Leadership in Management: Styles, Ethics, and Power Dynamics

This essay delves into the multifaceted concept of leadership, exploring its various dimensions and theoretical frameworks. It begins by defining leadership and differentiating it from management, emphasizing leadership as a process rather than a position. The essay examines effective leadership styles, including the use of power, and analyzes motivational theories like Maslow's hierarchy of needs. It also discusses the impact of power and influence in leadership, the ethical considerations involved, and the potential downsides of leadership, such as dark personality traits. Furthermore, the essay explores situational leadership, Vroom’s normative model of decision-making, and the follower readiness model. The author reflects on insights gained from coursework, highlighting the importance of inspiration, motivation, and situational awareness for successful leadership. The essay provides a comprehensive overview of leadership principles and practices, making it a valuable resource for students and professionals alike.

Running head: LEADERSHIP
LEADERSHIP
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author note:

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Introduction
The word ‘leadership’ can bring to mind a variety of illustrations. Leadership is
understood in the process in which one or more individuals succeed in attempting to
frame and explain the reality of others (Northouse 2018). Leadership is the course of
giving constructive direction to shared initiatives and creating enthusiastic effort in order
to be expended to attain specific purpose. However, it is vital to note that while leaders
set direction, it is vital for them to employ management expertise to guide individuals to
the right destination in smooth and efficient way. The topic of leadership has drawn
important insights which state that leadership must be understood as process and not a
position. Beck and Cowan (2014) have noted that leadership occurs when individuals
tend to be leveraged to understand ethical and consistent actions aligned to
organizational goals. Moreover, there can be observed significant differences between
managers and leaders where leaders tend to create a vision, while managers focus on
establishing goals. Leadership as well as management are indivisible in character
where each functions with the other. Majority of times managers tend to play the role of
a leader at the requirement of the organization. A key element of effective leadership
has been found in the authority and influence that an individual has in order to influence
behavioural patterns of individuals and get them to act in specific ways (Ciulla 2014).
The paper is a reflection on the topics of leadership, values, power, ethics and attributes
and influence essential for successful leadership by throwing light on some of the
theoretical frameworks to understand underlying factors of leadership.
Discussion
Understanding effective leadership styles
Effective leadership can employ various forms of power such as legitimate,
expert, information, referent, and reward and coercive to accomplish desired outcomes.
As a student of management, I gathered inclusive insights regarding the topic of
leadership till the eleventh week of my curriculum. The first week of the curriculum
focused on various aspects of leaders and meaning of leadership and the way
managers, management tends to draw divergences in the field of management. The

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course fundamentally emphasized on explaining that leadership must be recognized as
a process and not a position. Hillman (2014) has noted that individuals do not have to
hold formal leadership role in order to be a successful leader. Effective leadership is
regarded as the use of fundamental skills and competences accurately executed at the
correct time to facilitate organizations attain its utmost potential. Considering the above
factors, it is vital to link to one of the examples shared by my professor in the course
regarding issues encountered by Uruguayan rugby team which has been regarded as
an important narration of leadership skills performed in dynamic and challenging
circumstances. Such an example sheds light on the way effective leaders face
challenges in dealing with varied personalities and motives with an intention to attain
desired objectives in the arena of adversity which shows high complexities (Iqbal,
Anwar and Haider 2015).
To my understanding, leadership is not a role but a process which entails the
process through which an individual or a group leverages other individuals towards a
specific aims or objectives. On gathering insights from the course, I have understood
that leadership in its true forms is exclusively related to the establishment of
environment where each individual is perceived as a leader and is empowered to take
individual decisions and will be accountable for the same. Oostlander et al. (2014) have
claimed that while, hierarchies, processes and channels categorize and standardize the
way people work and further restrain individuals as well as their leadership capabilities.
This therefore impacts the process through which most effective expertise performs.
Moreover, it is necessary to note that without proper culture of leadership, organizations
often tend to encounter not only risks of losing talent but also risk losing clientele and
business. Thus, effectual way of forming leadership capabilities is to envision it right
from the foundation (Wang, Kim and Lee 2016). At this juncture, the capability to inspire
others is considered as a primary leadership competence and has well-established
linkages to build consistent, goal-oriented teams and accomplishing fallout from others.
Motivation Theory on Leadership
Delving into lecture notes and evidence-based resources based on leadership, I
have realized that the value of motivation is typically under-estimated and least

