Reflective Writing on Personal Leadership Experience and Theories

This reflective writing piece analyzes a student's experience working in a watch factory, focusing on the challenges faced in managing and developing people. The paper discusses the application of leadership theories, including autocratic, behavioral, and self-efficacy theories, to the student's experience. The student reflects on the management style, highlighting the negative impacts of an autocratic approach and contrasting it with their own efforts to support and encourage employees. The analysis emphasizes the importance of employee satisfaction and the role of effective leadership in achieving organizational goals. The paper concludes by underscoring the need for managers to foster a positive work environment and the significance of employee input and development. The student provides a detailed account of the workplace environment, the challenges faced, and how the application of different leadership theories could have improved the situation. The paper also highlights the importance of considering the youth's innovative ideas and perspectives.

reflective writing
[Document subtitle]

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Introduction
This paper will help in discussing the reflection on the personal experience which is relevant to
managing and developing people. Further, the analysis of the experience will be done depending
on the leadership theories and the models. Then the conclusion has been made relying on the
analysis.
It has been stated that the managing and the developing people are called as the leadership that is
being demonstrated as the procedure for persuading the organization's employees in order to
achieve the individual, group and the organizational goals in a specific period of time.
Furthermore, the employees are persuaded by the type of leadership which encourages them in
order to work to achieve the vision and the mission of the company. It is being observed that the
leader positively helps in accomplishing the objectives and the goals of the organization by
efficiently and effectively managing and developing the personnel.
Discussion and Analysis
When I was in the 1st year of my graduation, I worked in the watch factory of Great Britain for
the period of three months during the time of summer break to gain some experience. At the
workplace, I was mainly responsible in order to train the new employee, providing the support of
information technology and being the administrator of the human resource. During that period of
three months, I faced various difficulties in order to cooperate with my colleagues. Firstly, it was
very challenging for me in order to reach an accord with the new employees and even with the
seniors because of various reasons like different opinions. Further, this was specifically related to
the relationship and the role of the company. Secondly, when the decisions were made, and the
employees were told their job, they were not actually performing in a way which was being told
and as a result chaos occurred most of the times. Thirdly, the decisions were only made by the

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managers, and the employees were not supposed to give any suggestions, and the decisions were
imposed on them even the employees are not motivated to perform effectively and efficiently.
The management of the organization was very authoritative. Lastly, new employees were afraid
to give their suggestions even if they know the company will be able to maximize profitability
because of their suggestions.
Furthermore, the directions were only given by the managers. For example, the new system must
work effectively and offer a correct and the clear report in a short period of time, and my job
responsibility was to fulfil the requirements. Also, my responsibility was to conduct interviews
with the new staff or who were willing to work with the organization. I was supposed to find the
right person for the right position so that the organization can achieve the desired goals. Even I
was supposed to make sure that the new employees are working productively or not by reducing
the calculating mistakes of the system.
I had to ensure that the employees are appropriately familiar with the systems of operation to
avoid the gaps and the overlaps in the positions of the company. My target was to clarify the job
responsibility of the worker in distinct positions, and as a result, the work was delayed because
the responsibilities were not clear adequately to the employees as the duties were only imposed
on them. Moreover, I was supposed to communicate with the engineer and attempted to achieve
the manager’s requirement. Also, I was supposed to point out the errors of the system which
occurred during the performance of the task and informed the company in order to fix it up.
I found it very challenging in order to accomplish the manager’s requirements. For example,
there were various reports which were required by the manager in order to overlook the process
of the production and the situation of the finances. Most of the systems of the organizations were
not flexible and sometimes they were not able to give productive results then in that case I was

