mckinsey's centered leadership model

1. INTRODUCTION

This assignment discusses the transition of male centered leadership to the

female centered leadership in corporate world. Several researchers have

conducted research on the argument that women in business require a different

range of leadership skills from men.

Women have similar set of managerial, leadership and interpersonal skills as

men do however, most of them lose it before reaching the top. Leadership skills

are not personalized spheres of either gender; these can be more effective for

any person regardless of gender or vice versa. At times, the leadership style of

women differ from men, but as mentioned earlier, these can be adopted my

men as well.

Researchers have classified four different thoughts to discuss the gender based

leadership concept (Appelbaum, Audet, & Miller, 2003), these are as follows:

Biology and sex believe that leadership is related to gender and is

biologically determined and inherent for men (Oakley, 2000).

Gender role acknowledges the role of mixing with people and considers

the gender to be determinant of leadership (Kolb, 1999).

Casual factors discuss various factors other than gender deciding upon

the effectiveness of leadership, being influential on it. These include

feminist attitude, self-confidence, and work environment (Cassirer &

Reskin, 2000).

Attitudinal drivers accept that women may have different set of skills of

leadership than men and they practice these in different manners (Claes,

1999).

STRATEGIC LEADERSHIP ~ 2 ~ SUBMITTED BY: REHMAN ASLAM

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

Researchers have found out that women may succeed as an effective leader but

they usually achieve the success by behaving and performing like men. They

separate themselves by their own feminine group and mix with their male

colleagues to match their style of leadership and management (Simpson, 2000).

Some of the leadership qualities maybe innate in the individuals but most of

these can be acquired and learned by experience (Andolsen, 2008). This

definition supports the research that leadership is not based on gender but it is

based on skill sets an individual has.

Another approach stating significant qualities of an effective leader discusses it

with every alphabet of the word leader (Porterfield & Kleiner, 2005).

L – Listening the ideas and thoughts of others and learning from those,

E – Energizing the colleagues with own commitment and fueling the whole

organization with energy,

A – Acting in the way that benefit everyone in the organization,

D – Developing their own skills as well as others,

E – Empowering the team to take risk and make decisions, and

R – Recognizing the achievement of the team.

This approach also doesn’t talk about gender, it discusses the qualities as a

person.

2.1 McKINSEY CENTERED LEADERSHIP MODEL

McKinsey & Company started a project called McKinsey Leadership

Project almost 8 years ago, to help women in corporate world navigate

the paths to effective leadership along with the learning about the factors

that help women reach the top and sustain there. The research resulted


in finding five interrelated dimensions of a leadership model called

‘Centered Leadership Model’.

These dimensions include meaning, managing energy, positive framing,

connecting, and engaging (as shown in figure 2.1 below). Every one of

these is important for a leader to possess and more the engagement of

the dimension is, more would be the effectiveness of leadership.

Fig 2.1 Centered Leadership Model (Barsh, Cranston, & Craske, 2008)


a) Meaning

This dimension of centered leadership model discusses the importance

of having meaning of whatever the leader believe and practice. Once

they find the meaning in their aims and goals, they enjoy the pursuit of

these aims and goals. They personally feel it worthwhile and engage

with the achievement of these goals. A goal with meaning is a goal with

purpose. It is easy to convey to the followers and sharing the meaning

actually inspire them to follow (Barsh, Cranston, & Craske, 2008). This

is the most important dimension for leaders. The leaders can convince

others very well if they themselves are clear in their objectives.

b) Managing Energy

Once the leaders find meaning to their goals, they need to manage their

energy to achieve those effectively. They need to know about

themselves in more details so that they can find their strengths and

weaknesses. The things that deplete their energy should be countered

with accordingly as well as the things that enhance their energy should

be practiced more often. When they replicate energy, it helps them to

become a role model for the people in organization to sustain their own

energy and commitment towards the goals. The art of minimizing

depletion, restoring the energy and necessary flow of it is essential for

effective leadership (Barsh, Cranston, & Craske, 2008).

