical models like the DISC and GRIP models, which are instrumental in building effective teams. The report also discusses the stages of team development and the appropriate leadership styles for success at each stage. Finally, it offers recommendations for fostering open communication among team members to support overall team development and effectiveness.

Leading teams in health
and social care

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Examine the role of leadership in leading teams.........................................................................1
Theoretical models used while building an effective team..........................................................3
Stages of team development and leadership style to effectively achieve success at each stage..7
Recommendations for open communication amongst team members to support development
of team.........................................................................................................................................9
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Leaders in an organisation are people who are responsible to manage, control and
organise a group of people often known as a team. When taking health and social care sector into
consideration it is necessary that the leaders are working through different stages while
managing a team so that they are successfully achieving the required goals and objectives for the
team. The following report consists of various roles and functions of a team leader that are to be
fulfilled by them while they are leading a team (Heyden, Doorn and Reimer, 2018). They are
also required to work use different team development theories effectively as mentioned in the
report. The report also explains various ways through which the team leader is leading a team in
different stages. At the end some recommendations are also provided for team leader which will
enable them to successfully manage open communication within team.
MAIN BODY
Examine the role of leadership in leading teams.
Leader play very crucial and important role that is significant for successfully or effectively
conducting required practices. Leader can be describe as the person who have potential and
capability to influence other people in significant manner to carry out practices in require way. A
Leader is somebody who can perceive how things can be improved and who rallies individuals to
push toward that better vision. Leader can run after creation their vision a reality while putting
individuals first. Simply having the option to propel individuals isn't sufficient and leader should
be compassionate and associate with individuals to be fruitful. Leader s don't need to come from
a similar foundation or follow a similar way. Future leaders will really be more assorted, which
brings an assortment of viewpoints. It is very important that leader have required skills set and
capabilities to conduct leadership practices in significant manner (Gilstrap, 2019). This will help
in providing assistance to employees who are performing practices in health care and social care
practices. There are different roles of leader that should be significant played by leader in order
1

to enhance the overall performance or capabilities of employees. Several roles of leader in order
to lead a team is mention below – Coach team members – the major role of leader in order to build a team is to provide
guidance and direction to conducting practices. Leader will provide assistance to
individual employees by performing the role of mentor or coach. A powerful group
leader mentors individuals on accomplishing objectives and creating essential aptitudes
that get results. Instructing includes creating colleagues' exhibition, offering criticism and
showing the ideal abilities and expected hard working attitude. A mentor style group
leader works close by its individuals to build up their abilities. The colleagues should
have the option to pick up from the group chief's ability and mentorship. He should
remain by his group consistently. At the point when a group performs well, the credit
goes to the group chief, also now and again when the group neglects to proceed according
to the desires for other people, don't attempt to play safe. Enhance strength of team and overcome weakness – Leader needs to enhance the
overall strength of team as well as minimize the weakness. It is essential that leader is
conducting their role in significant manner by increasing the strength of individual team
member along with reducing the weakness of employees so that they could successfully
and effectively perform the task of business. It is likewise the obligation of the group
chief to distinguish the group's qualities and shortcomings (Rapp and et. al., 2016). By
figuring out which colleague dominates at which task, you can appoint the necessary
errands to the suitable individual. It's likewise useful to decide regions of chance and the
fitting strides to enhance them. With in health and social care practices it is crucial that
all employees are conducting business practices significantly as well as enhancing the
strength of each employees. this is important role of a team in order to build or develop
team member along with influencing overall performance. Identify goals of team – It is crucial role of a leader to correctly identify and determine
the goals of team. This role of leaders helps employees and team member to successfully
conducting business practices. As through this role, leader is able to provide proper
guidance and direction to employees for successfully or effectively conducting business
practices. To quantify group achievement, it's critical to recognize what achievement
implies. Assessing objectives and deciding how the group will quantify achievement can
2