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understood knowledge domain amongst people who view leadership roles and
expertise within an organization. Motivation is important basically as it allows leader to
accomplish and even exceed individual organizational objectives. Furthermore,
approaches directed toward the mission and objectives of organizations or the products
and services resulting from those behavioural patterns. According to McCleskey (2014),
these behavioural approaches tend to vary from efficacy, which entails making
judgments regarding the competence of behaviour in regards to certain criteria. Thus, a
satisfactory level of motivation is regarded to be essential but on the other hand
inadequate provision for performance and usefulness of any leader. At this juncture,
potential leaders must apply motivational theories to select the accurate theory which
will enable leaders to result in higher performing and engaged workforce (Cooper 2015).
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs tend to enable leaders shape their style to align to the
needs of their followers. In majority of circumstances, organizational leaders encounter
challenges regarding financial crisis or low remuneration wages. However, on the next
level up of Maslow’s motivational theories to develop worker safety, related to
accomplishing essential needs. Thus, to my understanding, by applying Maslow’s
theory, when a leader has accomplished all criterions to meet the needs of the lower
levels, they tend to commit to nurture personal growth. Thus, for instance, career
guidance, employees attain their potential by offering increased responsibility and
power. Contemporary leaders tend to focus on the upper level needs as mentioned in
Maslow’s hierarchy (Hillman 2014).
Understanding impact of power and influence in leadership
Meanwhile, our curriculum has explored the phenomena of power and influence
which sheds light on comprehending the differences between powers, influences and
further emphasizes on various sources of power (Wang, Kim and Lee 2016). On
gathering inclusive insights from various scholarly evidences I have understood that
effective leaders can utilize power for good and leaders’ personal standards and ethical
code tend to be amongst the highly imperative factors of the way leaders primarily
perform the various sources of power available. However, several events in recent
times have shed light on the elevated need for the observation of ethics of

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contemporary leaders and tend to explain the fundamental reasons to which recent
management studies on the question of ethical leadership. Leaders’ implicit and explicit
expectations in relation to goals attainment impact the performance of followers and
teams. However, on gathering insights from various resources, I have learnt that to
enhance individual or team performance, effective leaders must establish high but
attainable goals and further articulate their level of confidence that their followers have
the ability to accomplish desired objectives. At this peak of discussion, the Pygmalion
effect can be applied in varied range of work groupings and across all essential sectors.
According to Ahmad et al. (2014), in any case if supervisors or leaders tend to uphold
constructive expectations regarding of employees they lead with an expectation that
they can solve challenging issue which will eventually enhance performance of
employees and organization. Thus, for becoming effective and successful leaders must
employ Pygmalion leadership training to be the most effective leadership development
intervention.
Dark Side of Leadership
Delving into various scholarly evidences on leadership I have learnt about the
dark side of leadership. Comprehensive studies of authors have noted that when
leaders encounter augmented demands from the organizations they either succeed or
face challenges. Certain qualities can aid or pose impediments to the achievements and
progression of the desired aim and in due course overlap the line between strength and
weakness, particularly when it shows high importance. However, I believe that in order
to avert dark personality attributes to succeed, leaders must obtain improved awareness
and comprehensive understanding of the way they should respond to certain situations
and distinguish underlying factors of their actual behaviour. Such a strategy of avoiding
unconstructive sides of leaderships can be attained by effective feedback session,
developing increased level of self-awareness and obtaining insights of constructive
personality traits which result to effective leaders. Meanwhile, Kaiser, LeBreton and
Hogan (2015) have noted that one of major issues for organizations depends on the
way they manage disrupted leaders, especially the ones who exhibit unconstructive and
dark personality traits. To my understanding, individual divergences in leaders are

