What is Servant Leadership?

Posted on August 13, 2011

The phrase “Servant Leadership” was coined by Robert K. Greenleaf in The Servant as Leader, an essay that he first published in 1970. In that essay, he said:

“The servant-leader is servant first… It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. That person is sharply different from one who is leader first, perhaps because of the need to assuage an unusual power drive or to acquire material possessions…The leader-first and the servant-first are two extreme types. Between them there are shadings and blends that are part of the infinite variety of human nature.“

“The difference manifests itself in the care taken by the servant-first to make sure that other people’s highest priority needs are being served. The best test, and difficult to administer, is: Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? And, what is the effect on the least privileged in society? Will they benefit or at least not be further deprived?“

In his second major essay, The Institution as Servant, Robert K. Greenleaf articulated what is often called the “credo.” He said:

” This is my thesis: caring for persons, the more able and the less able serving each other, is the rock upon which a good society is built. Whereas, until recently, caring was largely person to person, now most of it is mediated through institutions – often large, complex, powerful, impersonal; not always competent; sometimes corrupt. If a better society is to be built, one that is more just and more loving, one that provides greater creative opportunity for its people, then the most open course is to raise both the capacity to serve and the very performance as servant of existing major institutions by new regenerative forces operating within them.”

There are many excellent books and articles about Servant Leadership. For a short bibliography on servant leadership, click here. Books by Robert K. Greenleaf and colleagues of The Greenleaf Center can be found in our online bookstore. To view our selection click here. For short articles on servant leadership by Dr. Keith, CEO of the Greenleaf Center, click here.

The Greenleaf Center is always interested to learn about the servant-leaders or servant-led organizations that you encounter. Please share your examples with us by sending a note to Courtney Knies by email (cknies@greenleaf.org) or fax (317.669.8055). We look forward to hearing from you!

http://www.greenleaf.org/whatissl/

The cult of the faceless boss

Posted on August 13, 2011

Too many chief executives are instantly forgettable. It’s the flamboyant, visionary bosses who change the world

Nov 12th 2009

THE European Union is not the only institution that prefers faceless technocrats to people with star power. The corporate world is increasingly rejecting imperial chief executives in favour of anonymous managers—bland and boring men and women who can hardly get themselves noticed at cocktail parties, let alone stop the traffic in Moscow and Beijing.

Some of the world’s most powerful bosses are striking mainly for their blandness: Sam Palmisano at IBM, Tony Hayward at BP, Terry Leahy at Tesco, Vittorio Colao at Vodafone. These men are at the head of a vast army of even more forgettable bosses. Watch the parade of chief executives who appear on CNBC every day, or drop in to a high-powered conference, and you begin to wonder whether cloning is more advanced than scientists are letting on.

It is true that there are a few more women and members of ethnic minorities at the top of companies than there used to be. But physical diversity has not translated into cultural diversity or intellectual vitality. Almost without exception, today’s bosses spout the same tired old management clichés—about the merits of doing well by doing right, the importance of valuing your workers, the virtues of sustainability and so forth.

The women who were profiled in a recent article in the Financial Times about the “top 50 women in world business” were every bit as adept with the cliché as their male colleagues. Indra Nooyi, the boss of PepsiCo, proclaimed that she spends her weekends “doing everything that normal people do”. Andrea Jung, the boss of Avon, said her biggest inspiration came from “Avon’s six million sales representatives worldwide”.

The fashion for faceless chief executives is part of an understandable reaction against yesterday’s imperial bosses, many of whom were vivid characters, capable of holding their own in a cocktail party with Tony Blair, but who collectively brought opprobrium on the system that let them shine. Some, such as Jeff Skilling of Enron and Tyco’s Dennis Kozlowski, broke the law and helped inspire a dramatic tightening of government regulation, in the form of the Sarbanes-Oxley legislation. Others, such as Home Depot’s Bob Nardelli and Hewlett-Packard’s Carly Fiorina, paid themselves like superstars but delivered dismal results.

The turbulent business climate is another factor that encourages today’s chief executives to keep their heads down. Their average tenure has declined from ten years in the 1970s to six years today, and boards are becoming ever more likely to sack bosses if they get out of line, particularly in Europe. The financial crisis has also produced a wave of popular fury about over-paid executives and their unaccountable ways. In this sort of climate it is not just the paranoid, but the faceless, who survive.

Facelessness—or at least humility—is also the height of fashion among management consultants and business gurus. Corporate headhunters are helping firms find “humble” bosses. Jim Collins, one of America’s most popular gurus, argues that the best chief executives are not flamboyant visionaries but “humble, self-effacing, diligent and resolute souls”. Business journalists have taken to producing glowing profiles of self-effacing and self-denying bosses such as Haruka Nishimatsu, the boss of Japan Airlines, who travels to work on the bus and pays himself less than his pilots, and Mike Eskew, the former boss of UPS, who flew coach and shares an administrative assistant with three other people. It can only be a matter of time before somebody writes “The Management Secrets of Uriah Heep”: be ’umble, be ever so ’umble.

Yet there is surely a danger of taking all this too far. A low profile is no guarantee against corporate failure, as the former bosses of two companies lauded by Mr Collins, Fannie Mae and Circuit City, can tell you. In general, the corporate world needs its flamboyant visionaries and raging egomaniacs rather more than its humble leaders and corporate civil servants. Think of the people who have shaped the modern business landscape, and “faceless” and “humble” are not the first words that come to mind.

Be bold, not bland

Henry Ford was as close as you can get to being deranged without losing your liberty. John Patterson, the founder of National Cash Register and one of the greatest businessmen of the gilded age, once notified an employee that he was being sacked by setting fire to his desk. Thomas Watson, one of Patterson’s protégés and the founder of IBM, turned his company into a cult and himself into the object of collective worship. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs are both tightly wound empire-builders. Jack Welch and Lou Gerstner are anything but self-effacing. These are people who have created the future, rather than merely managing change, through the force of their personalities and the strength of their visions. George Bernard Shaw’s adage about progress depending on “the unreasonable man” applies just as much to business as to every other area of life, if not more.

The previous outbreak of the cult of facelessness was in the 1950s, when books such as “The Organisation Man” and “The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit” topped the bestseller list, and when two of America’s biggest firms, General Motors and General Electric, were both run by men named Charles Wilson. Today’s world is as different as possible from the one that produced organisation man: an unusual degree of turbulence requires unusual bosses, rather than steady-as-she-goes functionaries.

The best defence of these faceless bosses lies in the realm of public relations, rather than management—they are helping to defuse public anger at corporate excesses. But even here the case is weak. Few people pay any attention to the identikit bosses who keep popping up to hum their corporate muzak about doing well by doing right. The best ambassadors for business are the outsized figures who have changed the world and who feel no need to apologise for themselves or their calling. There is no long-term comparative advantage in being forgettable.

http://www.economist.com/node/14844995?story_id=14844995

The Global Leader: Understanding Chinese Business Culture and Business Practices

Posted on August 13, 2011

Discover a number of the most important Chinese business practices, etiquette, and customs that are different from those used in the West.

Even people who speak the same language often misunderstand each other. This was illustrated in the following story.

A man walking down the street noticed a sign in the window of a restaurant that said, SPECIAL TODAY–RABBIT STEW. He said to himself, “That’s a favorite of mine,” and went to order the stew. After he had taken three or four bites, which did not taste right, he asked the waiter to call over the proprietor. “By any chance is there any horsemeat in this rabbit stew?” the customer asked. “Well, now that you ask, there is some,” replied the owner. “What is the proportion?” asked the man. “Fifty-fifty,” came the reply. Now most people would have felt that no further questioning were needed, that there was a clear understanding. But this man pursued the issue. “What do you mean by fifty-fifty?” he asked, and the proprietor replied, “One horse to one rabbit.”

There was a famous story told by Winston Churchill about an argument between American and British military officers during WWII about the planning of what came to be known as D-day. The British wanted to “table it.” To the Americans that meant to delay the matter until later-to the British it meant deal with it now.

Unfortunately, there is an even greater potential for Chinese and Westerners to misunderstand each other due to different culture and business practices. To understand why that occurs, it is important to know some of the major differences underlying how people in the two cultures think.