forestall miscommunication (Hong and et. al., 2019). This additionally gives colleagues
an away from of what they are required to finish. Defining clear group objectives and
assessing progress en route permits groups to work cooperatively. Through defining clear
goals, leader is able to manage the performance of employees and carry out business
practices significantly. Resolve conflicts – There are different issues and problems occurs within organisation
that will lead to have affect the overall performance. It is important role of leader to
resolve the conflicts as well as minimize the issues in order to correctly carry out
business practices. Since groups are comprised of various characters, work characteristics
and inspirations, strife can now and again happen (Kang and Yang, 2020). The group
chief is liable for forestalling struggle where conceivable and settling it when it emerges.
By setting standard procedures and plainly relegating undertakings, you can forestall
numerous wellsprings of contention. In the event that you notice struggle, it is ideal to
determine it before it raises. Meeting with both colleagues can give you knowledge into
the reason for the issue. Meeting with the individuals as a group can offer everybody the
chance to concoct an answer that works for the two sides. Issues may manifest whenever
in the group. The leader must be effectively accessible to his group. The colleague ought
to have the freedom to approach his guide at whatever point he can't take a choice all
alone. The colleagues should have the option to count on their chief whenever without
the dread of getting reprimanded.
 Organize team initiatives – This role of a leader is related to the initiative consider by
leader in order to successfully or effectively performing business practices. In this main
role of a leader is to organize team initiatives along with provide guidance to employees
for successfully performing business practice. Association is essential when there are
various colleagues taking a shot at a solitary objective (Rong, Yang and Ma, 2017).
Singular undertakings, objectives, interchanges and significant records ought to stay clear
and open. It is the duty of the group chief to put together group gatherings, subjects of
conversation and progress toward the objective.
Theoretical models used while building an effective team
There are a number of models that are used by leader in order to successfully build a team. They
can use some of these model in order to make sure that an effective team is developed. The
3

leaders in social and health care are also using these models. The models can be successfully
applied on each sector or industry in order to develop and form an effective team. Some of such
models that can be used by health and social care are mentioned below:
DISC Model
This is a model which was developed by Dr. William Moulton Marston in the year 1928.
It is an effective model that is used by the leaders in order to deal with various conflicts that are
taking place in management (Wong, 2018). They are required to predict various behaviours of
personality traits in an individual. Basic four traits that are taken into consideration in this theory
are Dominance, Inducements, Submission and Compliance. These four traits are continuously
changing over the years. In present time the four skills include Dominance, Influence/ inspiring,
Steadiness/Supportive and Compliance/ Conscientiousness. This theory is used by industry in
professional context which makes it best to be used in social and health care context. Below
mentioned is a description of all these four characteristics;
Dominance: These consists of people in a team who are direct, ego-driven, risk-taker, problem-
solver and decisive in nature. It is required by these individuals to make sure that they are
successfully motivated by a team leader in health and social care (Zhang, Wang and Zhang,
4

2018). When providing health care to patients the individuals need to take quick decisions and
this trait of people is a helpful trait that will help individuals to successfully deal with such
problems arising in their work. These people in a team have a number of different strengths such
as they are time manager as well as good organisers. They are also helping team in bringing
innovation. Whereas it is required by leader to manage various weaknesses of these individuals
as well. These individuals may often be authoritative and argumentative (Yang and Lin, 2020).
They may disrespect others in team and can also act stubborn at various instances. All this is to
be managed well by a leader while forming a team and dealing with dominant people.
Inspiring/Influential: These are those people in a team who are often enthusiastic, trusting,
impulsive, charismatic, emotional, optimistic and persuasive in nature. The leader in health and
social care need to make sure that people with these personalities in a group are maintained as
they make sure that positive and health working environment is maintained within the team.
They are also very emotional in nature and they can deal with patients as well as their families
well while they are providing health care facilities to them. They are great negotiator and peace
maker which is one of their major strengths. They can also help in successfully motivating others
in a team which is a great benefit for the organisation. However it is also necessary for a leader
in a team to face various challenges that come while managing such people which include the
lack of attention they are paying to little details. It is often seen that such people forget to focus
upon small things and due to this they cannot successfully attain all the objectives. A leader in
health and social care system needs to make sure that the team members with impulsive nature
are asked to focus upon the minor details successfully.
Steady/Supportive: These are the people in a group or team who have the major characteristics
of being friendly, reliable, team player and empathetic. Every team requires such members who
can successfully achieve the team goals with peace and harmony. It is necessary that these
people are encouraged in a team who are bringing the team together and building a friendly
environment in the team (Marrone, Ferraro and Huston, 2018). Some of major strengths that
health and social care teams can draw out from these members are that they are very loyal and
dependable. While dealing in healthcare system it is required that team members are loyal to
their leaders ad have patience as well as empathy. The team members with such characteristics
are successfully helping team leaders to deal with various problems as they arise, however, the
leaders are required to deal with the sensitivity of these members.
5