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supposed to inform the manager that the system was not working and the engineer had to
overlook it. The watch factory was only believed in maximizing profitability, and they were not
concerned about the employees at all. They employees were not given any decision-making
authority, the decisions were only imposed on them. The employees were not given adequate
training in order to handle the machine during the time of failure, every time, the engineer was
called to look after the machines.
Personal Experience
When I reflect my time with that organization, then only in realize that how important it is to
manage and develop people. The organizations should give adequate importance to the personnel
because if they are encouraged and satisfied, then they will give more productive results to the
organization and they will even work more than their potential. It is very important that the
manager should be a great leader in order to lead his team and further encourages the members
of the team to achieve the personal, group and the organizational goal effectively. If I compare
myself with the manager, then I can see that I was doing my job much better than him. As I was
encouraging the new staff and was supporting them in order to work effectively by resolving
their personal issues. But the manager was very authoritative and never gave any importance to
the employee.
I personally took the suggestions and the feedback from the new staff so that I can train them
accordingly. It is very important to study the mindset of a person and understand how they feel
before imposing your decisions and the responsibilities on them. I trusted every single employee
in order to create a strong relation with them, and I also tried to encourage them to a great level
so that they could improve their performance more effectively than before. Further, the manager

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of the organization should welcome the suggestions of the youth because they have more new
and innovative ideas as compared to the traditional ones. The manager should understand that the
youth gets impacted because of his behavior and the leadership qualities (Drucker, P.F., 2014).
Application of Theory
According to the autocratic leadership theory (Bhatti et al., 2012), the autocratic leaders are the
ones who take decisions without even consulting the teams. This leadership style in only
desirable when the decisions are required to be made quickly, and there is no requirement for the
input and the agreement of the team is not required for the outcome. Similarly, in my case, the
management of the organization used the autocratic style of leadership, and they never consulted
the employees in order to take the decision. The decisions were only imposed on the employees
for the benefit of the organization only. The management never considered the personnel as the
asset of the organization and they only wanted to be authoritative in every possible way.
According to the behavioral theory (Chemers, M., 2014), the leaders were divided into two
kinds. Firstly, the leaders who are mainly concerned with the employees and achieves the desired
goals of the organization by encouraging and motivating the employees. Secondly, the leaders
who are only concerned with the job. Similarly, in my case, the management of the company was
only concerned about the task. They were not ready to give any power to the employees so that
they can take any decision related to their job. The management only wanted to accomplish the
vision, and the mission of the organization and they were not concerned about the employees like
whether they were encouraged and satisfied or not.
According to me, the organization should have used the self-efficacy theory in order to be more
creative and innovative. Further, this theory would help the organization to make the

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communicative effective with the employees and encouraged the employee to give their new and
innovative ideas for the betterment of the organization. This could have helped in motivating and
encouraging employees in order to work more effectively, and the strong relation was built
between the employees and the manager (Eppel, A.B., 2015).
Conclusion
From the above-given analysis, it can be said that I didn't have a great experience at my
workplace. The management of the organization didn't possess good qualities of a positive result.
Mainly, the manager possesses the qualities of the autocratic leader. Further, it can be said that it
is very important to manage and develop people in order to accomplish the success because if the
employees are happy then the success can be enjoyed and will sustain for a longer period of time
but if the employees are not happy then the company is not able to attain the success to a longer
period of time. Furthermore, the autocratic theory, behavioral theory and the self-efficacy theory
are being applied to my personal experience. Therefore, I tried my best to be a good leader for
the ones who were getting my support during the work, but I was not able to give my hundred
percent because of the qualities of the manager.

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REFERENCES
Bhatti, N., Maitlo, G.M., Shaikh, N., Hashmi, M.A. and Shaikh, F.M., 2012. The impact of
autocratic and democratic leadership style on job satisfaction. International Business
Research, 5(2), p.192.
Chemers, M., 2014. An integrative theory of leadership. Psychology Press.
Drucker, P.F., 2014. The Executive in Action: Three Drucker Management Books on What to Do
and Why and How to Do It. Harper Collins.
Eppel, A.B., 2015. Self-Efficacy Theory. Phobias: The Psychology of Irrational Fear: The
Psychology of Irrational Fear, p.346.