Leadership is an important task which is concerned with the process of influencing the behavior of subordinates in the direction of goal attainment. Hence, the performance of public sector organizations basically depends, largely on their leadership. However, the performance of public sector organizations of Addis Ababa City Government highlighted sorts of implementation deficiencies in leading organizational performance.
Accordingly, the general objective of this study was to assess challenges of leadership in leading organizational performance in Addis Ababa City Government with 4 specific objectives; those were to identify leadership challenges in leading organizational performance; to describe leadership mindset in leading performance; to assess attitudes of employees towards managing performances and assess to what extent leadership is effective in implementing good governance principles so as to enhance organizational performance. The study employed an explanatory research design with a composite of qualitative and quantitative approaches. Employees and process owners from Micro & Small Enterprise, Education, Health, Construction and Trade bureaus were selected through simple random sampling technique, while bureau heads were selected through availability sampling techniques. The data were gathered through questionnaire, interview and focus group discussion.
Then, 142 sample population were selected as a sample; 136 of them were found to be valid for the analysis, as well 5 bureau heads were incorporated in the interview. Also 10 individuals of FGD were employed with process owners of the selected bureaus of the city government. Mann-Whitney U test was used to compare ordinal data across groups (leaders and employees). The result of the study shows that leaders of the city government are confronting challenges in searching innovative ways of working to improve performance, leaders are also not challenging the employees to try out new ways of doing their task as of the level expected and the leaders’ commitment to good governance is insufficient. This evinces that leaders of the city government are not effective in leading organizational performance whereby, they dearth leadership skills and awareness about the pillars of good governance and its ways of implementation.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Acronyms
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study
1.2 Statement of the Problem
1.3 Purpose of the Study
1.4 Objectives of the Study
1.4.1 General Objective
1.4.2 Specific Objectives
1.5 Research Questions
1.6 Scope of the Study
1.7 Limitation of the Study
1.8 Significance of the Study
1.9 Organization of the Study
CHAPTER TWO: REVIEW OF LITERATURE
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Definition of Leadership
2.3 Review of Leadership Theories
2.3.1. The Trait Theory
2.3.2. The Behavioral Theory
2.3.3. The Contingency or Situational Theory
2.3.4. Transformational Theory
2.4. Effective Leadership Practices
2.4.1. Modeling the Way
2.4.2. Inspiring Shared Vision
2.4.3. Challenging the Process
2.4.4. Enabling Others to Act
2.4.5. Encouraging the Heart
2.5 Likert Styles of Leadership in Organizations
Level 1: Coercive or authoritarian exploitive
Level 2: Benevolent or Rules and Roles
Level 3: Pragmatic
Level 4: Principled
Level 5: Perspectivist
2.6 Performance Measures
2.7 The Relationship between Leadership and Organizational Performance
2.8 Mindset and Leadership
2.9 Empirical Review
2.9.1 Some Studies in Sub Saharan Countries
2.9.2 Local Findings
2.10 Conceptual Framework
CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Description of the Study Area
3.2.1 Geographical Location and Population
3.2.2 Administrative Structure of the Addis Ababa City Government
3.3 Research Design
3.4 Research Approaches
3.5 Population and Sampling
3.5.1 Population
3.5.2 Sampling Frame
3.5.3 Sampling Unit
3.5.4 Sampling Techniques for Quantitative Data
3.5.5 Sampling Techniques for Qualitative Data
3.5.5.1 Sampling Techniques for Interview
3.5.5.2 Sampling Techniques for Focus Group Discussion
3.6 Data Type and Sources
3.7 Data Collection Instruments
3.7.1 Questionnaire
3.7.2 Interview
3.7.3 Focus Group Discussion
3.8 Data Analysis
3.8.1 Quantitative Data Analysis
3.8.1 Qualitative Data Analysis
3.9 Data Presentation
3.10 Ethical Considerations
CHAPTER FOUR: FINDINGS/RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
4.1 Introduction
4.2 Response Rate
4.2.1 Quantitative Result Response Rate
4.2.2 Qualitative Result Response Rate
4.3 Reliability and Validity of the Instrument
4.4 Results of Quantitative Data Analysis
4.4.1 Analysis of Demographic Characteristics of Respondents
4.4.2 Results and Discussion of the Findings
4.5 Results of Qualitative Data Analysis
4.5.1 Challenges of Leadership in Leading Performance
4.5.2 Leaders Mindset in Leading Organizational Performance
4.5.3 The Attitude of Employees towards Managing Performance
4.5.4 Organizational Performance in terms of Good Governance Pillars
CHAPTER FIVE: SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
5.1 Introduction
5.2 Summary of Findings
5.3 Conclusion
5.4 Recommendations
5.4.1. Addis Ababa City Government
5.4.2. Bureau Leaders
5.4.3. Future Researchers
REFERENCES
Acronyms
illustration not visible in this excerpt
Acknowledgements
Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!
For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor?
Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again?
For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory forever. Amen.
Romans 11:33 - 36
I would like to thank the following individuals, without whom this thesis would not have been realized:
First and foremost, I owe an immense gratitude to my supervisor, Dr. Waqgari Negari for his counselling, timely response and friendly approach during the courses of this study. His intex llectual disposition and wide experience was brought to bear on, and greatly influenced, the yield of this thesis. His ability to view things pragmatically was critical and priceless to the success of this study and needs to be praised.
Secondly, I am forever indebted to my parents, Endale Kebede, and Yewubdar Fanaye, for their unconditional love, support and encouragement, which has been pursued from my childhood. Similar sentiments goes to my adorable sister Azeb Endale, for her support and moral courage throughout the course of my study. You guys were truly my inspiration and were ultimately responsible for my success in life. I also render gratitude to my future spouse Tsigereda Bekele, for her understanding and patience throughout my studies.