Understanding Eastern and Western Thinking Patterns

It’s important to realize that one of the more subtle aspects of culture and business etiquette has to do the way one thinks about how the world. The following table presents some of the differences between how the Chinese and the Western individuals think about culture and values.

The Importance of Business Customs or How To Blow a Business Deal

This different culture world views cause a great deal of frustration and distrust between the individuals attempting to work together. Three examples are listed below.

• A businessman went to Taiwan to close a deal with the president of a large paper company. Since they were meeting for the first time, they started out with the normal pleasantries such as “How was your trip?” etc. It turned out the businessman happened to be from Columbus, Ohio, the home of Ohio State University. When the president of the Taiwanese company mentioned that his son was going to this school, the business person then said, “Yes, it’s a very good school, let’s talk business.”

• A while back, two dotcoms wanted to establish business relationships with potential tech partners in Singapore. Through the intercession of a couple of savvy Singaporean’s, an initial meeting was arranged to determine if there might be some areas of commonalties. The two companies chose as their representative an American lawyer.

• During the same trip, another dotcom company had sent their business development person to meet with Singaporean counterparts. Meeting followed meeting and at the end of the week things looked very promising. Both sides were very pleased at the progress and the potential. Then, two weeks after coming back to the U.S., the contact person was promoted to a VP position and a new person took over.

If you missed the point of these stories, one probably doesn’t understand certain culture values such as lianzi & mianzi and guan xi.

Americans quickly establish business relationships, but there relationships are generally shallow and not particularly long lasting. Throughout the Orient, it takes time to develop the relationship, but once it’s developed, it tends to last for a very long time. This simple observation means that Americans and some Europeans tend to lose out on business deals.

It is also a fairly common practice for multinational corporations to rotate people through a country every two or three years. Of course, once that expat leaves, they take with them relationships it took months and years to cultivate.

To make matters worse, many companies tap employees who are experts in technical or management matters as their overseas managers. However, a recent study finds other skills vital for success.

Prudential Relocation, an arm of Prudential Insurance, asked 72 personnel managers working for multinationals to name the traits required for overseas success. Nearly 35% said culture adaptability, patience, flexibility and tolerance for others’ beliefs. Only 22% of them listed technical and management skills.

Elements of Chinese Business Etiquette

A common mistake business people make before going overseas is not making an effort to understand the basics, such as how to make a positive first impression. These first impressions are based on etiquette and greeting rituals that vary for different countries. The business etiquette associated with the wai in Thailand, the bow in Korea and Japan, and the handshake in the West when done properly create a good first impression. When done wrong, one potentially botches the relationship in the first 30 to 60 seconds.

Unfortunately, creating a positive first impression is not enough. One should also have an understanding of the following aspects of Chinese business etiquette:

• Gift giving
• Greeting rituals
• Business relationship development
• When to display emotions
• Time perceptions
• Differences in decision making and problem solving
• Guest-Host relations
• Negotiation styles
• How to use intermediaries
• Meeting customs and conduct
• Use of the names, titles and business card presentation
• How to establish relationships with government officials

Finally, according to Mark Buchman, who teaches a class called “Doing Business in the Pacific Basin” at UCLA, there are five principles (The 5 Ps) that one must keep in mind to successfully deal with different business etiquette in general. They are:

1. Plan. It doesn’t have to be the 60-page bulletproof version one would present to the venture capitalists, but there has to be something written that all agree on. It’s critical to define the fundamental opportunity, your competitive and marketing strategy, and its tactical components.

2. Persevere. It’s not easy to do business there, so don’t give up. Many sound business concepts fail when the company loses heart too early in the process.

3. Patience. If you are a financially driven company that sets high hurdle rates with short-term payback periods, you will give up too early and lose the investment or not have the guts to try.

4. Personal Relationships. Something generally considered *not too important for most task oriented managers is extremely important in Asia.

5. Perfection. We are bound to make many mistakes. Learn from them and don’t make them a second time.

To those five, I would add a six principle, “Prevention.” As Ben Franklin once said, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

Our greatest enemy is our own ignorance. If we don’t take steps to understand the subtle aspects of Chinese culture and business practices, we will most likely never experience the sweetness of success

Chinese Business Practices and Cultural Resources

Legacee has put together a number of resources to assist with the culture side of market entry.

a. We have put together a number of books on business and business strategy to help the business traveler. These include books such as:

• Doing Business in Asia: The Complete Guide
• Digital Dragon: High-Technology Enterprises in China
• China Dawn: Culture and Conflict in China’s Business Revolution
• Passport China: Culture and Conflict in China’s Business Revolution
• Business China: Your Pocket Guide to Chinese Business, Customs and Etiquette
• Doing Business in China: A Practical Guide to Understanding Chinese Business Culture
• Cowboys and Dragons: Shattering Cultural Myths to Advance Chinese American Business
• Chinese Business Etiquette: A Guide to Protocol, Manners, and Culture in the People’s Republic of China

b. There is also coaching and workshops for the side of things not easily learned from the books.

c. We can also refer you to experts here and in other countries for individualized coaching or training.

According to Andrew Kwok, a consultant with many years of experience in this field:

Guan xi (connections/relationships) is a very important element in doing business in China. Being introduced by even midlevel government bureaucrats can give you a head start in the trust building process with your potential Chinese partners.

Bring lots of business cards when visiting China. Don’t be afraid to offer your business card. Chinese people love to exchange business cards. Chinese names are traditionally written with the last name first and other names second.

In recent years, the Chinese government has been aggressive in launching various campaigns against bribery and graft. However, bribery and graft are still problems. It would be best to establish your reputation and avoid being involved in such behavior at the beginning of the relationship.

Do not give lavish gifts. It may be seen as a bribe. Never give clock as a gift. The words “give you a clock” sound similar to “attending your funeral”.

Do invite your host to a meal. The Chinese people love elaborate meals. If you invite the General Manager of a company, do expect him to bring along a couple of deputies and assistants to the event. There will be a number of toasts throughout the meal. You are expected to make at least one toast to the most senior member of the Chinese party.

Cultural Resources For the Business Traveler

Chinese Culture

A great site that discusses the numerous aspects of Chinese culture.It contains lists of over 700 web sites organized into many different categories of subjects that include: About China, Feng Shui, Proverbs etc.

Taiwan Business Customs, Practices, and Etiquette

Here you will find a series of reports on Chinese (Taiwanese) business customs, etiquette, cross-culture communication, negotiating tactics, business culture, manners and business entertaining.

Chinese Historical Images

For the person who enjoys learning from pictures: the site contains a number of very interesting pictures from modern and ancient China. The site is organized into sections that include: maps. archaeology, art, divinities, people, historical sites, historical illustrations, technology, customs, and stereotypes.

Chinese Historical and Culture Texts

One cannot understand a Chinese culture unless one also is familiar with the classic texts that shaped this culture. The site contains a large number of translations to for classic texts of Chinese literature. It’s organized in categories that include:

• Confucian philosophy including the Confucius and Mecums,
• Taoist texts from Lao Tse and Chuang Tse,
• Short articles

The Art of War

Of interest to many business people is Sun Tzu’s classic, The Art of War. Many Chinese read the book for its insights into business, it’s customs and practices even though it was written almost over 2500 years ago.

China Business Sites

A very complete listing of China and Chinese Related Business and Economic Information.

The Society for Intercultural Education, Training, and Research

This is an organization which aims to enhance awareness of intercultural issues in education, policy-making, and business, to facilitate communication between people of different cultures, to provide professional expertise in culture issues, to develop standards for interculturalism, to promote exchange of ideas and experience in the intercultural field. This site provides newsletter with great articles regarding intercultural issues.

Intercultural Relations

InterculturalRelations.com is a free online interdisciplinary resource designed for the interculturalists around the world who study, teach, train and/or research in cross-cultural psychology, cultural anthropology, intercultural communication, multicultural education, race/ethnic relations (sociology), multicultural literature, sociolinguistics, international business and other related sub-disciplines. This site provides researchers and teachers to keep up with relevant developments (research results and methods) in other related intercultural relations disciplines, and also help to promote efficient research and effective teaching and training in intercultural relations (ICR).

Chinese Cultural Classics

This page contains a list of classic Chinese books–many of them available in English versions.

http://www.legacee.com/Culture/CultureOverview.html

Asian and American Leadership Styles: How Are They Unique?