Cautious/Conscientious/Complaint: These are the members in a team who have a quality or
characteristics that is enabling them to work precisely and accurately. These members are
successfully working to provide the organisation which logics and system. Leaders in health and
social care can take help from them to collect various research and solutions (Chan and et. al.,
2017). However, some of these are finding it difficult to deal with criticism.
GRIP Model
This model was developed by Richard Beckhard's in 1972. This includes of four different
elements for maintaining effective networks that are mentioned below:
Goals: The leaders in health and social care are required to communicate the goals and
objectives of team successfully to the team members. It is necessary that everyone in team is
aware about goals and working successfully to fulfil all the required goals of team.
6

Roles: It is required by the team leader to successfully distribute various roles amongst various
members in a team. It is enabling the team to perform well and there are no confusion between
the tasks that re to be performed by different team members.
Interpersonal: It is the duty of leader in a team to effectively make quality communication
within a team. Using the ways to develop quality communication leaders in health and social
care can successfully develop a team that is effective enough to complete the project or task that
is allotted to them.
Processes: The leader in health and social care is required to successfully design a proper system
and path which will help in solving various problems or the conflicts that are faced by leaders
while they are managing a team in health and social care (Wong and et. al., 2019).
Stages of team development and leadership style to effectively achieve success at each stage
A team in an organisation is developed through a number of different stages. It is the duty of
leader in an organisation to deal with various challenges that are coming their way while they are
dealing with a team. According to the Tuckman's team development model there are five
different stages of team development. The theory was developed by Bruce Tuckman in year 965.
the leaders in health and social care organisation can also deal with various challenges coming
their way while the team goes through all of these stages as mentioned below:
Forming Stage: It is the first stage where every member of team have started communicating
with others. They are successfully developing various relationship within team and getting to
know each other better that is necessary for the team members. Various information that is to be
communicated by leader at this stage includes sharing the guidelines, aims, experiences as well
as expectations of various members in the team. In the health and social care leaders are often
also working upon various activities in order to successfully develop a team and work on the
forming stage of a team successfully. The leaders are also using the following stage as an
orientation stage at a personal and professional level. In health care organisations t becomes
necessary for a leader to make sure that they are successfully developing various guidelines and
boundaries for various team members.
Storming Stage: The following stage is often characterised to be a stage where conflicts are
arising between the team members. It is necessary that all the member are successfully working
together and getting to know each other better. Often at this stage there are a number of conflicts
taking place between different group members. The reason for this is the differences they are
7

identifying due to cultural barriers (Castellani and et. al., 2019). At this stage team members are
also learning about expertise, skills, strengths and weaknesses of each other. In order to take a
roles in team it is necessary that all these features are analysed in every team member. It is
necessary that maximum utilisation of team members is made and no resources are wasted in the
process. It is one of the important stage in team development which is forming a basis for other
stages for further development.
Norming Stage: This is a stage where leaders in team have to work hard and make sure that
whatever confusion and conflicts that have raised in the team are successfully dealt with. It is
required that all the members in health and social care are now working in harmony in the group.
In order to successfully develop it the leaders are also required to provide open communication
to all the members in a team. It is also required that any role conflicts among team members is
solved by the leader and leader is working on providing various roles and duties to all the
member sin a team. Along with tasks all the members are also provided with various
responsibilities and the team members will then be responsible for the tasks that they are
undertaking. There are a number of problems in health and social care that are arising at this
stage. It is the duty of team leader to talk to all the team members and make sure that all their
problem are looked into and solved properly (Newman and et. al., 2019). Problems at this stage
are also arising due to not fully understanding various goals and objectives, roles of team
members and the expectations within the team.
Performing Stage: This is the stage where every member in the team is working towards the
tasks they have been assigned. It is necessary for them to make sure that they are successfully
fulfilling all the requirements and their duties within the team. It is necessary that the individuals
are working independently and fulfilling all their needs within the team. Often they may require
some help and support. It is the duty and responsibility of leaders to successfully provide the
individuals with the support they require. All these steps are necessary in order to make sure that
the proper aim and objective for which the team is formed is achieved successfully. In health
care and social care organisations the leaders are responsible to continuously keep a check on the
various tasks and activities which are performed by their team members. It is necessary for them
to make sure that performance management of employees is helping to achieve the best quality
of work.
8

