Personal Philosophy of Leadership – Part 3

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Golkonda, Jyothi

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Contents

Personal Philosophy of Leadership ................................................................................................. 2

Abstract ..................................................................................................................................................... 2

Introduction .............................................................................................................................................. 2

Leadership Core Values ............................................................................................................................. 3

Leadership Assumptions ........................................................................................................................... 6

Personal Leadership Beliefs ...................................................................................................................... 7

Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................. 9

Annotated Bibliography .......................................................................................................................... 11

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Personal Philosophy of Leadership

Abstract

This paper will reflect my thoughts of leadership the responsibilities of leader and summary of

what I’ve learnt in this class on leadership theories, practices, values, assumptions, vision,

beliefs, behaviors, diversity, team building, dealing with change, and ethics. What makes a

leader more effective and successful? The ethical responsibilities of a leader, the principles of

leadership and the qualities a leader must have. Importance of self-awareness, trust, relational

transparency and balanced processing in a leader. Leaders must be value-centered, self-

disciplined, passionate and compassionate. A leader must be able to adapt their leadership style

to the situation at hand. They must be attuned to the situation and the needs of their subordinates,

some situations may need the leader to be directive while some situations may need the leader to

be supportive.

Introduction

"A leader isn't limited to those with positional authority. Leadership, instead, is defined

alternatively as someone who influences others to achieve a common goal. This would represent

the work and contributions of anyone who serves in this capacity." -- Barbara Steel, senior vice

president of leadership effectiveness at Zenger Folkman and co-author of "How to Be

Exceptional: Drive Leadership Success by Magnifying Your Strengths" (McGraw-Hill, 2012),

"A leader is someone who actually listens. Someone who takes advice and implements it. Most

leaders need to listen more and talk less." -- Jeffery Hayzlett, CEO of The Hayzlett Group

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"Leadership is the willingness to speak up when it's easier to stay silent, hold yourself

accountable when you have excuses at the ready and inspire without intimidation or the fear

another will surpass you. A leader shows more empathy than ego and remains dedicated to the

betterment of the whole and not the advancement of one." -- Brenda Della Casa, director of

online content and community at Preston Bailey Designs.

To me leadership is an interpersonal process of influencing your team towards the organization’s

goal. Leadership is about listening to your team, recognizing their effort and standing up for

them. Leadership is about building a collaborative environment within the team. A leader must

be honest, clarify values and set an example for their team. Another important aspect of the

leader is to envision the future

Leadership Core Values

I think the core values of leadership are honesty, integrity, influence, motivate, recognition and

trust.

Honesty

According to Northouse honesty is not just about telling the truth. It has to do with being open

with others and representing reality as fully and completely as possible. Sometimes telling the

complete truth can be destructive and counterproductive. The challenge for leaders is to strike

the balance between being open and candid while monitoring what is appropriate to disclose in a

particular situation. Similarly there may be organizational constraints that prevent leaders from

disclosing information to their subordinates. Honesty is about not promising what cannot be

delivered.

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Integrity

Integrity and honesty go hand in hand. Integrity is taking responsibility for your actions,

respecting others and respect for self. Leaders with integrity inspire others since they can be

trusted to do what they say. Subordinates are constantly observing their leader. Leaders with

highest standards of character and integrity set higher standards for the group by playing a role

model. Leaders with integrity are loyal, dependable and not deceptive. Leaders must exhibit the

same morals and ethics that they seek in their subordinates.

Influence

Influence is how a leader affects their subordinates. According to Terry R. Bacon author of

“Elements of Influence” people try to influence other by using ten positive influence techniques:

logical persuading, legitimizing, exchanging, stating, socializing, appealing to relationship,

consulting, alliance building, appealing to values, and modeling. Leader’s influence their team

mostly by role modeling, having higher standards and values and gaining the trust of

subordinates.

Motivate

According to Northouse motivation is an important skill in a leader. Leaders must be self-

motivated and must motivate their subordinates to work hard at achieving their goals. Leaders

must make their subordinates feel that they are performing an important work that is necessary

for the organization’s well-being and success. This motivational aspect drives them to achieve

their goals. A leader must step into the shoes of their subordinates and view things from the

subordinate’s perspective. Empathize with their subordinates during difficult times and make

them stronger mentally and emotionally. Motivation can also be accomplished by recognizing

subordinates for their effort and rewarding them.

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Recognition

Recognition is the process of reinforcing desired behaviors, and recognizing individuals and

teams in a timely and effective way, for their exceptional contributions. Recognition is an

important part of leadership. Recognition not only brings emotional lift to the individual who

was recognized but also encourage similar behavior with everyone else.