Posted on August 13, 2011

Executive Summary:

Business leadership is at the core of Asian economic development, says HBS professor D. Quinn Mills. As he explained recently in Kuala Lumpur, the American and Asian leadership styles, while very different, also share important similarities.

Editor’s Note: Political connections and family control are more common in Asian businesses than in the United States. In addition, says HBS professor D. Quinn Mills, American CEOs tend to use one of five leadership styles: directive, participative, empowering, charismatic, or celebrity. Which styles have Asian business leaders adopted already, and which styles are likely to be most successful in the future?

In a talk in Kuala Lumpur on June 15 at the invitation of The Star/BizWeek publication and the Harvard Club of Malaysia, Mills explained the differences and similarities between American and Asian leadership. Below is the transcript of his talk, “Leadership Styles in the United States: How Different are They from Asia?”

The rapid economic development of Asia in recent decades is one of the most important events in history. This development continues today and there is every reason to anticipate that it will continue indefinitely unless derailed by possible but unlikely international conflicts. At the core of Asian economic development is its business leadership—managers and entrepreneurs who sustain and create Asian companies. Do they exhibit the same leadership styles as top executives in the West?

There are important differences. Are differences attributable to different cultures or to different stages of corporate development?

But first, what are we talking about?

Roles in organizations involve more than just leadership. It is useful, but not yet common in our literature and discussion of business, to distinguish among leadership, management, and administration. They are in fact very different; each is valuable and has its place. Briefly, leadership is about a vision of the future and the ability to energize others to pursue it. Management is about getting results and doing so efficiently so that a financial profit or surplus is created. Administration is about rules and procedures and whether or not they are being followed. These distinctions are very important to clear communications among us about how organizations are run—when they are not made, we become very confused, as is much of the discussion around our topic.

Briefly, running an organization effectively involves:

• Leadership:
  Vision
  Energizing
• Management:
  Efficiency
  Results
• Administration:
  Rules
  Procedures

Our focus today is on leadership: how an executive sets direction and energizes his organization to pursue the direction. This is appropriate because managerial techniques are being spread fast by imitation, adoption, and MBA education. Administrative techniques were generalized around the world decades ago. So what is much different now is leadership.

Family and political connections

Cultural differences are important, but primarily as a matter of emphasis. For example, family leadership of business enterprises, including large companies, occurs in very similar ways in both [regions], but is more common in Asia.

Li Ka-shing [of the Hong Kong-based Hutchison Whampoa and Cheung Kong holding group], for example, runs his companies closely and is planning to pass the leadership of his firms to his two sons. Similarly, the heads of some of America’s largest firms, both publicly held and private, are the scions of the families that founded the firms.

There is less freedom of action for executives and boards in America than in Asia.

But more common in America are firms that are run by professional managers who are replaced by other professional managers, either as a consequence of retirement or of replacement by the board of directors of the firm. The better companies have sophisticated programs for developing executives within the firm, and ordinarily choose a next chief executive officer from among them. American CEOs average about thirty years with their firms and own less than 4 percent of its shares. There is a small number of firms, which get a great deal of publicity and so seem more numerous than they are, that hire CEOs directly from the outside, with no previous experience with the firm. These CEOs are driven by a need to excel in a competitive environment (they want to win), and they insist that money is less important to them than professional achievement; but it’s hard to credit that given the enormous inflation of top executive compensation packages in America in the last decade.

Many American firms, especially most of the large ones, are more dependent on capital markets for their capital (equity and debt) and so pay much more attention to Wall Street than is yet common in Asia. Wall Street has strong expectations about the behavior and performance of executives and about succession. There is less freedom of action for executives and boards in America than in Asia.

In Asia, succession usually is passed on to the siblings. In Li’s case, he is handing it to his two sons, while Jack Welch developed a talent machine to groom CEOs for General Electric.

To a significant degree, large American firms are at a later stage of development than many Asian firms—they have passed from founders’ family leadership to professional management and to capital obtained from the capital markets (rather than obtained from government—directly or indirectly—or from family fortunes). In this transition they have adopted particular styles of leadership responsive to boards (often led by outside directors) and to Wall Street.

It is possible, but not certain, that Asian firms will follow this evolutionary path. The political connections so important for top business leaders in Asia, whether in democracies or one-party states, are not unknown but are much less important in America. It is a characteristic of Asian top executives that they have such connections that are important to their businesses. In America, the chief executive officers of very large firms often have virtually no direct connections to top politicians—the government is treated at arm’s length and business is done by business people. There are, of course, exceptions, and deep political involvement is still a route to business success in America, but it is much less common than in Asia.

Leadership styles in America

Leadership styles are more varied in America today than in Asia. In America there are five:

• Directive
• Participative
• Empowering
• Charismatic
• Celebrity (superstar)

The first four reflect how an executive deals with subordinates in the company; the final one is directed at people outside the firm.

Directive leadership is well known in America, but is declining in frequency. It stresses the direction given by executives to others in the firms. The leader is very much in charge. This style is very common in Asia.

Participative leadership, which involves close teamwork with others, is more common in Europe, where it is sometimes required by law (as in northern Europe, especially Germany) than in America. It is also common in a variant colored by national cultural norms, [as] in Japan.

Empowering leadership is relatively new, and stresses delegation of responsibility to subordinates. American companies that operate with largely autonomous divisions employ this style of leadership. A few younger Asian business leaders now espouse this style (for example, the CEO of Banyan Tree Resorts).

At the core of empowering leadership is the ability to energize the people in a company. Jack Welch commented, “You may be a great manager, but unless you can energize other people, you are of no value to General Electric as a leader.” Energizing others is the core of the new leadership in America.

Adaptability is … less common and less valued in Asia and Europe. It will be needed everywhere soon enough.

Charismatic leadership is the leader who looks like a leader. People follow such a leader because of who he is, not because of good management or even business success; nor because [the people] are offered participation, partnership, or empowerment. Human magnetism is the thing, and it is very different in different national cultures. What looks like a charismatic leader to Americans may appear to be something very different to people from other societies.

Celebrity leadership is very different. It looks outside the company to the impact on others—customers and investors. The CEO becomes a star and is sought after by the media like a screen star. Ordinarily it requires good looks, a dramatic style, and an ability to deal effectively with the media. It is in a bit of a slump in the United States right now due to the corporate financial reporting scandals, which have focused attention on CEOs with the ability to get things done right in the company; but celebrity leadership will make a recovery. Boards looking for top executives to revitalize a firm look for superstars; they seek outgoing personalities.

Corporate governance in the West means oversight from regulators, boards of directors, even institutional shareholders. While Asia now has most of these institutions, they are ordinarily not as well established and not as significant in the minds of top executives. Asia is bedeviled by official corruption that reaches far into business. America has less of this, but has in its place considerable financial reporting fraud. Both are very dangerous to the economic success of the nations involved. Graft tends to destroy an economy first by undermining the trust that is required for transactions to occur, and by distorting the economic calculus that underlies sensible business decisions. As it continues, graft destroys the national political entity. Long-established graft is a way of life that is very hard to root out. Politicians promise to eliminate it, but are unable or unwilling to do so.

The role models available for business leadership in the different regions of the world are significant. In America, with its longstanding experience with professional business leadership, the most readily available role model for the head of a company is the corporate CEO. In China and Chinese-related businesses it is the head of the family. In France it remains the military general. In Japan it is the consensus builder. In Germany today it is the coalition builder.

There are nine key qualities that research shows people seek in a successful leader:

• Passion
• Decisiveness
• Conviction
• Integrity
• Adaptability
• Emotional Toughness
• Emotional Resonance
• Self-Knowledge
• Humility

The emotionalism that goes with passion is more common in America than elsewhere. Europeans see it as a sort of business evangelicalism and are very suspicious of it. Decisiveness is common to effective executives in all countries: In this regard European and Japanese chief executives are the most consensus-oriented, and Chinese and American top executives are more likely to make decisions personally and with their own accountability.

Conviction is common to all.

Integrity is a complex characteristic very much determined by national cultures. What is honest in one society is not in another, and vice versa.