Adjourning stage: The adjourning stage is last stage in the team development process. It is often
seen that teams are not permanent in nature (Keller, 2017). A team is formed for a limited period
of time and after the formation of team all the members are getting back to their original roles
and duties. It is necessary by the team leaders to make sure that the team members are
successfully meeting their requirements within the team and then going back to their required
field. There is a lot of hard work that goes into fulfilment of various tasks in the team. It is
necessary that the team members are appreciated by the leader. In health and social care the
leader is often praising the good work of team members that have gone into the team. This will
successfully motivate the team members and the team members can adjourn being satisfied from
the work and the result they have obtained through the work they have performed.
With the help of above information it can be understood that there are a number of
different problems that are faced by a team leader within an organisation while various stages of
team development. It is the duty of team leader in health and social care organisations to
successfully take required steps to deal with these problems and lead the tea towards success.
Recommendations for open communication amongst team members to support development of
team.
Team leader plays an important role to manage a team to achieve various tasks. Team
leader are required to review communication from time to time. Open communication helps to
make strong relationships amongst team members (Gazit and Bronstein, 2020). Team leader
always try to make effective communication among team members so that smooth flow of work
can be maintained within the team. This process helps team members in understanding each
other well. Effective communication helps the employees to complete all the tasks assigned to
them in the best quality possible and in the time allotted to them. Below mentioned are some of
the steps that can be followed by the leader in order to make sure that they are successfully
managing and maintaining open communication between team members:
Open- Door Policy - Open door policy helps to build trust among team. In this policy,
anyone is able to ask questions and also able to give ideas. This policy indicates that team leader
is open to employees questions, their complaints and to get their suggestions. This way
employees feel like they are communicating with seniors. It help to improve individuals work.
This is also helping in generating a sense of belongingness amongst employees. The team
9

members are successfully working towards their goal if they are feeling valued at the
organisation. These are various steps that can be successfully taken by leader, which will allow
him to manage open communication within team members (Siems and et. al., 2017). Along with
this they can also successfully enable team members to fulfil all their goals and objectives.
Open to Reciprocal feedback -This feedback is constructive in manner and everyone can
learn from it. Everyone is not perfect. So constructive criticism help to improve their thinking
process. Feedback may be positive or negative. But team leader need to understand to solve all
complaints related to staff. Reciprocal feedback helps to make a better workplace and helps to
get good results in the future. It is an effective step that will help the team leader in health care
sector to establish open communication within the organisation. It is the duty of leader to make
sure that the feedback provided by team and to the different team members are taken positively.
It will allow them to establish open communication and avoid any kind of conflicts of grievances
between the employees. Also through providing feedbacks improvisation in performance of both
team members and the team leader is seen. It will ultimately help in development of team and
also enhance productivity of team.
Clear tasks and roles distribution: The leader in organisation is required to make sure
that tasks division between various members is clear. It is a great way to bring in communication
amongst the group. When every team member is known about the roles and responsibilities they
can successfully communicate with the person who is responsible for certain tasks rather than
going to someone else (Yuan and Lo, 2018). These are various ways which are helping the
leaders in health and social care to establish open communication between various members in a
team. When all the team members are well aware of their roles in team they will also understand
their superiors and can identify the person they are responsible to respond to. It is of great help
for the leaders as they can start open communication within the team without having to guide the
members in team again and again.
Transparency: It is one of the major step that is required to be taken by a leader within a
team in order to make sure that all the team members are communicating well. It is often seen
that the major decisions in team are handed over to the leader. Also the leader is not informing
the team members about the various decisions which are taken by them. Due to this the team
member cannot trust leaders and do not communicate openly. If trust of team members is built
by the team leader through maintaining transparency the members can trust the team leaders and
10

