Characteristics of an effective team leader

Introduction

Most managers are very good controllers, certainly control and leadership drive hand to hand. According to Koontz and o’ Donnell “it is the art of including the subordinates to accomplish their assignments with zeal and confidence. Zeal reflects ardors, earnestness and intensity in execution of work; confidence reflects experience and technical ability.” (Leadership PPT, Scribd). Moreover, according to Dwight D. Eisenhower “it is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it” (Forssell, D. 2008). We will now discuss in detail about leader leadership and its characteristics as well as team conflicts and its resolutions.

Leader: A leader is “A person who rules or guides or inspires others”.

A leader is someone who leads strongly, but is not bossy. Someone, who is admirable but not superior, someone who gets the job done, but does not rush. Leaders should understand and identify the values and recognizes the values of the ethical behaviour. As we know, every business has some ethics. Leader is the one who makes the others to follow the ethics in the work place. If he fails to follow ethics and live up to their expectations, it affects the organization’s name and fame. Leader exhibit ethical behaviour powerfully to influence on others actions.

Leadership: Leader ship is an interactive speech that influences the people to follow the values and ethics of the leader towards achieving the common goal and monitors the company in order to make more coherent and cohesive. A leadership is a complex procedure, which involves the following three dimensions.

The leader.

The employee.

The demands of the situation.

Leadership involves in creation of the new ideas and goals and allows others to apply those ideas and a goal in to reality .leadership is challenged by the ability to motivate others frequently over a long period of time, and effectively guiding others. “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.” By Peter Drucker.

Leadership is not an individual’s action, it is a team effort fostered by group discussions, sharing individual views and influencing power by considering the effective strategies and generating a clear vision. Leadership is a combination of the knowledge, values, skills, and behaviors. Everyone has their own beliefs and views on the characteristics of an effective Leader. A group or team may assess leader ship and its success only by depending on how well the characteristics of the leader are Compatible with the characteristics they believe and they follow.

A leader should know his own abilities, and ethics and beliefs, knowledge and value and identify them. For instance, if the team members highly value the quality “trust”, then the leader should be viewed as a Trust worthy person. By knowing his own strengths and weaknesses he can plan to improve those areas where he seems to be weak. “Recognizing strengths and compensating for weaknesses represents the first step in achieving positive self-regard.” By (Warren Bennis & Burt Nanus)

A successful leader will always make effort to learn and practice to improve his skills .the values and ethics that a leader believes defines his character. Trust, confidence, and effective communication are the two most important keys for effective leadership.

Characteristics of a leadership

Following are some of the characteristics that a leader should possess.

1. Co-existence with followership

2. Responsibility

3. Understanding nature

4. Precedence

5. Situation

Co-existence with followership

Leadership is not conferred of ordered but is one to be earned. A person cannot be defined as a leader without having followers. As we, all know that no single person has the same attitude in a group.so the leader should approach his team members or followers according to their style of acceptance and motivate them in order to achieve the common goal.

Responsibility: A leader has complete responsibility on the team members in all circumstances. Because he is the one who directs them and allocates tasks to them to complete the project. He should direct the group without facing any difficulties. Whether its success or failure he is the one who is responsible for it.

Understanding nature: A leader should have the capability of understanding the feelings and problems of the group and also the individuals. This can be done only if he maintains a friendly relation with the group members. “Guide a leader is looked upon as a friend and a philosopher.”

A leader should do his best to fulfill the personal and social needs of his followers.

Precedence: Since leader is the one who should guide his followers, he should be capable to deal with any type of technical skills and personality traits and have the ability to deal with his followers who are of different attitudes and influence them by motivating. Even he should be aware of his limitations and ethics to make his followers trust him.

Situation: Leadership is not a constant pattern. It changes according to the type of the people in the group and the situation in which the group is operating. A leader should be capable of dealing with any type of situation. In some situations, he should be able to take the decisions instantaneously.

Leadership does not exist if there are no leaders and leaders should possess several characteristic to be an effective leader. Some of the characteristic of effective leader are as follows:

Mission: Every leader must know what their mission is so they understand why the organization exist. Every leader should be aware about the mission, mission should also be clear, understandable, descriptive so employees can identify that, and they strive to achieve it.

Vision: A vision should be intellectual enough to encourage people to visualize it but material enough for supporters to comprehend it, recognize it and be prepared to climb aboard to accomplish it. In simple words, vision can be understood as “which direction you want your organization to go?”