Adaptability is a pronounced characteristic of American leadership generally. It is less common and less valued in Asia and Europe. It will be needed everywhere soon enough.

Emotional toughness is common to all top executives; Americans spend more time trying not to show it.

Deep political involvement is still a route to business success in America, but it is much less common than in Asia.

Emotional resonance, the ability to grasp what motivates others and appeal effectively to it, is most important in the United States and Europe at this point in time. It will become more important in Asia as living standards improve, knowledge workers become more important, professional management gets greater demand, and CEOs have to compete for managerial talent.

Self-knowledge is important in avoiding the sort of over-reach so common in America; it is less common a virtue in America than in Asia, and is a strength of the Asian executive.

Humility is a very uncommon trait in the American CEO. It is sometimes found in Asia. It is often a trait of the most effective leaders, as it was in the best-respected of all American political leaders, Abraham Lincoln. Once, when the Civil War was not going well for the Union side, a high-ranking general suggested that the nation needed to get rid of Lincoln and have a dictatorship instead. The comment came to Lincoln’s ears. Lincoln promoted the general to the top command in the army anyway and told him, “I am appointing you to command despite, not because, of what you said. Bring us victories, and I’ll risk the dictatorship.”

What’s next for Asia

The “New Asian Leader”? There are three prototypes:

1) Li Ka-shing of Hutchison Whampoa-Cheung Kong: old Chinese leadership in transition like Li Ka-shing. Rags-to-riches in one generation; handing over his business empire to his two sons who are Western-trained. There are many such examples in Asia. Li Ka-shing is in different areas of business—telecommunications, security, and high-end IT—and is very interested in becoming a contractor in the emerging homeland security construct in America. With Li Ka-shing, the threat to success is his reliance on an international concern to be a significant contractor in the establishment of the U.S. homeland security hierarchy. Li’s personal story is an amazing tale of success. After the death of his father, Li—at age twelve—went to work in a plastics factory. Within a decade he started his own plastics company, which he later leveraged into a real estate and investment concern. It then was an early entrant into China’s telecom and IT wave of the early 1990s, and became a market leader.

Li is a man who seeks to establish a positive legacy. He created a foundation in 1980 to help young Chinese students have the educational and other opportunities he had to make for himself at age twelve. He also started his own university, Shantou University, in 1981, with a similar purpose.

2) William and Victor Fung of Li & Fung: old traditional Chinese family-owned companies now run by the third generation of the family, Western- and highly-educated, who use Western technology extensively to face globalization and succeed. Very much Western-centric in approach yet Asian in practice, the Fungs of Li & Fung have mastered techniques of getting maximum efficiency out of the supply chain, taking raw materials and making low-cost, high-demand consumer goods, particularly clothing, much more cheaply than in the United States.

What the Fungs have accomplished is similar to what Japanese automakers accomplished a generation ago. By strictly adhering to principles of quality control—principles that were espoused by American business consultant Edward Deming—Nissan and Toyota made cheaper, better cars than the Americans did, eventually causing the big three U.S. automakers to follow suit. William and Victor Fung are interested in being business consultants, teaching others how to do what they’ve done. Both men are Harvard-educated and have a desire to be open and forthcoming about their business model.

As Asian companies seek access to world capital markets, they will move toward professional managers who will employ leadership styles more akin to those now used in the United States.

The main threats with Li & Fung are these: driving down labor costs, and concerns about relying on suppliers who potentially abuse the human rights of workers or pay less than a standard living wage. Victor and William Fung are the new type of Asian leaders—will they soon be the only type?

3) New Economy business leaders. Information technology and the Internet are bringing out a high-tech type of leadership that is common in America’s high-tech sector. Entrepreneurial, innovative, hard-driving, very flexible, ambitious, optimistic, visionary in the technology and business aspects, they will play a good, but not dominant role. N. R. Narayana Murthy of India’s Infosys and Stan Shih of Acer are good examples. They have adopted an almost entirely Western style of leadership and are succeeding in Asia.

What is the conclusion? Styles of leadership are currently different between Asia and America. Culture colors the way things are done, but less so what is done. The differences in styles most markedly reflect the stage of development of the economies and companies of Asia. As Asian companies seek access to world capital markets, they will move toward professional managers who will employ leadership styles more akin to those now used in the United States.

As Asian companies rely more on professional employees of all sorts, and as professional services become more important in Asian economies, the less autocratic and more participative and even empowered style of leadership will emerge. Asian leadership will come to more resemble that of the West. But significant cultural differences will remain—economic and geopolitical rivalries within Asia and between Asian countries and the West will continue and perhaps grow. Economies will retain characteristic national features. Convergence in a leadership style does not guarantee likeness of results nor even peace. We will continue to have to work for economic progress and peace; it will not come automatically.

About the author

D. Quinn Mills is the Alfred J. Weatherhead Jr. Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School.

http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/4869.html

How To Influence People: Understanding The Nine Spheres of Power

Posted on August 13, 2011

By Murray Johannsen

Effective leaders know how to influence people. In most organizations, its not about authority, it’s about influence. Discover the power inherent in nine spheres of influence. This page contains:

• Power Overview
• Authority
• Expertise
• Punishment
• Postive Reinforcement
• Persuasion
• Coaching
• Relationships
• Vision
• Charisma

Overview

In politics, a sphere of influence is typically defined as the cultural, economic, military or political influence a state exerts over another state. Similarly, powerful leaders have a sphere of influence used on the influence people around them.

Written in 1959, French and Raven The Bases For Social Power is commonly cited in management texts as the model for how to influence people. However, they listed only five sources, which they referred to as:

• Reward,
• Coercive,
• Legitimate (authority),
• Referent (charisma) and
• Expertise.

It’s been over 45 years since this classic article on how to influence was published and times change. For example, there is a great deal of research in both psychology and management that we can now draw on to better understand the nature of leader influence. Besides the five that used by French and Raven, I believe there are four more:

• Coaching,
• Vision,
• Relationship, and
• Persuasion.

And while reward and coercion are commons terms in how to influence, it would be more helpful to think in terms of behavioral modification (or operant conditioning) which uses two motivational consequences that leaders need to understand: positive reinforcement and punishment.

Facilitative Leadership

Posted on August 13, 2011 Updated on August 13, 2011

This article discusses the strengths and weaknesses of facilitative leadership—is a special type of leadership style for building consensus in meetings.

Acting Like a Facilitative Leader

If you fail to honor your people,
They will fail to honor you;
It is said of a good leader that
When the work is done, the aim fulfilled,
The people will say, “We did this ourselves.”
Lao Tzu, , 604-531 B. C., Founder of Taoism, Tao Te Ching

Effective faciliative leadership is based on three major assumptions.

Assumption 1: Facilitator Neutrality

One of the major differences between an autocratic leader and a facilatative leader is how each is perceived. Autocratic leaders typically take a position for which they are strong advocates. Facilitative leaders appear neutral and may really be neutral.

Assumption 2: The Leader Acts in the Best Interest of the Group

In many respects the faciliative leadership looks a great deal like a servant leader—they put the primary needs of the group ahead of their own selfish needs. A classic example is short-term profits over long term growth. The dominant view in capitalism is to stroke short-term results and to hell with the long-term. Such a view benefits the c-level executives and impatient investors at the expense of employees and patient investors.

For an exception to this rule, see the 60 Minutes video titled Antinori: Keeping it All in the Family

During facilitation, it’s hard to act in the best interest of the group as a whole. It’s hard to know what best interest means.

Let’s say that a corporation has set up a strategy council to determine fundamental business strategy. Since the CEO is to busy shepherding merger, the CIO is asked to chair the sessions. For that person to be successful as a facilitator, she would have to set aside her advocacy role for the use of information technology.

Assumption 3: It’s Important to Build Consensus

To understand faciliative leadership, one has to understand the nature of consensus. The Diocese of Greenburg defines it as, “A method of making decisions through which a group strives to reach substantial, though not necessarily unanimous, agreement on matters of overall direction and policy which can be supported by all.”

Some might say it means one needs 100% agreement, others might say it means everyone agrees somewhat. Someone else might say, “You have consensus when they can live with it.” A cynic might say, “Consensus is when someone is not actively sabotaging the efforts of the group.”

Whatever definition is chosen, consensus is important since groups members experiencing it support and are more committed to implementing the the solution.

