Task 1
Section 1
- The skills and knowledge required for leadership in order to support the achievement and creation of organisational strategy and vision are strategic thinking skills, planning and delivering skills, people management skills, innovation skills and change management, communication skills, persuasion and influencing skills. Along with these, some other general skills are having patience, reliability, dependability, positivity, team building and flexibility is required in order to create an organisational strategy or vision from the start and implement it within the organisation for its achievement. There are some skills and knowledge common for both leadership and strategic management, however, role of strategic manager is much defined. A manager must think for the long-term and how their actions and decisions can influence the organisation in a longer run. Along with that, a strategic manager must possess listening and communication skills, in order to get a much wider range of input. The skill of assessing the profitable and potential investment is necessary along with planning and organising idea, people, resources and time, forming positive and flexible groups in order to carry out the objectives and goals of the objective. The two most important skills are critical thinking and execution skills. It must be in manager’s capacity to think broadly about the challenges faced by the employees and organisation and to carry out the strategic plan they have laid out in order to produce better output.
- These skills and knowledge of leadership and strategic management in order to achieve the organisation strategies and visions can be assessed and evaluated through DISC and MBTI. The DISC and MBTI tool of assessment has been created to determine the insight of an individual’s personality as well as behaviour. Organisations, institutes and corporation to determine the personality of an employee or individual often use it. However, MBTI is assumed to be constant and a much longer test, which is a huge indicator for internal thinking of an individual, whereas, DISC is open to various possibilities, consist of smaller test and distinctly measures the personality conveyed by the external behaviour of the individual. MBTI assessment test helps in understanding an individual’s self-knowledge, as they tend to be personal and reveals a great lot about the individual. These personality tests are mostly used to determine the team building capability, corporate retreats, exercise, sales meeting, staff training and several public forum. It is even used for personal application such as employee training.
- There are several theories for management and leadership such as contingency theory, situational leadership theory, transformational leadership theory, transactional theory, behavioural theory and Great Man Theory of Leadership. Contingency theory states that there is no best method for corporate organisation or to lead a company and make decisions. Although, the course which is optimal is completely dependent upon external and internal environment.Situation leadership states that there is not a single leadership style, which is the best; it solely depends upon the strategy of leadership suitable for a particular task. Transformational leadership theory states that inspiration, motivation, intellectual stimulation, influence by idealisation and consideration to individual is necessary. Transactional theory consist of motivating and showing ways to followers through attracting their own self-interest. Behavioural theory of leadership states that a leader must consider their behaviour and traits and copying other’s leadership is acceptable. Great Man Theory of Leadership states that some individual are naturally born with traits, which sets them apart from other, which are responsible for their position, power and leadership. The situational leadership theory is one of the suitable leadership style because it is not constant and changes with every situation and task, and even though it does not have a base, it is relatable to all the employees and address every individual in the company.
Section 2
- The most important skills and knowledge for a leader to possess is people management skills because through the employees in the organisation the organisational strategy can be successfully implemented. Other than people management skills, strategic thinking is also important because leaders have to take instant and accurate decisions. After that, skills like planning and delivering comes along with innovation skills, because a leader must involve in knowledge and skills like these. Lastly, change management persuasion and influencing skills are required.However, skills like communication, persuasion and influencing falls under the people management skills and are considered to most important, although persuasion and influencing are not as important as communication skills. For a strategic manager, the most important skills are long term thinking along with critical thinking and execution skills. It is considered essential because a strategic manager is in charge of tactical part of the organisation and is responsible for improving the organisation’s current position, therefore, thinking for long term is necessary along with critical thinking and the ability to properly execute the plan otherwise it will be considered as a fail. After that, skills like assessing profitability of an investment and forming flexible group is necessary. Most of the time it is not in the job role of a strategic manager to access the net profitability of an investment, however, it is an added advantage for the position.
- Leadership and management skills needed for successful achievement of organisational operations are planning every steps of the business, capacity planning, improvement and analysis of productivity along with quality assurance. Other than this knowledge, a manager must be realistic, look for efficiency, and focuses on quality along with effectiveness in supply chain management.However, an operation manager must not manage; they are required to lead the business operations. Although to create and achieve organisational strategies skills and knowledge like strategic and critical thinking is required because in order to make strategies past and present analytics must be assessed properly. Implementation skills are also required to properly adopt the strategies and check if any changes are required in the strategy. There are differences in the skills of achievement of organisation goals and creating and implementing the same.
