Leadership refers to the practical ability to guide. Leaders are capacitated to lead self, individuals, or organizations through tasks. Additionally, leadership can infer to the momentous governance of a team through a one-time activity or could indicate a continuous process of spearheading daily functions in a place of designation ( Daft, 2014 ). However, different logics emerge to explain the phenomenon of leadership which may not synchronize entirely. For instance, leadership can be viewed as a capacity for communitarian integration while other indicators state that leadership is an innate urge to pursuit and possession of power. Other factors to describe leadership will circumvent the issues of traits, interaction, intelligence, vision, values, and charisma. While the context and situation are factors that vary in exercising leadership, there are different styles and strategies employed to fit every instance of leadership. Moreover, leaders are in charge of the staff allocated to their departments. Thus, the professionalism of a leader at work should be blended on virtues that boost the teams' growth and production effectiveness. Therefore, this study embarks to examine leadership in a workplace to explore different challenges that leaders face in the workstation, the types of work teams they allocate and approaches towards the overall effect of professionalism and the team building phenomenon.
Through daily activities, leaders encounter various challenges which inhibit the way they work or how they execute work delegations. Firstly, leaders experience a problem of handling conflicts in the workplace. Teamwork is crucial in the execution of tasks. When workers have disparities, they delineate from each other by avoiding contact or collaboration. Mostly, leaders who have bigger working teams may not notice the disconnection. Specifically, a Laissez-Faire Leader conducts less supervision to their squad which infers that they can take a while before noticing work team conflicts. Conversely, a participative leader values the input of the team hence working closely with them ( Daft, 2014 ). When leaders see conflict among their workmates, they are bound to make rational decisions which neither affect the leader-team relationship nor the production of the entity. This indicates that leaders could fall into the trap of making biased decisions when solving work team conflicts. Thus, handling disputes suggests that a leader need be objective in a style that will suit each perpetrator favorably.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Furthermore, leaders are hindered by the inconsistency of what to prioritize in their workstation. Continuous governance enables a leader to connect with their workers or employees which establishes aspects of loyalty. As a leader, the team expects protection and care from their frontrunner. This means, a leader guards the welfare of his/her work team but at the same time implementing the responsibility bestowed upon them by the employer organization. Usually, leaders are obligated to make choices that are hierarchically imperative to the organization or their work teams. The inhibiting factor in this phenomenon is that a leader cannot act in defense of the work team and consequentially sabotage the integrity of the firm. Leaders will make decisions that are contrary to the expectations of the interests of the employees for the organization evaluates the leader's value on production, not on flawless liaisons within their designated departments.
A leader is the typical point of focus for the work team. At work, employees may face hardships in completing or handling a task. For instance, an overdue project may indicate that the team has to employ more working hours or take extra assignments out of work. Typically, on such scenarios, employees complain to each other about the workload and how weary they feel as a result. Extensively, some employees may express their concerns to their leader. Leaders have no objection to such work dynamics. Sometimes the workload could be so immense that they feel to crack out to their teammates as well. Nonetheless, this is the ultimate challenge leaders can face and how they react can instigate a lot of positivity or negativity to the team. Leaders are not only required to handle their workload in time but also chip in to assist the work team in managing the challenging projects. Furthermore, employees emulate their leader's mentorship.
In a workstation, there are different forms of organizing work teams. Work teams can be functional, cross-functional or self-directed ( Goleman , Boyatzis & McKee , 2013). Functional units comprise of the organization's members who are assigned various operational departments and work to attain specific departmental goals. For instance, an organization can have finance, human resource, and sales and marketing departments. These departments can have a manager, senior and junior employees. In functional work teams, work delegations and remunerations vary hierarchically. The vertical representation of leadership in this form is dependent on the governance structures of the organization, and usually, workers level up to senior positions based on qualifications, experience and value addition.
Cross-functional work teams are formulated from different departmental expertise where representatives from various work segments meet to input their know-how on a specific task ( Goleman , Boyatzis & McKee , 2013). Mostly, these work teams are problem-solving in nature as every participant avails skills and bits of intelligence they acquire from their learned professions or their departmental functional units. In this form of a work team, the leadership role is more intended for moderation as the input of every participant can be challenging for the other employees to relate to. Furthermore, cross-functional teams are empowered to make decisions individually about their expertise field. Also, they improve the coordination and reliability of interdependent work departments
Self-directed work teams go beyond the predetermined values of functional units and ad hoc cross-functional delegation. These types of work teams are individualistic driven to establish personal production and progress. Self-directed employees take complete ownership of their work duties by playing virtual management roles ( Goleman , Boyatzis & McKee , 2013). In this form, workers set own targets and datelines that are compatible and in tandem with the corporate objectives of the organization. Also, workers are assigned supervisors which facilitates their proactivity in teaching, coaching and developing them rather than directing and controlling them.