Consensus in The Real World

There are some very powerful groups that must function by consensus. For example, policy developed by members of the G8, the European Union, and ASEAN are all based on consensus. If something is agreed to in summit, individual states must voluntary carry it out.

Using The Facilitative Style During Meetings

Meeting facilitation is most appropriate when one has to deal with complex problems. It’s strength is it’s ability to meld the best ideas from different people. Use it when one needs the strong support and active cooperation. It’s a natural style for project managers, board chairman, entrepreneurs, and team leaders. Unfortunately, if over used, it can create problems as well.

Problems With Facilitation of Meetings

Those who over use facilitative leadership can experience a number of problems.

Inappropriate Use Presents an Appearance of Weakness

High power distance cultures such as those in Asia tend to prefer leaders with an autocratic style. In some environments, people prefer to be told what to do, not asked what they should do. It’s important to remember, faciliative leadership does not mean a complete absence of autocratic leadership,

It Requires High End Communication Skills

Functioning as afacilatative leader requires more skill than acting as an autocratic one. Telling people what to do is easy, asking them what to do and getting them to all agree is hard.

It takes Time To Reach a Consensus

Making the decision yourself is always faster—obtaining consensus is slow and often difficult. In fact, some might argue that if consensus is unlikely, it’s better just to make the decision yourself.

http://www.legacee.com/Info/Meetings/FacilatativeLeadership.html#niceguy

Effective Team Leadership

Posted on August 13, 2011

How to build teamwork and avoid conflict with coworkers

Apr 19, 2007 Joni Rose

Building an effective team requires a leader that is an expert communicator who supports team efforts every way possible. Learn some techniques to build a cohesive team.

If you are new to a leadership role or are finding that the team dynamics are askew, then you may need to look at some techniques to help build teamwork.

1. Remove individual competition – competition can kill collaboration. If you want the team to work together, you need to not single out employees efforts and instead look at team performance and team metrics
2. Delegate clearly – give clear instructions so there is no ambiguity on who is to do what and when.
3. Define the reporting structure clearly – make it very clear who is in the lead position and who is accountable and for what.
4. Create group incentives for excellence – to motivate the team even more, offer incentives that the group will receive.
5. Clearly define expectations and what excellence looks like – this is a crucial step to team harmony. If your team does not understand clearly what excellence looks like to you, how will they ever attain it? You may have a very different idea than your team members about what you are striving towards.
6. Provide ongoing professional development opportunities
7. Give the team the power to make and implement decisions – empowering the team to contribute ideas and then take some risks and learn is an incredible team building moment.
8. Deal with staff conflicts immediately – don’t let conflicts fester and grow into bigger conflicts. Deal with them as soon as possible and be consistent with your approach.
9. Promote acceptance of a variety of points of view – differences in cultural backgrounds, ages, experience levels and educational levels, can influence the foundations used to make perceptions and judgements. Being open minded to these varying points of view should be encouraged.
10. Encourage open, honest communication – Jack Welsh (Past CEO of GE) believes strongly in what he calls “candour” in the workplace. Jack believes that far too often we are afraid to admit the truth and this lack of honesty can be a huge cost to a business financially as well as decrease staff respect for management. Staff sees the reality of situations and expect upper management to be not only aware of the reality but be able to act quickly on any obvious problems.
11. Make sure the basic resources are made available – it is hard to do a job without the necessary resources.
12. Articulate a clear vision and a code of behaviour to get you there – if your vision isn’t clearly articulated, your team will not know how the steps they take today contribute to the big picture in the future. Your team needs to feel passionate about the work they do. If they see that their efforts contribute to a big picture, they can anticipate next steps.

http://www.suite101.com/content/effective-team-leadership-a19274

WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO BE A TRULY VISIONARY LEADER?

Posted on August 13, 2011

What more can be said about our leaders these days, as one scandal after another comes tumbling out of the closets in Corporate America and Washington, D.C.? Indeed, a USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll found that both corporate executives and government officials were among the least trustworthy of all occupations (teachers and small-business owners ranked as most trustworthy).

These things might have us wondering whether we have any true leaders left at all, much less truly visionary leaders. Yet such truly visionary leaders do exist, and they can be found in both expected and unexpected places.

Some of these individuals are more prominent and more broadly visible, while others work their visionary leadership more quietly or in a more focused corner of the world. But they’re out there, and they look to both contemporary and historical visionaries for inspiration, wisdom and courage to continue on the visionary path.

What makes a truly visionary leader?

The word “vision” is used so frequently that it can seem challenging to fully appreciate the concept and those who have (or nurture) it. We might immediately think of the term as it’s used in political campaigns – “the vision thing,” or in corporate bureaucracy – “our vision and mission statements,” and not be moved at all by it. The term has gone from inspired concept to deadened sound bite. In a world where “vision” has been used so often (and too often inappropriately), what does it mean to be truly visionary?

Real vision and true visionaries can lift us out of the muck and mire and into the higher realms of human potential and possibility. As Agape International founder and spiritual director, the Rev. Dr. Michael Beckwith, said, a visionary helps awaken and direct the inner strength of the people (Utne Reader, February 2002). How, exactly, does one go about doing that?

Whether intentionally or not, the visionary thumbs his or her nose at what’s accepted by the hoi paloi, and doesn’t settle for the norm if the norm is mediocre, or worse, dehumanizing or destructive. They don’t allow themselves to be hypnotized by the lemming mindset or the mass hallucination about what’s popular or “normal”. Instead, they are interested in pulling people up; they invigorate and stir a greater possibility.

Envisioning a greater possibility…

To be visionary, regardless of the era in which we live, is to envision another possibility – or even that there is hope and possibility at all. Then the visionary, in some way, spreads the seeds of that vision – those possibilities – so that they might take root in others and find their way into our common reality. She might write or speak out, create a new type of product or company, express a vision artistically, or find another avenue of expression – these are all just means for spreading vision seeds.

The true visionary walks the fine and often challenging line between the inspired world – intuition, reflection, the Divine-inspired – and the material world of action, effects, systems, powerful special interests, ego, status quo, and tangible results.

The visionary is a conduit between those two dimensions of higher thought and our physical reality. He must connect with a source of inspiration and courage that emboldens him to let a specific vision “speak out through him” even though others might disagree, since an illuminating vision often casts light on current imperfections, arousing the ire of the protectors of the status quo. She is the one who, in trust or faith, leads the way along a new road, though she herself can’t see but a few steps ahead and may feel uncertain.

For this reason, a visionary is what Oscar Wilde called a dreamer who “can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.”

And yet the visionary perseveres, usually through a wide variety of challenges, uncertainties, personal short-comings, and setbacks, taking her place among fellow visionaries who sow vision seeds of individual and collective potential. For most of these men or women, the path of service is also one of spiritual progress, where they themselves learn, develop and serve spiritually, in hope of contributing something useful to those around them.

What or who inspires the visionary? In addition to her strong connection with a higher wisdom – whether that higher wisdom is termed a calling, a passion, or Divine inspiration – a visionary can find comfort, courage and inspiration from others who have walked ahead of her, or who are walking with her, on this path.

Examples of true visionaries, past and present

Many of the people ultimately recognized by their contemporaries or historians as visionaries or inspired leaders appear (at least at some point in their lives) to be relatively average. Few announce to the world, at age six, that they’re going to be a visionary when they grow up. “Visionary” doesn’t seem to be a job title that these men and women set out to acquire, and some end up doing powerful, visionary work that shapes things for the better but is never publically recognized.

Many of these men and women seem to encounter circumstances – sometimes very harsh circumstances – that stir up closely held passions, wisdom, faith, values and talents, and they rise to the occasion, building reach and capability as they go along. They’re confronted with an opportunity, or string of opportunities over time, that motivate them to summon up their best in hopes of creating an improved set of circumstances. They walk the path that appears before them, day by day, month by month, and ultimately their steps come together in a movement or body of work that is recognized by others as inspired. Usually, many other people benefit from their decision to take up the challenge.

Contemporary Visionary Leaders

Below, you’ll find a list of a variety people from different backgrounds. Visionary leadership doesn’t necessarily take one specific thing — like getting a criminal justice degree online or doctoral degree in physics.