Task 2
Section 1
- The individual in this context possess enough personal achievement and organisational strategy and vision, as they work in a voluntary capacity. On conducting an audit of the personal management and leadership knowledge and skills, which facilitates the achievement, and creation of organisational vision. The individual has good communication skills, there it is natural for them to manage a group of other individuals and possess interpersonal skills like verbal and non-verbal communication, listening, negotiation, problem solving, and decision-making skills. The individual even possess skills like change embracing, implementing change in others and having a cordial relationship with the fellow colleagues. Along with that, individual puts forward their view on a meeting and sometimes lead a group of people as well. However, the individual lacks handling situations, which are stressful and sometimes fails to assess the actual performance, along with that they are not with confrontation while providing negative feedbacks, which can later cause challenges. The individual possess manageable skills regarding costing and project management, however, they can perform motivation on the subordinates very well and has the ability to resolve the conflicts. Overall, the individual is determined to achieve the organisation goals and possess enough knowledge and skills to create and implement strategies for the same as well.
- The major objective fixed regarding the personal development required for the strategic needs of the organisation is to have a clear target for vision, mission and values for the entire strategic plan conducted by the organisation. Along with that, effective counselling and teaching skills are required because in order to implement the strategy adopted, it must be properly counselled to the employees. Getting alignment and buy-in within the entire team is required as well, along with developing clear, realistic and measurable goals, priorities and objectives.It must be with the leader or manager to have this development within them to create an action plan, which will provide a clear pathway to meet the organisational goals. It is also important to conduct proper analysis regarding the risk associated and strategy regarding mitigation, along with engaging every stakeholder associated with the organisation, as the impact of the strategy will be on them as well. It is also important to provide enough encouragement for the innovation to take place within the organisation. Cultivating a culture, which is optimised, will help the organisation and its employees to drive for the results.
- A personal development plan in order to develop an individual’s leadership and management skills, which will help in creation of organisation vision and strategy, is created by considering both, personal and organisational, point of view. Step one consist of giving definition to what sort of leadership style is required by the organisation in order to implement the strategies, after that the second step is to self-assess oneself. Through tests like MBTI and StrengthsFinder, one can understand their traits, strengths and weakness and then can make plans accordingly. The third step is to identify the core values, it is important to understand the core values of the organisation, in order to blend an individual’s own core strength with it and create a synergy. The fourth step will be to write a personal vision statement, where the objectives regarding leadership and management will be stated along with the achievement and contribution they want to provide. The fifth step is to analyse the perception of other employees. The sixth step is to understand the current leadership skills and which skills are lacking. Lastly, the seventh step is to set goals, which will consist of specifics, measurability, attainability and realistic components within it.
Section 2
- The objectives and action plan selected for the personal development will surely contribute to the achievement of the organisational strategy and vision. Having clear target on the mission, vision and values will help in fulfilling the organisational vision along with effective counselling and teaching as it will help in implementing the action strategy. Other than that, developing clear, realistic and measurable goals and priorities is the basics of achievement of organisation goals and required in every leader and manager. Action plan is sort of pre-planned road for the employees in order to achieve the organisational goals along with risk analysis, which is required as a safety measure. The action plan mentioned here consist of seven steps which is clearly defined the development required in the personality of the leader or manager. Setting a definition for the goals and objective is important, as without them there will be no meaning to achieve organisational goals. Tests like MBTI and DISC or StrengthsFinder helps a leader to assess their own skills. Determining core values, writing personal vision statement and considering perceptions of other about the leader is essential as it all helps in improving the personality of a leader.
- According to the audit about the knowledge and skills of the individual, it came into light that they have great communication skills and a clear vision about the organisational objectives and goals. Along with that, the individual is open to changes and maintains a cordial relationship with the fellow employees however, it becomes a barrier for the individual as this restrict them to give negative feedbacks to them. This can be improved through training and communication skills activities. The individual can be taught how professional communication is different from personal or friendly communication and must be made aware that providing only positive feedbacks will hamper the person to whom the feedback is provided along with that the organisation will suffer as well. Another thing on which the individual will require training is levelling the stress meter. It can be improved by taking counselling from the senior management and other higher executive and must find ways to create a stress and panic free work environment.
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