c) Positive Framing

Taking things as they are helps in believing that we can do it. Optimism

enables the leaders to frame the facts and situations as they are. Having

found the meaning and managed the energy, positive framing is another

important dimension of leadership. It recognizes the facts of adversity

and responds to those with appropriate actions. A meaningful goal with

appropriate energy and motivation would lead to the positive framing

of the path for achieving the goal. Self-awareness is another important


thing that leads to positive framing and enables leaders to coup with

unfavorable situations effectively and moving on with the best solution

(Seligman, 2004).

d) Connecting

Connecting with colleagues as well as other corporate professionals is

another dimension of effective leadership. The personal touch that

communication gives for achieving the goals is unmatchable. It ensures

the colleagues about personal commitment of their leader. Networking

is really important for a leader. They need to grow the network and

sponsorship to enhance their credibility as well. They also need to

reciprocate with the situations they deal with (Barsh, Cranston, &

Craske, 2008). The attitude ‘WE’ is better than ‘I’ and it is the key to

success.

e) Engaging

Engagement is related to risk taking, taking ownership for the outcome

of the goal. This includes opportunities as well as risks associated with

the goal and its outcomes. When the achievement of goal become the

personal voice of the leader, the team gets the confidence to take risks

and getting things done more effectively and sometimes differently.

Leaders who choose risk and work with it are more likely to be satisfied

with their decisions than the others who didn’t opt for risks (Gilbert,

2006). Discussing the means and methods to achieve the goals or to

solve a problem often results in coming up with better opportunities.


3. CRITICAL EVALUATION

The involvement of women in business and their success as effective leaders in

the past decades has triggered the research in this field. The gender differences

in leadership style have been studied thoroughly as women have begun to take

over more leadership positions. The research studies impact of sex

stereotyping, organizational effects of various types of leadership, and

acceptance of a diversity of non gender linked leadership styles as the main

interest.

Women used to look after their homes and families while men used to work for

living. This changed during the World War II. Despite the hazards that the war

proclaimed on us, a positive change was the involvement of women in

businesses, production and other organizations. Countries like France,

Germany, Australia, Canada, England and America focused on recruiting women

workers in order to release the men for national defense. The industrial

revolution in USA also helped this change to prosper (Cardinali, 2002).

Since then, slowly and gradually women are making their mark in national

economies with their engagement and participation in businesses. Their sense

of ownership in the organizations has made them successful in their careers.

This increasing trend is continuing in twentieth century with more female

leaders serving at the top of organizations. Though they face and have to

overcome stereotypes and gender discrimination at work (Rees & Miazhevich,

2005).

Our critical evaluation on the assertion that women in business require a

different range of leadership skills from men is supported by various

researchers as well as the Centered Leadership Model which is interlinked with

each other, overlapping with the other dimensions. Though the McKinsey’s

model was meant to be for women, men also follow it to be an effective leader.


The five dimensions of leadership discussed above are essential for any leader.

The level of competency in each dimension differs for men and women. The

leadership style of men is more towards being ‘autocratic’ while for women it is

more towards being ‘democratic’.

Understanding and finding the meaning is equally important for both genders.

Women need to struggle more for sustaining energy for work and change as

they are the ones who look after their homes along with work. The passion

towards work leads to the incredible energy that helps in being effective. Zia

Mody is a successful litigator in India; she enjoys winning the cases in court.

Her passion to win excites her and restores the energy needed. She used to

work sixteen hours a day to prepare for cases along with managing three young

daughters at home (Barsh, Cranston, & Craske, 2008).

Women are stereotyped, to be more pessimists, and maybe they actually are,

rather than optimists. To become a successful leader, they need to teach

themselves optimism. Seeing things as they are help in finding better solutions

and opportunities out of any situation. They face exceptional confrontation in

affirming and developing a distinguished leadership style. The scarcity of role

models for women creates hurdles for them to look up to one. However,

framing things positively to counter their adverse effects require more efforts

by women (Seligman, 2004).

Participating in the presentations herself promotes the work done by women

rather than just working on the projects and let others present the ideas.