Visionary leaders are often just willing to stand for what they believe is right, which may encompass many things. Take a look to see what this group of visionary leaders inspires in you.

• Bill Thomas, MD, The Eden Alternative. Dr. Thomas took a look at the current state of elder care in nursing homes throughout the country, and made it his mission to bring about a higher, more humane potential. He created an organization, The Eden Alternative, which inspires more loving, caring, humane and elder-respecting nursing home atmospheres. This means that Thomas and other Eden Alternative advocates must take on the huge system of healthcare, and seed enormous culture changes within those organizations that make a transformation to the Eden Alternative values.

• Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio). Regardless of your political affiliations, once you know more about this man, you’ll have to agree that his courage and inspiration are worthy of respect. As a young mayor of Cleveland, Ohio, Rep. Kucinich had been elected on a promise to fight against privatizing the city’s electric utility. That he took on the powerful utility interests provoked the wrath of those who stood to benefit from the privatization deal. In the face of financial and political blackmail, Mr. Kucinich stood his ground. As a result of the backlash stemming from the long reach of his opponents, the City’s credit was revoked by banks with ties to the privatization interests. After his tenure as Mayor, Mr. Kucinich wasn’t even able to find a job in Cleveland for years afterwards. Ultimately, it became evident that he was right all along, and he was honored by the new city council there. Kucinich now represents his district in the U.S. Congress, and is still finding the courage to speak up authentically against special interests and on behalf of the common good. In fact, his “Prayer for America,” is creating new dialogue across the nation.

• Erin Brockovich-Ellis. If you’ve seen the blockbuster movie with Julia Roberts starring as Erin Brockovich, you know the story. Brockovich’s real-life story is one that shows great spirit and courage (and more than a little bit of moxie). A financially broke, divorced woman with several young children, Brockovich finds opportunity in the midst of seemingly promiseless circumstances. In the face of a seemingly limiting and potentially hopeless situation, she finds passion, purpose and a lot of hidden gifts that turn her into an extremely effective investigator and environmental activist. Her work ends up benefiting working-class residents living near toxic waste sites.

• A.T. Ariyaratne. Mr. Ariyaratne is the founder of Sarvodaya. His efforts for positive, spiritually grounded and community centered development in villages throughout Sri Lanka started when Ariyaratne was a high school teacher in 1958. “Our development philosophy not only involves improving the quality of life of our people, both physically and spiritually, it is also an effort to rebuild on a human-scale – social, political and economic institutions, where people can enjoy freedom.” Mr. Ariyaratne persevered despite significant challenges – including threats against his own life and of his family. About these and other threats or attacks, he says, “Without critics, cynics and obstructionists, one cannot make progress.” His Sarvodaya-based approach in Sri Lanka has become a model of sustainable community development and public participation, and his own behavior provides a model of courage and spiritually inspired living, regardless of one’s religious or spiritual affiliations. In 1992, Mr. Ariyaratne was awarded the Niwano Peace Prize in Japan, and received the Gandhi Peace Prize in 1996.

Historical Visionary Leaders

• The U.S. Founding Fathers. By now they’re legends for envisioning a new kind of nation based on freedom and civic participation, but back then they were very much human beings with strengths and frailties – merchants or citizen leaders who were guided by their passion and accepted the challenge placed at their feet. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Paul Revere, Patrick Henry, and others who overcame personal inhibitions and challenges – such as Jefferson’s fear of public speaking, the damage done to Revere’s business, Washington’s uncertainty over whether he was up to the task of being the new nation’s first president. Despite their very human faults, each summoned the courage and eloquence to set aside their personal preferences and the lure of a comfortable status quo to help bring a revolution, and then a new nation, into being. For more information, read an excellent personal account in Patriots: The Men Who Started the American Revolution, by A.J. Langguth, or visit Ivy Sea’s Independence Portal for quotations and web site links.

• Mother Teresa (1910-1997). Called the “Saint of the Gutters,” Mother Teresa was born in 1910 in Macedonia. Though she felt called to a life as a Catholic nun and became a Sister of Loreto, she was 38 years old when first called to begin on the path for which she ultimately won the Nobel Peace Prize. Living in a convent in India, she came upon a poor, dying woman on a Calcutta street. The woman died in her arms, and Mother Teresa determined that she would devote her life to ensuring that others who were outcast and impoverished would not have to die alone, uncared for, in the streets of Calcutta. She said that even then, while she knew what she wanted to do, she had no idea how to go about doing it. After reflection and seeking spiritual guidance, she set about to establish the Missionaries of Charity as a vehicle for doing that work.

• Mohandas Gandhi (1869-1948). Born into a respectable class in colonial India and educated as a lawyer, Mohandas Gandhi could have enjoyed a comfortable upper class life. But like others whose efforts are seen as visionary leadership after the fact, Mr. Gandhi met up with circumstances that brought him face-to-face with the injustice of class rule and prejudice. He set aside his upper-class, comfortable lifestyle, rejected the status quo, and started a non-violent revolution that ultimately resulted in the independence of India from British rule. Rather than advocate for violent revolution, Mr. Gandhi stimulated a grassroots movement based in non-violent protest. Despite several assassination threats and attempts, as well as political harassment and the occasional jailing of both himself and his wife, Mr. Gandhi persevered, rejected violent methods, and continued to speak out on behalf of India’s independence. He was indeed assassinated in 1948, but not before his words and movement inspired many around the world, and continue to do so. “If my faith burns bright, as I hope it will be even if I stand alone,” he said, “I shall be alive in the grave, and what is more, speaking from it.”

Applying your own lessons from the legends

The short list of truly visionary leaders included above is far from complete. There are many other visionaries – both contemporary and historical – that could serve as models to inspire and encourage. Who would you add to this list?

Again, it is important to realize that, though these men and women may be judged in hindsight – after their actions or, in the case of historical figures, their lives – they were very much like your neighbors, coworkers, friends – even yourself – when faced with the opportunity to set out on the path for which they ultimately became well-known. They persevered through uncertainty, personal fears about their ability to carry out the mission before them, setbacks and harassment.

For a regular dose of current-day visionary leaders, I highly recommend subscribing to ODE Magazine, which features a selection of people – widely known and less known – who are quietly yet intently and courageously sowing seeds of light, possibility, positive transformation and, yes, hope. A subscription to Hope is one of the best ways to spend twenty dollars and get much more in return.

http://www.ivysea.com/pages/ldrex_0802_04.html

MAX WEBER (1864-1920)

Posted on August 13, 2011

Max Weber was born 1864 and died 1920. Weber asks how is it a leader can give a command and have actions carried out? He answered the question by classifying claims to the “legitimacy” in the exercise of authority. Except for slavery, people entered into one of three kinds of leader/follower relations (Weber, 1947: 328-349, summarized).

Table One: Max Weber’s (1947) Model of Transaction and Transformation Leadership Authority