effectively communicate within the team. In this way it is necessary for the team leader to
develop transparency of decision making and various steps that are taken within a team. This will
bring motivation and encouragement in employees as well. Through this the employees can
successfully develop and come up with various new and creative ideas for the team development.
CONCLUSION
With the help of the above mentioned report it can be clearly analysed that there are a
number of important roles and functions of leaders in a team. It is the duty of leaders in an
organisation to make sure that all the members are successfully performing the tasks they are
assigned and meeting the requirements they are to fulfil for the organisation. In order to do so
there are various models such as GRIP model, DISC model and Tuckman's team development
theories that are adopted by leaders to manage team in an organisation. The leaders are also
required to maintain open communication within a team. In order to successfully maintain this
communication team leaders are establishing roles and responsibilities within team members.
They are also responsible to develop transparency and open door policies to accept feedbacks
from employees which will enable them to manage open communication with a team.
11

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Gazit, T. and Bronstein, J., 2020. An exploration of the leadership strategies of Facebook
community leaders. Online Information Review.
Siems, A. and et. al., 2017. Improving pediatric rapid response team performance through crew
resource management training of team leaders. Hospital pediatrics, 7(2), pp.88-95.
Yuan, C.C. and Lo, S.H., 2018. Relationship among team temporal leadership, competency,
followership, and performance in taiwanese pharmaceutical industry leaders and
employees. Journal of Career Development, 45(3), pp.227-238.
Chan, W.C. And et. al., 2017. Open innovation and team leaders’ innovation traits. Engineering
Management Journal, 29(2), pp.87-98.
Zhang, J., Wang, Y. and Zhang, M.Y., 2018. Team leaders matter in knowledge sharing: A
cross-level analysis of the interplay between leaders’ and members’ goal orientations
in the chinese context. Management and Organization Review, 14(4), pp.715-745.
Newman, T.J. And et. al., 2019. Developing sport team captains as formal leaders. Journal of
Sport Psychology in Action, 10(3), pp.137-150.
Keller, R.T., 2017. A longitudinal study of the individual characteristics of effective R&D
project team leaders. R&D Management, 47(5), pp.741-754.
Castellani, P. and et. al., 2019. Tacit knowledge sharing in knowledge-intensive firms: the
perceptions of team members and team leaders. Review of Managerial Science, pp.1-
31.
Wong, A. and et. al., 2019. Ethical leaders manage conflict to develop trust. Leadership &
Organization Development Journal.
Marrone, J.A., Ferraro, H.S. and Huston, T., 2018. A Theoretical Approach to Female Team
Leaders’ Boundary Work Choices. Group & Organization Management, 43(5),
pp.825-856.
Yang, R.M. and Lin, Y., 2020. How Paradoxical Leaders Influence Team Creativity in
Ambidextrous Environment: The Role of Group Harmony. In Academy of
Management Proceedings (Vol. 2020, No. 1, p. 12533). Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510:
Academy of Management.
Rong, Y., Yang, B. and Ma, L., 2017. Leaders' sense of power and team performance: a
moderated mediation model. Social Behavior and Personality: an international
journal, 45(4), pp.641-656.
Hong, Z.J. And et. al., 2019. Experienced trauma team leaders save the lives of multiple-trauma
patients with severe head injuries. Surgery today, 49(3), pp.261-267.
Wong, Z., 2018. The Eight Essential People Skills for Project Management: Solving the Most
Common People Problems for Team Leaders. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.
Kang, S. and Yang, R.M., 2020. Are We All in the Same Boat? Congruence Effects of HPWS
for Leaders and Followers. In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol. 2020, No.
1, p. 18960). Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management.
Rapp, T.L. And et. al., 2016. Leading empowered teams: An examination of the role of external
team leaders and team coaches. The Leadership Quarterly, 27(1), pp.109-123.
Gilstrap, C., 2019. Exploring m-leader affordances: team leaders and mobile technologies. Team
Performance Management: An International Journal.
12

Heyden, M., Doorn, S. and Reimer, M., 2018. Unpacking Functional Experience
Complementarities in Senior Leaders’ Influences on CSR Strategy: A CEO–Top
Management Team Approach.
13