Analysis of Leadership Challenges in the Girls Who Code Project

This report examines the leadership challenges faced by the Girls Who Code project, an NGO aiming to reduce the gender gap in the technology sector. The analysis focuses on several key issues: the difficulty of securing funds and resources, the challenges of navigating cultural diversity within the team, and the importance of clearly communicating the organization's vision to both team members and target customers. The report highlights the need for effective leadership in mobilizing resources, adapting to changing circumstances, and ensuring accountability. The report also discusses the expansion strategies of the organization, as the project currently operates only in the US market. The project has partnered with IT companies like Accenture and Dell. The report emphasizes the importance of a clear vision, strategic planning, and effective team alignment to overcome these challenges and achieve the organization's goals.

Running head: LEADERSHIP
LEADERSHIP
Name of the student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

1LEADERSHIP
The aim of this project named Girls Who Code initiated by Ms Reshma Saujani’s NGO is
to reduce the gender gap in the technology career. Leadership in this type of NGOs is a matter of
concern because it has highly personalized nature of leadership in the sector. Here the leader may
face demonstrating commitment and remarkable ability for mobilizing resources (Tan et al.,
2016). They are criticized for having position to dominate the organization failing to adapt the
changing circumstances and being unaccountable.
Despite the fact that “Girls who Code” is a small organization but has created a great
position in the US job market. The leadership issues in this not for profit organization relates to
the unavailability of funds to successfully complete the project (Hailey, 2017). In many
countries the gender gap in the society is supported therefore convincing people to contribute in
this type of project is challenging for the leaders. Proper strategy to reach the sponsors and
convincing the schools to allow their students to be a part of this type of project are challenging
for the leadership. It has partnered with the IT companies like Accenture and Dell so that the
girls get proper placement in these organizations. More companies are to be partnered with this
organization so that the gender gap in the IT career is reduced.
Another issue that the leaders in this type of project face is cultural diversity. The team
members in this type of organizations come from different cultural and ethnic background to
whom the utility and importance of technological development are different (Bano, 2019). To
some of the girls gender gap is common in any type of sector therefore they can also handle this
in their Technology careers. Now the team members or the employees in Girls Who Code
possess proper skills to convince these girls to enhance in learning computing skills like robotics,
programming and web designing are luxury. In this aspect the leaders fail to align the employees
to understand the points of view but develop misleading policies.

2LEADERSHIP
The third issue with this type of programs relates to the failure of sharing their vision to
the target customers by the leader. In this case the leaders fail to create vision and persuade the
team to make it their vision too. This is due to the fact that they may not follow their own plan
with discipline, fail to keep score on what matters and does not have right people for the right
jobs to make them happen (Soodan et al., 2017). Having a clear vision is mandatory and in the
case of this organization, it aims to teach 1 million girls by 2020. This objective has to be divided
into strategies so that the vision of the leader is understood by the team members also and they
played their role effectively.
Finally As the organization is situated only in the US market, the organization gets the
help of the IT companies situated in the US only. The other companies operating in the other
markets are not being part of it where the technology career are dominated by men. The
expansion strategies are not developed questioning the capabilities of the leader.

3LEADERSHIP
References:
Bano, M. (2019). Partnerships and the good-governance agenda: Improving service delivery
through state–NGO collaborations. VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and
Nonprofit Organizations, 30(6), 1270-1283.
Hailey, J. (2017). Accreditation and International NGOs: Issues and Challenges. JNEL Special
Issue I.
Soodan, V., Pandey, A., Soodan, V., & Pandey, A. (2017). Impact Assessment of Leadership
Style on Job Satisfaction of NGO Employees in Uttarakhand-India. Social Sciences, 6(1),
6-12.
Tan, H., Guo, Y., Zhu, M., & Jia, L. (2016). Being Humble as a team member in NGO: Servant
Leadership and its Impacts on Creativity. In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol.
2016, No. 1, p. 16619). Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management.