Goal: How organization is going to measure the achievement of its mission and vision? Similar to vision, objectives or goals must be operational; that are precise and quantifiable. If your efforts results are not quantifiable, then it will be challenging to recognize if you require accomplished your task or visualization. You might have wasted vital resources following an approach or design without knowing if it actually prospers.

Competency: Your sponsors, staffs, and the community as being a professional in your playing field or an expert in management observe you. If your constituents apprehend you as greatly credentialed–either by educational degree or with specialized experience–and skilled of leading your company to success, it will be more difficult for you to be as appreciated, well regarded, or shadowed. Practically speaking, not all senior managers instantly hold all of the features that spell success. Many front-runners acquire along the way with tough work. As emergencies and tests arise, those at the top of the ladder have key opportunities to exhibit to others that they are in fact, skilled to be front-runners. In reality, greater proficiency achieved as a leader increases more on-the-job involvements.

A strong team: Genuinely, few officials hold all of the skills and capabilities obligatory to exhibit total mastery of every requisite area inside the organization. To accompaniment the areas of paleness, a wise leader accumulates effective groups of experienced, credentialed, and skilled personalities who can supplement any empty space in the leader’s skill set. This capability is what sets leaders spaced out from others. Yet, the leader is required to be eager to confess he lacks definite abilities and go about discovering reliable coworkers to accompaniment those shortages. After constructing the team, the entrepreneur needs to trust that team to comprehend problems, generate resolutions, and to act on them.

Communication skills: It ensures little good to have a solid mission, visualization, and goals and even a concrete budget. If the executive cannot smoothly and effectively deliver his opinions to the investors inside and outside of the business. He must frequently be in touch with important personalities, by email, conferences, or supplementary methods of communication. Of course, the finest method to ensure other individuals receive and comprehend the communication is through face-to-face communications. Receiving out of the workplace or visiting different locations is a unique method of building relationship and sending and receiving communications. “Management by Walking Around,” or MBWA, gathering workers at their workstations or meeting rooms, or joining them for dine are just an uncommon of the countless effective methodologies leaders can practice to develop positive relations with employees.

Interpersonal skills: Successful businesspersons are comfortable connecting to other individuals; they effortlessly create relationship and are at least more overenthusiastic than they are introvert. These features support leaders appear open-minded, pleasant, and calm in their position. Those abilities contribute to staff wanting to work together with their leader. They also support encourage employees to do a better work. When personnel can relate to their manager, they have faith in that their manager is more anxious about them, with their performance, and with their efficiency. Additionally, they have confidence in that they can drive to their manager with difficulties they come across on the work without be afraid of penalties for not knowing in what way to resolve matters. Not all industrialists are skillful at interpersonal abilities. Individuals that are not might discover it supportive to take a way, select a tutor or locate a counselor to help them construct interpersonal expertise. The intangible charge is too high to not to develop these abilities. Additionally, here is where a robust team originates into play. The less knowledgeable leader who is still book learning these skills can count on the team to get out and cooperate with workers, and spread an encouraging approach to help cultivate self-confidence.

A “can do, get it done” attitude: Nothing figures an image of success more than accomplishment, and accomplishment is the number one reason that encourages just about everybody across all cultures. When personnel realize that their manager can lead and direct, has a clear visualization and achievable objectives, and in fact gains outcomes in a timely way, then that individual’s credibility upsurges throughout the business. Businesspersons must humbly exhibit their abilities to give their constituents lawful reasons to appreciate and value their hard work.

Inspiration: Quite frequently, personnel need somebody to look up to for direction, supervision, and inspiration. The businessperson needs to be that individual. I hope that Human Resources have employed enthusiastic individuals. However, there are periods, when many workers need the manager to motivate them by conversation or action. Employees need somebody to look up to, respect, and follow. Even when the production or distribution of services looks like “it is all working fine,” the leader may perhaps at times required to step in individually to offer a recommendation or reassurance to make sure that workers accomplish their jobs in an optimal manner.

Ambition: Sleeping on your achievements is immoral for employee spirits and commercial trustworthiness. Workers need to be repetitively motivated for enhancement and attainment; and they need to see the equivalent and extra in their leaders. When the manager is trailed as somebody who works to accomplish progressively greater goals, personnel will be overwhelmed and more enthusiastic to emulate that behavior. It is a win-win for everybody.