Trust

Trust is built based on character and competence. Character includes the leader’s integrity,

motive and intent with their subordinates. Competence includes the leader’s capabilities, skills,

results and track record. Both these qualities are very essential for a leader to build trust within

subordinates. A leader who is honest and sincere but is not capable of driving the results will not

be trusted by their subordinates. Similarly a leader with very good talent, skills and good track

record but is not honest will not be trusted by their subordinates.

Stephen M R Covey lists 13 Behaviors of High-Trust Leaders Worldwide

1. Talk Straight

2. Demonstrate Respect

3. Create Transparency

4. Right Wrongs

5. Show Loyalty

6. Deliver Results

7. Get Better

8. Confront Reality

9. Clarify Expectation

10. Practice Accountability

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11. Listen First

12. Keep Commitments

13. Extend Trust

Leadership Assumptions

According to Dr. Stephen R Covey’s leadership must be centered on a set of moral principles. He

believes that these principles are interdependent and must be practiced together in leadership to

be effective. Covey also suggests that leadership should focus on aiding individuals who need to

be listened to, understood and empowered.

The principles listed in Principle-Centered Leadership support the servant leadership model

which believes that “effective leadership emerges from a desire to help others”. Although the

characteristics of a principle-centered leader are definitely traits of some people in leadership

roles, there do not appear to be any one trait that every effective leader falls into.

The foundation for authentic leadership is the moral and ethical values that the leader believes in

and the leader’s positive psychological qualities and self-awareness. A leader must also be

transparent, open and truthful. Balanced processing is a self-regulatory behavior of authentic

leader is balanced processing. Balanced processing is about being fair and having an open mind

and exploring other people’s opinion before making a decision. It is about objectively

considering others perspective but at the same time using one’s internal moral standards and

values to guide their behavior and not being influenced by outside pressures. It is about aligning

passion and vision to the vision of the organization, and doing the right thing for the leader,

follower and the organization.

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Personal Leadership Beliefs

Right after school I started my first job at Nortel and worked there for 8 years before I moved to

EDS (now HP) in 2005. Nortel is over a hundred year old company which was founded in 1895

as Northern Electric and Manufacturing. It supplied telecommunications equipment for Canada’s

fledgling telephone system. Since then Nortel has grown as a global leader in the

telecommunications industry. At its peak in 2000 Nortel had 94,500 employees worldwide, with

25,900 in Canada. Nortel's stock crashed in 2001 and they had to let go 60,000 employees (two

thirds of its workforce). After the layoffs and restructuring, the company seemed to be slowly

turning around. In the first quarter of 2003 an unexpected return to profitability was reported a

quarter too early, which triggered a total of $70 million in bonuses to the top 43 managers. The

accounting scandal hurt both Nortel's reputation and finances, as Nortel spent an estimated

US$400 million on outside auditors and management consultants to retrain staff. Nortel could

not recover from that accounting scandal and finally in June 2009 Nortel announced that it no

longer planned to emerge from bankruptcy protection. That was the end of a company that was

more than 100 years old.

This is a perfect example of how a wrong step at higher levels of leadership can cause

devastating impact. And hence Honesty, Ethics and values play even bigger role in leadership

positions. I now work for GE and I appreciate the effort and support we get from our legal

department. The emphasis on being honest to our customers and placing customer needs first.

Every new partnership or project is completely vetted with the legal department.

The biggest lessons for me in life are lessons learnt from events that were not positive. I once

had a conflict with my manager on a process we followed in the team. My thoughts were

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completely different from the thoughts of my manager and my skip-a-level manager. My

previous manager who moved out of that role a few months back had a very different leadership

style than my then current manger. He had an open door policy and would listen to everyone’s

perspective. My then current manager had a very different leadership style. More of the power

oriented style. “I make the rules and you follow” sort of leadership style. Long story short I

received a negative performance review that year and was placed on performance plan. I never

had such bad performance review in my 10 year career. It was devastating. She was not my

manager for 75% of the year yet she got the chance to do my performance review. I decided to

find another job and leave the company. Before that I wanted to talk to my mentor (our

operations director) and get her opinion. She gave me the best advice for which I am thankful

even today. She said take this very seriously. Look at your performance plan carefully and note

your action items. Make sure you follow up on all your action items. She coached me on how to

pull myself out of the situation. When I bought up about the fairness in my performance review

she offered a listening ear. She offered me her personal number so I can call her over the

weekend if I wanted to vent out. I also talked to my HR manager and our senior executive

director. Everyone suggested that this was just a bump in the road and should not impact my

career in GE. I did not believe the later part of the sentence was true at that time. But I decided to

face it and prove myself. Few months later I found another position within the company and

moved out of that group. I thought my performance review would have negative impact for the

new position but to my surprise they considered it positive since I was willing to face my

weakness and fix it. The self-awareness for me with this incident was my interpersonal

communication skills. It is very important to understand the personality and style of the person

you are communicating with. You need to adjust your communication style based on who you