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significantly owing to genetics. Thus, the repercussion lies on the fact that organizations
should be develop utmost awareness and knowledge of promoting as well as selecting
individuals who tend to score high in dark behavioural attributes. Such dark personality
traits further tend to show significance in inhibiting growth along with leader progress.
Thus, it has been noted that organizations have less competence and capacity to
proficiently manage leaders who show signs of shady personality characteristics.
However, authors have refuted the idea as study in because research in clinical
psychology suggests that even clinical levels of personality disorders can be dealt with
suitable interventions (Harms and Spain 2015). However, in recent times it has been not
practical to show ineffectiveness on the side of developing awareness and make certain
that individuals exhibiting shady personality traits are not chosen or promoted as
leaders. For attaining effective leadership skills, structured interviews or personality
evaluations for selection and recruitment such as the Five Factor Model of
Personality are identified as proper means in order to recognize negative leadership
traits already during selection and leadership development.
Situational engineering in leadership
Moreover, another attribute vital for effective leadership is situational leadership
where leaders employ their knowledge of the way situation tend to pose impacts on
leadership skills in order to dynamically shape the situation to enhance the chances of
success (Feister et al. 2014). However, a new and advanced move towards leadership
preparation is identified as Situational Engineering which has in recent times showing
significant changes in job performance. Leaders to obtain utmost efficiency rely on
Leader March training curriculum which notifies relationship-oriented leaders to aid
them execute paramount performance in reasonably manageable situations as well as
task-oriented leaders where leaders undergoing such training will perform at the
supreme level in either low or elevated control situations (Guarana and Hernandez
2015). Moreover, it has been noted that as the Leader Match program tends to educate
leaders to "engineer" their specific situations in order to attain most accurate
equivalence of the situation with their leadership approach, modern leaders in

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circumstances especially in unfortunate leadership performance are expected to be
supreme such as relationship-oriented leaders in elevated power situations.
Vroom’s normative model of decision-making of leadership
On gathering insights from lecture notes and various scholarly resources, I have
gathered the knowledge that the application of Vroom’s normative has the ability to
create a range of mediums which facilitates influential to take into concern situational
influences to select the most useful and successful supervisory procedure. Furthermore,
Vroom’s normative model of decision-making has been employed in an extensive range
of organizational situations in order to enable leaders to select the most effective
management approach and also to signify and explain the behavioural patterns of
leaders as well as group associates (DuBois et al. 2015). Further, Vroom’s model can
be employed to investigate in the domains of sexual characteristics and leadership style
as well as cultural authorities and leadership approach.
Follower readiness
The idea of Follower Readiness model can also be implemented by potential
leaders who incline towards situational leadership styles. Sharma and Kirkman (2015)
have noted that as the model proposes that effective leadership is attained by choosing
accurate leadership styles on the basis of the level of followers’ readiness. Delving into
the ideas of followers’ readiness, I have attained the understanding that situational
leadership model developed by Fred Fiedler employs similar forms of situational
dimensions which as per Fiedler depends on task and relationship behavioural patterns.
Leaders following situational leadership offers directive as well as supportive
behavioural approaches whereby leader and follower prefers to share opinions and
ideas during decision making process with primary role of the leaders depends on
enabling and communicating as well as delegating low relationship performances
(Guarana and Hernandez 2015). At this juncture, leaders tend to provide insignificant
amount of direction or guidance.
Leaders and Change

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On gathering insights from different lecture notes and evidence-based resources,
I have gained the understanding that organizations are restructuring their strategies in
order to develop as a highly agile and horizontal approach in order to accomplish the
demands of clients and stakeholders. Contemporary organization's top leaders have
the understanding that leaders cannot solve every organizational issue through
monetary investments and thus require highly dedicated and resilient workforce. Thus,
to my understanding, potential or successful leaders must need to accentuate action in
order to develop a change at rapid pace and smoothly attain desired goals. However,
there can be identified certain factors which potential leaders must focus on to facilitate
change. At this juncture, leaders must develop trust among workforce to develop
change management (Harms and Spain 2015). However, if employees or the group
members have trust in their leaders, it will reflect constructive and effective leaders.
Only with effective leadership techniques, employees must change the desired change
implementation and attain leadership goals. However, if the employees show trust to
their leaders, this association will combine together and advance the overall
performance and dedication of the employees. Authors have drawn examples of Nokia
whereby the company faced immense challenges and is understood as a cautionary
tale on the risks of failing to progress and should maintain its growth and prominence in
the market (Mathieu et al. 2014).
Conclusion
Hence to conclude, effective leadership is highly imperative in managing change
and change is identified as the only method to maintain the organization in the existing
business setting. Although change management brings high efficiency in workforce
where workers tend to develop high resistance and challenge owing to the unexpected
change and thus deny the change and continue as they are and thus be eliminated by
the society. For that reason, leadership style can be an effective determinant to
stimulate and encourage employees to incessantly accept change and drive them to
change. Leadership serves a decisive role in contemporary organizations in order to
stimulate and encourage the employees to modify organizations’ strategies to be able to

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uphold and acclimatize to the business milieu and further to ascertain the organization
to develop and make innovation.

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