1. Bureaucratic/ Rational Grounds – resting on a believe in the ‘legality’ of patterns of normative rules and the right of those elevated to authority under such rules to issue commands (legal authority).
• The leader is subject to strict and systematic discipline and control in the conduct of the office.
• Claims to obedience based on rational values and rules and established by agreement (or imposition). The office holder is restricted to impersonal official obligations and commands.
• Consistent system of abstract rules to apply to particular cases and governing the limits laid down on the corporate group.
• There is a clearly defined hierarchy of offices. Persons exercise the authority of their office and are subject to an impersonal order; officials, not persons exercise authority. They have the necessary authority to carry out their specialized functions.
• Each office is defined sphere of competence and is filled by a free contractual relationship (free selection based on technical qualifications or examination). Each office is a career, a full time occupation.
• People are remunerated by fixed salaries, in money and in pensions. Salary scales are graded according to rank in the hierarchy.
• There is a system of promotion based upon seniority or achievement (dependent on judgment of  superiors).
• Person who obeys authority does so in their capacity as a member of the corporate group.
• Person does not owe obedience to the individual, but to the impersonal order.
• A specified sphere of competence involves a sphere of obligations to perform functions marked off in the division of labor. Not every administrative organ is provided with compulsory powers.
• The means of compulsion are clearly defined and their use is subject to definite conditions.
• There are rules that regulate the conduct of an office (either technical rules or norms).
• Only people demonstrating adequate technical training qualification can be selected to be administrative staff or placed in official positions.
• There is a right to appeal and a right to state grievances from the lower to the higher.
• Sometimes administrative heads are elected. But in the pure form, the hierarchy is dominated by the principle of appointment.  Appointment by free selection and and free contract is essential to modern bureaucracy.
• Administrative staff should be completely separated from ownership of the means of production or administration. Workers, staff, and administrators do not own the means of production. There is a complete separation of property belonging to the personal and to the organization. The exception is the peasantry who still owns the means of subsistence (p. 338).
• People do not own their positions
• Administrative acts, decisions, and rules are formulated and recorded in writing.
• At the op of the business corporation is a position that is not purely bureaucratic.  It is more the position of a monarch (p. 3350.
• Capitalism fosters bureaucratic development, though bureaucracy arises in other settings (e.g. socialist).  “Capitalism is the most rational economic basis for bureaucratic administration and enables it to develop in the most rational form…”. (p. 339). Weber foresaw that socialism would require a higher degree of formal bureaucracy than capitalism (p. 339).
• EXAMPLES: The Catholic Church, hospitals, religious orders, profit-making business, large-scale capitalistic enterprise, modern army, the modern state, trade union, and charitable organizations (p. 334-335).
• ADVANTAGES – capable of attaining the highest degree of efficiency. Technical efficiency. The corporate control over coercive leaders. Favors the leveling of social classes.
• DISADVANTAGES – powerful interests co-opt the offices and turn them into feudal kingdoms.
1. Leveling in the interest of broadest possible basis of recruitment in terms of technical competence.
2. Tendency to plutocracy growing out of interest in greater length of technical training.
3. Formalistic spirit of impersonality that stunts enthusiasm and passion; Duty over personal considerations.
2. Traditional Grounds – resting on an established belief in the sanctity of immemorial traditions and the legitimacy of the status of those exercising authority under them (traditional authority).
• Legitimacy and power to control is handed down from the past. This power can be exercised in quite arbitrary ways (Chief can declare himself above the jurisdiction of the court).
• Office held by virtue of traditional status and be recruiting favorites or by patrimony.
• Obligations are not by office but personal loyalty to the chief. contracts of fealty.
• Promotion is by the arbitrary grace of the chief (no technical training of skill required).
• Commands are legitimized by traditions
• Obligations of obedience on the basis of personal loyalty (kinship, slaves, or dependents).
• Chief if free to confer or withhold his personal pleasure or displeasure according to personal likes and dislikes that  can be arbitrary.
• The traditional exercise of authority is only limited by resistance aroused in the subjects. Or, but pointing to a failure to act according to the traditions.
• Vassals are sorts of favorite people of the chief. This is termed Sultanism (the organization responds to arbitrariness and irrationality, rather than to the rationality of economic activity, p. 355).
• Functions are defined in terms of competition among the interest of those seeking favors, income, and other advantage. Fees can be paid to the Royal courts to purchase functions, such as shipping or taxation. This allows some mobility among the classes. It also results in bribery and corruption as well as disorganization.
• There is an irrational division of official functions (established by rights or fees, as described above).
• EXAMPLES – ruling families, feudal kingdoms in China Egypt and Africa, family business, Roman and other nobilities, clans and armies of the coloni.
• DISADVANTAGES:  The development of capitalism is obstructed (p. 355). In Traditional authority, the following Bureaucratic facets are ABSENT that facilitate capitalism (p. 343):

1. Clearly defined sphere of competence subject to impersonal rules
2. Rational ordering of relations of superiority and inferiority
3. A regular system of appointment and promotion on the basis of free contract
4. Technical training as a regular requirement
5. Fixed salaries

3. Charismatic Grounds – resting on devotion to the specific and exceptional sanctity, heroism or exemplary character of an individual person, and of the normative patterns or order revealed or ordained by him (charismatic authority).
• Charismatically qualified leader is obeyed by virtue of personal trust in him and his revelation, their heroism or exemplary qualities so far as they fall within the scope of the individual’s belief in his charisma.
• The words mission and spiritual duty are used q lot, as are words like heroic warrior, prophet, and visionary.
• Charisma regarded as of divine origin, the person is treated as a leader.
• Hero worship. Heroism begins with proof of charismatic qualification.  The hero must fight, and must be successful in brining benefit to followers, or charismatic authority will disappear. Acts of misfortune can be signs that the ‘gift’ has been withdrawn by the gods.
• Deference to heroes in a war, leaders of a hunt, people of legal wisdom or a shaman. founds of religions such as Mormonism (Joseph Smith) or Christianity (Christ) or Islam (Muhammad).
• “What is alone important is how the individual is actually regarded by those subject to charismatic authority, but his ‘followers’ or ‘disciples’ “(p. 359).
• Set apart from ordinary people and endowed with supernatural and superhuman powers and abilities.
• one type of charisma is a hereditary monarchy; Another is patriarchal authority. A third is religious charismatic. A fourth is the military hero.
• Charismatic leaders choose members not for technical training, but on the basis of social privilege and the charismatic qualities of disciples. People are not promoted, they are only called or summoned on the basis of their charismatic qualification.
• Followers live in communistic relationship with their leaders on means provided as voluntary gifts.
• There are no established administrative organs.
• There is no system of formal rules. the only basis of authority is personal charisma.
• There is no abstract legal principle.
• The leader preaches, creates, or demands new obligations.  There are revelations and then there is the leaders will to power (Nietzsche).
• Charismatic authority repudiates the past and is in this sense a revolutionary force (in contrast to traditional authority).
• Charismatic authority is radically opposed to both rational and particularly bureaucratic authority (p. 361).
• The charismatic is also, in pure for, an anti-economic force (p. 362).  At the same time it is the greatest revolutionary force.
• Charisma can not be taught, learned or acquired in discipleship. charisma can only be tested for, as in the Jedi Knights of Star Wars. And there is all kinds of magical asceticism to the Jedi Knights that is proof of their charisma, not to mention their heroic journeys of adventure.
• When two charismatic leaders oppose one another, the only recourse is to some kind of a contest, by magical means or even an actual physical battle of the leaders (p. 361).
• the biggest challenge is for the charismatic administrative staff to transition to a bureaucratic and rational administration (p. 370-371).
• ADVANTAGES – escape the control of bureaucratic apparatus. Escape the bonds of traditional inertia.

Weber is careful to point out that none of the three ideal types occurs in “pure” form (p. 329, 333). And he noted that any pure charisma went through a process of routinization. There can be a combination of bureaucratic and charismatic leadership (p. 333). And Weber was quite clear in stating that at the top of the bureaucracy, sits a CEO who fits the category of the monarch; what Machiavelli calls the Prince (p. 335). And at the top of the military command, is an officer who is “clearly marked off by certain class distinctions” (p. 356).  Officers differ radically from charismatic leaders (though General Douglas MacArthur was said to combine position, class elitism, and charisma).  Mercenary armies could be dispatched for private capitalistic purposes (p. 356).

Weber observed that there can be gradual transitions between the three types. The capitalistic entrepreneur could charismatically organize an enterprise with loyal followers vested in their vision and mission. Then as the hierarchy, rules, contracts, and other apparatus are applied, the charismatic leader sits a top a bureaucracy.  The bureaucracy set constraints upon his exercise of authority and leadership.  It may even replace him with an office-holder.  As the bureaucracy turns to stone, it becomes increasingly feudalistic, based on precedent, ritual and tradition.  Soon people look about for a charismatic leader to transform the feudal situation into a charismatic cause. There is a decentralization of authority, more delegation, and professionalization of appointments. Thus through charismatic transformation, the traditional authority becomes a bureaucracy, and turns feudal, and the endless cycle continues on till the present moment. Only small firms escape the influence of bureaucracy, but as they grown there is no escape.

Yet while the cycle continues, the spread of bureaucratic administration in church, military, court, state, corporation, and university is foretold by Weber. Bureaucracy to Weber was the first knowledge organizations.

Bureaucratic administration means fundamentally the exercise o control on the basis of knowledge.  This is the feature of it which makes it specifically rational.  This consists on the one hand in technical knowledge which, by itself, is sufficient to ensure it a position of extraordinary power.  But in addition… holders of power… increase their power… by the knowledge growing out of experience… technical knowledge is somewhat the same position as commercial secrets to to technological training. It is a product of the striving for power (p. 339).