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are conversing with. I also started to pay attention on avoiding conflicts. After that I had five

different managers and the consistent feedback I got from all of them is that I am a pleasure to

work with apart from other good feedback on my leadership style and my “can do attitude” and

my technical skills. I believe that what makes us better leaders is what we’ve learnt from the bad

experiences we overcome.

I learnt the importance of emotional intelligence. i.e. the ability to manage ourselves and our

relationships effectively through self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and social

skill.

Conclusion

Successful leaders are continually learning. They use their experiences as lessons learnt for

improvement. They read, take classes or training and listen to others and use their eyes and ears

to continually expand their competence and improve their skills. Leaders must spread positive

energy within the team through their enthusiastic and hopeful believes. Good leaders are service

oriented and believe in their subordinates. They don’t over react to negative behaviors, criticism,

or human weaknesses. They don’t feel built up when they discover the weakness of others. They

believe in the unseen potential of all people. They feel graceful for their blessings and feel

naturally to compassionately forgive and forget the offenses of others. They regularly exercise

the four dimension of the human personality: Physical, mental, emotional and spiritual. They

exercise their minds through reading, creative problem solving, writing and visualizing,

emotionally they make an effort to be patient

Leadership is about seeing change that is needed and acting before the change is mandatory.

Self-awareness is the most characteristics of a leader. Giving and receiving feedback helps

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promote self-awareness within the team. A leader must facilitate an environment for effective

teamwork and collaboration.

A good leader is a visionary. A leader motivates people by connecting the dots between the work

they do to the over goals of the organization. People who work of such leaders usually motivated

and take pride in their work and contribute their one hundred percent towards accomplishing the

collective goals. A good leader clearly communicates the goals, sets a good example by being a

role model, inspires, supports and encourages their subordinates to perform their best. They

focus on the interests of the team and recognize the team for their accomplishments.

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Annotated Bibliography

1. Northouse, P.G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and practice (6th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA:

Sage Publications.

Planning on covering all the concepts covered in this book throughout the quarter.

2. HBR's 10 Must Reads: On Leadership. (2011). Boston, MA: Harvard Business School

Press.

3. Covey, S. R. (1992). Principle Centered Leadership. Fireside PRess.

Principle-Centered Leadership, is a long-term, inside-out approach to developing people

and organizations. The key to dealing with the challenges that face us today is the

recognition of a principle-centered core within both ourselves and our organizations. Dr.

Covey offers insights and guidelines that can help you apply these principles both at work

and at home -- leading not just to a new understanding of how to increase quality and

productivity, but also to a new appreciation of the importance of building personal and

professional relationships in order to enjoy a more balanced, more rewarding, more

effective life.

4. Regina Eisenbach, Kathleen Watson and,Rajnandini Pillai. (1999). Transformational

leadership in the context of organizational change. Journal of Organizational Change

Management, 12(2), 80-88. Retrieved from

http://search.proquest.com/docview/197630746?accountid=12861

This article bridges the gap between change management and transformational leadership

and qualities enabling leaders to successfully enact change

5. Kotter, J. P. (1991). Leading Change: Why Transformation Efforts Fail. In Harvard

Business Review on Change (pp. 1-20). Harvard Business School Press.

According to Kotter an organization has at least two opportunities to reduce their errors

in design and implementation of a successful transformation process. One is at the point

of design, the other at the point the error begins to occur. This article lists eight primary

reasons why organizations are unsuccessful in implementing change.

6. Ciulla, J.B (2004) Ethics and Leadership Effectiveness

in J. Antonakis, A. T. Cianciolo and R. J. Sternberg(eds), The Nature of Leadership

(Sage, Thousand Oaks/London/New Dehli), pp. 302–327.

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This chapter covers ethics of leadership in various dimensions. The ethics of a leader as a

person, which includes things like self-knowledge, discipline, and intentions, and so

forth, ethics of the leader/follower relationship (i.e., how they treat each other), ethics of

the process of leadership (i.e., command and control, participatory) and ethics of what

the leader does or does not do