Displaying engagement with work portrays the confidence and strength of

women as effective leaders. Engaging colleagues and mentors to share and

discuss ideas is also an effective way of displaying leadership qualities. Shona

Brown is the senior vice president in Google Inc. She handles opportunities and

the risks associated with those opportunities quite efficiently. She is a risk

taker. She dives into the situation to find the opportunities and analyze the

risks that usually gives her success (Barsh, Cranston, & Craske, 2008).


Leadership experts suggest that women should have mentors and they should

continuously ask for feedback from them. The network within or outside the

organization is also helpful in discussing the progress and issues faced in the

organization. Discussing how the meeting went with the mentor really helps in

minimizing the mistakes happened and also results in enhanced self

confidence. Membership of professional forums or organizations is an effective

way of finding female role models because observing is one of the best ways of

learning leadership styles.

Networking helps the leaders to understand the environment of any

organization. Networks act as the hub of power and social capital (Perriton,

2006). Women networks are relatively smaller than those of men but with

stronger ties and higher degree of similarity (O'Neil, Hopkins, & Sullivan,

2011). Researchers have found that social networks created by women are less

influential as well as not well developed. This results in fewer opportunities

within the organization and corporate world (Forret, 2006). Women need to

concentrate on the development of an influential network that will help them

grow and reach to the top in corporate world. Studies prove that networking

strategies that provides success to men are not equally practicable for women

in their success.

4. CONCLUSION

The Centered Leadership Model was initially designed for young women leaders

to learn and develop leadership qualities and styles to excel in corporate world.

The literature on leadership qualities and styles reflects that women need

different level of competency in the set of skills for effective leadership.

Women need to concentrate more on networking, connecting well to their

colleagues and getting good sponsorship. They need to negate the stereotypes

about themselves that they cannot be a good leader.


The different attributes in female vs. male styles of leadership have been

described as follows (Appelbaum, Audet, & Miller, 2003):

Female Male

Consideration Structure

Transformational Transactional

Participative Autocratic

Socio-expressive Instruction giving

People-oriented Business oriented

Women tend to follow interpersonally oriented leadership style that focuses on

helping and doing favors for colleagues, hearing their problems, having

concerns about their well-being, explaining procedures and being friendly with

them. This style is also known as consideration (Eagly & Johannesen-Schmidt,

2001). This style focuses on connection and engagement dimensions of

centered leadership model. The attribute of women to listen to others

distinguish themselves from men, and hence is a difference between their style

of leadership and that of men.

Networking effectively and carefully for the success in their leadership roles in

also important as discussed above. Women need to develop more influential

networks to sustain the effectiveness of their leadership.

A collaborative team approach empowering employees as well as customers is

also an important attribute of women leaders. The whole team is connected to

the leader as a rim of wheel. This results in better communication with the

team as well as confidence of the team into their leader’s abilities to lead

(Appelbaum, Audet, & Miller, 2003).

Women leaders should not portray feminine orientation towards management

that is believed to be poor in leadership. This would minimize the perception or

stereotype of women being incompetent from the minds of decision makers in

any organization (Kirchmeyer, 1998).


The advantages and opportunities for women in leadership style may

sometimes be countered. However, it’s often that social and organizational

changes place women in the position of new entrants into higher level

managerial roles. These women may reflect contemporary trends in

management emphasizing on transformational leadership, threatening older

and more established managers (Fondas, 1997). Nonetheless, on the whole,

research on leadership style has very favorable implications for women’s

increasing representation in the ranks of leaders.

Concluding the discussion with an example of a successful woman leader, that

had the positive growing impact on sales and revenue of PepsiCo, Indra Nooyi.

She started her career at a lower management level from Johnson & Johnson,

making her way through different positions and organizations to becoming the

CEO of PepsiCo. Her commitment and passion towards work and leadership

skills helped her in reaching at the top of world’s second largest beverages

business (PesiCo Our Leadership). Her continuous growth is the result of her

well developed and influential network throughout her career. Forbes has

ranked her as number fourth in the world’s hundred powerful women (Indra

Nooyi - Forbes). She is a role model for every woman in world to look up to for

being a successful leader.

mckinsey's centered leadership model

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