What is interesting and pioneering about Weber’s knowledge organization, is that it is based on a theory of power. Technical and experience knowledge and the control of it is part of the striving for power. And “the capitalistic entrepreneur is, in our society, the only type who has been able to maintain at least relative immunity from subjection to the control of rational bureaucratic knowledge: (p. 339). The charismatic has divine and magical power to inspire devotion and to return successfully from heroic journeys.

Overtime, there is routinization of charisma.  The charismatic leader and following can not remain stable, and will turn to either traditional or bureaucratic authority. The bureaucracy may need a charismatic leader to initiate reform, even revolution, but once the change is made, the charismatic personality has to go. Other interest become conspicuously evident.

There can be a search for a new charismatic leader. Techniques of succession are based on finding someone with a calling, but not by rational selection criteria. The designated one must attain the recognition of the community. It is not a matter of majority vote, unanimity is required. Charismatic rule is sometimes transferred by heredity, but the bearer must prove they have charisma. Kings and Queens anoint their successor in coronations with great official ritual and public spectacle.  In the weak form, charismatic legitimacy is given to the position, as in the succession of popes and their divine right to rule being decided by ritual means.  If the personal charismatic leader can not find another charismatic person to succeed them, they the corporation will turn to a Prince or Bureaucrat.

There are several main points.

1. Weber present more than an ideal type model of bureaucratic, traditional and charismatic authority. His is a dynamic model showing how one form of leadership and organization reverts into the other.
2. Therefore, the model is cyclical, with charismatic being the most unstable form, and bureaucratic ending up as a hybrid of monarchy at the top and bureaucracy everywhere else. When the charismatic revolution happen, there is a reversion to either bureaucracy or traditional fiefdoms in the corporate world. After revolutions directed against favoritism and powers of the bureaucratic office, the charismatic hero is displaced in favor of a bureaucrat or a prince.
3. The model is quite situational.  Weber specified the economic and social conditions that support the selection of each type of leaderly authority. But it is an unstable situational theory.
4. Weber writes eloquently about the transformation of charisma into an anti-authoritarian direction. The legitimacy becomes democratic, once leaders are selected by plebiscite (vote).  The new charismatic authority is based on the legitimacy of public acclaim. For Weber the anti-authoritarian direction of the transformation of charisma is into the path of greater rationality (p. 390).

http://business.nmsu.edu/~dboje/teaching/503/weber_links.html

Types of Leadership Styles

Posted on August 13, 2011 Updated on August 13, 2011

Understanding the many different types of leadership styles is a necessary first step in leadership development.

“A groom used to spend whole days in currycombing and rubbing down his Horse, but at the same time stole his oats and sold them for his own profit. “Alas!” said the Horse, “if you really wish me to be in good condition, you should groom me less, and feed me more.” — Aesop’s Fables

Leadership Styles Overview

By Murray Johannsen

When developing your leadership skills, one must soon confront an important practical question, “What leadership styles work best for me and my organization?” To answer this question, it’s best to understand that there are many from which to choose and as part of your leadership development effort, you should consider developing as many leadership styles as possible.

Three Classic Leadership Styles

One dimension of has to do with control and one’s perception of how much control one should give to people. The laissez faire style implies low control, the autocratic style high control and the participative lies somewhere in between.

The Laissez Faire Leadership Style

The style is largely a “hands off” view that tends to minimize the amount of direction and face time required. Works well if you have highly trained and highly motivated direct reports.

The Autocratic Leadership Style

The autocratic style has its advocates, but it is falling out of favor in many countries. Some people have argued that the style is popular with today’s CEO’s, who have much in common with feudal lords in Medieval Europe.

The Participative Leadership Style

It’s hard to order and demand someone to be creative, perform as a team, solve complex problems, improve quality, and provide outstanding customer service. The participative style presents a happy medium between over controlling (micromanaging) and not being engaged and tends to be seen in organizations that must innovate to prosper.

Situational Leadership

Situational Leadership. In the 1950s, management theorists from Ohio State University and the University of Michigan published a series of studies to determine whether leaders should be more task or relationship (people) oriented. The importance of the research cannot be over estimated since leaders tend to have a dominant style; a leadership style they use in a wide variety of situations. Surprisingly, the research discovered that there is no one best style: leaders must adjust their leadership style to the situation as well as to the people being led.

Goleman’s Model of Situational Leadership. This is a relatively recent view that based on the application of emotional intelligence to leadership. The six styles one can use are: coaching, pacesetting, democratic, affinitive, authoritative and coercive.

Hershey and Blanchard’s Model of Situational Leadership. Going back to the 1970s, the model primarily focuses on the nature of the task as the major variable in choosing your style. In this model, there are four options: telling, selling, participating and delegating.

The Emergent Leadership Style

Contrary to the belief of many, groups do not automatically accept a new “boss” as leader. We see a number of ineffective managers who didn’t know the behaviors to use when one taking over a new group.
The Transactional Leadership Style

The approach emphasizes getting things done within the umbrella of the status quo; almost in opposition to the goals of the transformational leadership. It’s considered to be a “by the book” approach in which the person works within the rules. As such, it’s commonly seen in large, bureaucratic organizations.

The Transformational Leadership Style

The primary focus of the transformational leadership style is to make change happen in:

• Our Self,
• Others,
• Groups, and
• Organizations

The transformational style requires a number of different skills and is closely associated with two other leadership styles: charismatic and visionary leadership.

Charisma is a special leadership style commonly associated with transformational leadership. While extremely powerful, it is extremely hard to teach.

Visionary Leadership, The leadership style focuses on how the leader defines the future for followers and moves them toward it.

Strategic Leadership

This is practiced by the military services such as the US Army, US Air Force, and many large corporations. It stresses the competitive nature of running an organization and being able to out fox and out wit the competition.
Team Leadership

A few years ago, a large corporation decided that supervisors were no longer needed and those in charge were suddenly made “team leaders.” Today, companies have gotten smarter about how to exert effective team leadership, but it still takes leadership to transition a group into a team.

Facilitative Leadership

This is a special style that anyone who runs a meeting can employ. Rather than being directive, one uses a number of indirect communication patterns to help the group reach consensus.

Leadership Influence Styles

Here one looks at the behaviors associated how one exercises influence. For example, does the person mostly punish? Do they know how to reward?

Cross-Cultural Leadership

Not all individuals can adapt to the leadership styles expected in a different culture whether that culture is organizational or national. In fact, there is some evidence that American and Asian Leadership Styles are very different, primarily due to cultural factors.

The Coaching Style of Leadership

A great coach is definitely a leader who also possess a unique gift–the ability to teach and train.

Level 5 Leadership

This term was coined by Jim Collins in his book Good to Great: Why Some Company’s Make the Leap and Other Don’t. As Collins says in his book, “We were surprised, shocked really, to discover the types of leadership required for turning a good company into a great one.” What he seems to have found is what The Economist calls “The Cult of the Faceless Boss.”

Servant Leadership Style

Some leaders have put the needs of their followers first. For example, the motto of the Los Angeles Police Department, “To Protect and Serve.” reflects this philosophy of service. One suspects these leaders are rare in business.

LEADERSHIP VIDEO — The Importance of Leadership

Description: Some have said that one only needs good management to run a successful business organization. In what areas do leaders make a difference? This video talks about the importance of leadership using different examples ranging from student organizations to three historical examples: Japan, China and Britain and three leaders who had such an immense impact on those nations: Emperor Meiji, The Dowager Empress Ci Xi and Elisabeth I.

Profiles In Leadership

This section will contain articles about the leadership styles of business and government leaders.

Profile 1: Ben Bernanke and Henry Paulson.

“Any one can hold the helm when the sea is calm.” -Publilius Syrus.

The two men have widely differing leadership styles but have been thrust together by historical chance in dealing with the 2008 Wall Street financial crisis.

Our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.” — Karl Popper, Austrian philosopher

For Additional Information

Transformational Leadership Primer

A Leadership Bibliography of Bibliographies

http://www.legacee.com/Info/Leadership/LeadershipStyles.html