Effective Leadership #8 - Mastering Roles

Hello Steemians, Hope you are all wonderful. Welcome to yet another article in Effective Leadership series. I'm writing this series for people who are working in different corporate companies, factories and other companies trying to manage their work and their work culture. Hope these articles will be helpful for them to grow as a good leader in their organization. As we have seen a lot of Leadership being a multi-dimensional function in our previous articles, I'm going to explain how mastering various roles in an organization is very important for an effective leader. Based on the organizational need, a person should master different roles in order to handle the different set of people.

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Fulfilling Key Roles

An effective leader should be capable of communicating well with the team members. The staff members will be expecting a good caring from the leaders to feel secure in the work they do. A good leader should have the following skills or key roles to run an effective team:

• Good Communicator - To be staff friendly leader helping the team do their task with effective communication with them.
• Knowledgeable - A leader should have the necessary knowledge in various areas of the project to be able to help a staff member when they have a need.
• Strategist - To have a look at the future. To always be focused on getting things done in the right method with proper planning and execution.
• Administrator - Capable of getting things done from the team.
• Promoter of Change - Change is something that happens in every organization. A leader should be a proponent of change an should be able to narrow down the change well to the staff members of the team.

We will see the above key roles in detail below. Before getting into details lets first see an overview of mastering roles and their importance.

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Mastering Roles - An overview

We have seen in our previous articles how a manager role is materially different from that of a Leader role. A leader plays a vital role in organizing the players in the team and act as a grandmaster, instructing strategies to play an all-rounder role in the game. However, a manager will be focusing only on the implementation part of a specific task. All the other details will be taken care by Leader. All the leaders are not master of all the skills. The skills and the way they approach things differ from one leader to another. In order to be successful, a good leader should learn all the skills that are required to excel. Skills can be obtained by observing a particular role or by observing the leadership styles of other leaders. The leadership style can differ from one person to another based on the specific task. People can change their styles based on the situation and the types of people involved in the activity.

Being an Administrator

None of the companies now expect a leader to just simply take care of "running a tight ship". The actual leader's responsibility is a lot more than that. Creativity is something that is expected in high level to be a good modern administrator. In order to do an effective streamlining of the activities, a leader should be capable of being a creative administrator. This will not only help in smooth running of the project but it will also help in increasing the efficiency of the team thus providing good output or returns.

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Waste management is something important for effective functioning of the team. In order to get good productivity, a leader should do continuous administration to understand the importance of organizing and managing waste. By minimizing time-wasting in the process, we will be able to improve productivity. Effective communication is important to the team members. Paper works and emails can be reduced and a direct face to face conversation can be made to move things quickly. Direct face to face communications is sometimes very effective in rolling things forward than waiting for a response to an email that was sent. If the project that you work is cross-functional, you can speak directly to the leaders of the other departments and clear the expectations. Setting expectations will help in scheduling the tasks and completing it before the deadline.

Becoming a Strategist

A leader should always focus on the effectiveness of the team by focusing on wider issues instead of being inclined to just one task alone. An effective leader should be a good strategist capable of getting things done on a day-to-day business with effective communication with the team. It may be sometimes required to handle different people in different ways, a leader should identify the strategy that will work and work accordingly. Sitting with the team and planning things can help in solving various challenges. As a strategy, a leader can take the following steps:

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• Call the team for a planning meeting.
• Identify the items that can be done at a given time.
• Break down the items into smaller goals and objectives.
• Assign the task to different members of the team.
• Set deadlines and clear the expectations
• Make sure everyone is aware of their responsibilities.

For an ideal way of working the above strategy can work well. For some different unexpected situations, the above planning may require rework. Continuous administration or follow up can help in validating the strategy that was planned. During the planning there can be situations where we will need some more time to revise a particular plan. Make sure you allocate enough time to do the revisions whenever it is required.

Promoting Change

In any organization change is inevitable. It can able be considered important for success in the future. Every staff should be cable of adapting to change to be successful in life and career. An effective leader should be able to lead change that can help the organization be competitive and grow. With the change, there can also be lots of new opportunities available for the staff members making them happy and motivated to work. These new opportunities help them grow and enrich their personal life and career. Following the same pattern, all the time is not healthy for an organization. Keep changing the way we do things and exploration should always be there. If we have been following the same pattern for several years, we have to do a survey to understand the customer needs and change the working pattern.

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Every individual is happy about adapting to new changes in the organization but, the only problem is that they are afraid to take the step. The whole team can be involved in bringing the change to the team and organization. If the team is asked for ideas to changes, I'm sure there will be lots of new ideas pouring and some ideas can even make things better and ease the way we work. Planning for new changes and implementing them should also be channeled well with the team. If the change is not planned well by the leaders, even though it is a good change for the team or organization, it may not be very successful and can create a bad impact on the staff members. If the staff members are psychologically affected, the output or productivity will be affected.

Communicating every aspect of the change to the staff members will give minimum disruption. If possible you can also listen to their voice before making the change to do things better. If there is going to be a change, even the staff members of the team should be committed to the change to make it successful. Stressing and explaining the positive aspects of the change several times can increase their hopes for the new changes. A good leader can sometimes be an example by projecting their dedication towards the change for the team members to understand.

Focusing on People

An effective management of the team members is the secret to success. If the team members are happy, the productivity will obviously increase. A people person will understand and value every staff member in the team. Being a people person should be something that emerges naturally in the heart. It should not be a skill or strategy used by a leader just to be nice to the staff for the sake of getting things done. A leader should think for the benefit of both staffs as well as the organization. It is the responsibility of a manager to think and stand on the side of management and channel things to the teams. But an effective leader should be able to stand in-between both management as well as staff members to make sure both are balanced and both are satisfied and productivity is good.

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Always ensure there is an openness in the team where every individual is given right to express their views. It is important that the staff members should not be afraid to express their opinion about something or the idea they have with you. A leader should give the necessary space to the team members. Encouragement is the next important thing that a leader can do to increase productivity. Constantly encouraging the staff members to adopt new methods and values that can help the team and organization will be helpful for the team growth. If it is possible you can also arrange training programs for the team members to increase their skills and potential.

Using different leadership styles

There are many leadership styles that different leaders use. It is not just you should be knowing all the different types of leadership styles but it is also important that you should be able to use them in the right situation. When focusing on the development of people you should also be having a focus on the strategic future of the team and the organization. A good leader should be able to identify and choose the effective leadership approach based on the situation. Not all the styles will work all the times. It is purely based on the creativity of the leader to adopt the right leadership style that will work. If you are implementing a change, you will have to consider all the aspects of the change. If it is not planned well, the risk factors can surface and the change may not look pleasant for all the staff members. Effective leadership is not only about planning strategies that will work but it is also about effectively implementing the change.

Share your views on the managerial skills and leadership skills in the comments section. Meet you again in another article in this series.

My previous articles in this series:

Effective Leadership #1 - An Introduction
Effective Leadership #2 - Focusing on Quality
Effective Leadership #3 - Learning From Others
Effective Leadership #4 - Gaining Experience
Effective Leadership #5 - Comparing Leaders and Managers
Effective Leadership #6 - Developing Strengths in General
Effective Leadership #7 - Building Personal Strengths

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