Professional presence is the influence imparted by the appearance of a leader, especially on a first meeting encounter. By combining composure, confidence, and style, leaders attain an equitable level of effect to their counterparts. Leaders play a vital role in the workplaces. They are in charge of planning, organizing, implementation and the supervision of the tasks delegated to them (Reece, 2012). This indicates that leaders are responsible for the actions of the team allocated to work with them in any exercise prescribed by the workstations departmental duties and responsibility. Therefore, leaders establish most appropriate professional virtues to trigger a primary developmental effect. Social psychologists state that leaders are continually perceived according to the form of appearance they adopt and retain through their first meetings with the work team. A first impression is vital to capture the vitality and intentions of the leader to execute their duties efficiently. A professional presence on a first appearance should reflect the synchrony between a leader's outlook and their descriptions of work. In this sequence, the dress code of a leader should align with their professions. In addition, leaders should possess quality voice projections and etiquette as well. In this way, leaders are accorded the respect they portray non-verbally through the combination of attributes they display at initial appearances.
Additionally, leaders should dictate authority by the way they walk into a meetup. Through entrance and poise, leaders can outline the level of composure and expertise they retain. Prior to making an entrance, leaders should examine the prompts to maintain throughout the session. Also, leaders should dictate confidence and the grasp of the subject content. An upright proportion reflects the boldness a leader holds. Moreover, poise instructs self-control and the sense of dignifying a leader. Leadership entails the struggle to make decisions every day. Some leadership decisions can be severe or may lack an informed basis. Nevertheless, such instances reveal the competency of a leader and the competence to tackle problems. Otherwise, nervous entrances can distract the leader's audience which might elicit insubordinate behaviorism or distortion of the seriousness needed in a leader- team relationship. Also, where poise lacks, incompetency arises.
An important facet of leadership is team building. Team building is the collective approaches intended to develop the dynamics of a work team through activities that solidify their unity and dedication to delivering (Reece, 2012). Teambuilding is directed to cater for the interpersonal relations between work teams rather than intensifying their training. Objectively, when teams bond in a socially non-restrictive realm, employees develop better working relations through which they can understand their roles better and consequentially set amicable goals for the successive working period. As well, leaders get an opportunity to tie with their work teams for the occasions are typically informal and communal. During summer holidays, I subscribe to voluntary internships around the state. Through teambuilding, I get chances to socialize with workmates and enquire about developmental career insights casually.
Conclusively, leadership can be challenging in the workplace. Leaders make decisions every day regardless of how technical they look. When handling conflicts, leaders should be keen not to project bias or favoritism. Intuitively, leaders mentor their work teams, and any instance of complaining would spur the urge to express discomfort on irritable work dynamics. Over time, leaders draw connections to their designated teams but cannot be a point of reference when making tough executive decisions that eventually sabotage the interests of the work team. Additionally, work teams vary with the structure of the organization. Functional work teams operate independently within the departments of their expertise. Conversely, cross-functional work teams encompass knowledge from the various functional units of an institution to handle ambiguous cross-cutting organizational problems. Self-directing work teams are individualistic and entail supervisor to worker guidelines. In the processes of establishing leadership skills, professional presence is essential to ascertain a leader's competence and suitability. The primary effect indicated that a leader's first appearance is crucial to influence how the work team perceives them and the role they play in the organization. Notably, leaders have to sustain an authoritative entrance to meet-ups. Also, leaders should be devoid of unprofessional distractions which alter with their poise and composure. Finally, teambuilding is crucial to developing the team's interpersonal relations as well as creating an informal environment for the employees to bond with their leaders.
References
Daft, R. L. (2014). The leadership experience . Cengage Learning.
Goleman, D., Boyatzis, R. E., & McKee, A. (2013). Primal leadership: Unleashing the power of emotional intelligence . Harvard Business Press.
Reece, B. L. (2012). Human Relations: Principles and Practices .