Last but not least, to employees and leaders of Micro & Small Enterprise Bureau, Education Bureau, Health Bureau, Construction Bureau and Trade bureau of Addis Ababa City Government, I am thankful for your cooperation via availing valuable information and gesture during data collection process to this end.
"Thank you all indeed"
Israel Endale
Abstract
Leadership is an important task which is concerned with the process of influencing the behavior of subordinates in the direction of goal attainment. Hence, the performance of public sector organizations basically depends, largely on their leadership. However, the performance of public sector organizations of Addis Ababa City Government highlighted sorts of implementation deficiencies in leading organizational performance. Accordingly, the general objective of this study was to assess challenges of leadership in leading organizational performance in Addis Ababa City Government with 4 specific objectives; those were to identify leadership challenges in leading organizational performance; to describe leadership mindset in leading performance; to assess attitudes of employees towards managing performances and assess to what extent leadership is effective in implementing good governance principles so as to enhance organizational performance. The study employed an explanatory research design with a composite of qualitative and quantitative approaches. Employees and process owners from Micro & Small Enterprise, Education, Health, Construction and Trade bureaus were selected through simple random sampling technique, while bureau heads were selected through availability sampling techniques. The data were gathered through questionnaire, interview and focus group discussion. Then, 142 sample population were selected as a sample; 136 of them were found to be valid for the analysis, as well 5 bureau heads were incorporated in the interview. Also 10 individuals of FGD were employed with process owners of the selected bureaus of the city government. Mann-Whitney U test was used to compare ordinal data across groups (leaders and employees). The result of the study shows that leaders of the city government are confronting challenges in searching innovative ways of working to improve performance, leaders are also not challenging the employees to try out new ways of doing their task as of the level expected and the leaders’ commitment to good governance is insufficient. This evinces that leaders of the city government are not effective in leading organizational performance whereby, they dearth leadership skills and awareness about the pillars of good governance and its ways of implementation. Also, leaders are not working towards setting personal example of themselves, the recognition system of the city government has a problem in that, there is no consistency and well-established system to encourage best performers, the value that leaders giving for employees learning and asking for feedback from employees about the effect on their action is not to the expected standard. This reveals that leaders place little value in developing staff, and in turn foster a fixed mindset environment. In addition, organizational performance of Addis Ababa City Government in terms of good governance pillars of transparency, responsiveness, consensus building and accountability fall on low level. With due respect, these findings imply the existence of leadership challenges and ineffective leadership practices in the city government. Finally, the recommended solutions, is to strengthen monitoring and evaluation mechanism to fill the gap of performances, to develop leadership development programs and the leaders should equally continually strive to develop effective and best practice leadership qualities that would make their leadership total quality driven.
Key terms: Organizational Performance, Leadership Challenges, Leadership Practice
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study
Leading performance in the last two decades in developing countries proved to be challenging due to several variables that ushered considerable changes. The introduction of reforms was ultimately seen as necessary because of the perceived inability of governments to address the day to day problems resulting in the erosion of public confidence (OECD, 2001).
Coming to countries located in the Sub-Saharan region of the African continent, Ghana has since the 1980s implemented a series of reform programs to enhance organizational performance of public sectors. In 1997, the government implemented the Public Sector Re-Invention and Modernization Strategy so as transform public sectors, their accountability, organizational performance framework and their relationship with the private sector and civil society (Report of the World Bank Task Force on Capacity Development in Africa, 2005).
Similarly, the Public Service of Tanzania continued to face numerous challenges in leading organizational performance. These included poor service delivery to citizens, low accountability manifested by corruption, in some cases embezzlement and negligence, and poor performance in most of the public service institutions. As a result, this situation forced the Government to embark on performance related reforms, in the form of the Public Service Reform Program in the 1990s (World Bank, 2008).
In the Ethiopian context, modern administrative system was introduced during the times of Emperor Menilik in 1901. Then, Emperor Haile Selassie (1930 - 1974) augmented his predecessor's initiative both in qualitative and quantitative aspect (MoCB, 2010). Basic legal frame works and regulation that were embarked in the mid-1960s focusing on meritocracy and having a civil service with a well-defined system, but it was not practiced and developed due to the influence by the feudal system in the country. Later, the Military rulers (1974-1991) who followed the feudal government further contributed to the failure of the civil service as a system. Throughout this period meritocracy was eroded, pay differences were minimized and pay increase was entirely abandoned specially for professionals, and the civil service was highly centralized (Asmelash, 2000).
Following the fall of the Dergue regime in 1991, the present ruling government (EPRDF) has embarked upon reforming the public sector in Ethiopia to make them more responsive to the needs and demands of the public (pro-citizen). To this end the government identified six priority areas that call for strategic intervention in the context of Public Sector Capacity-Building Program (PSCAP). These are: Civil Service Reform, District-Level Decentralization, Urban Management Capacity Building, Justice System Reform, Tax Systems Reform Information and Communications Technology.
Among the intervention areas, the civil service reform sub-program (CSRP) is a cross section issue of multi-faceted reforms intended to build and strengthen public sector capacity for the attainment of the Government's socio-economic development goals and objectives. The overall objective of the CSRP is to enhance the capacity of the civil service so that it will be effective, efficient, transparent, accountable, ethical, performance oriented, and that it promotes good governance (MoSC, 2013)
However, researches conducted by the Government in 1995 have indicated that civil service institutions were said to have been managed poorly and operating below capacity. The study recommended that the Ethiopian Civil Service Reform needed to focus on improving the capacity of the top Management System, civil service ethics, efficiency of service delivery, expenditure management and capacity of human Resource Management Sub-program. All these five components of the Civil Service Reform Programs were considered vital in building accountable and responsible civil service that can promote the development endeavor of the country (MoCB, 2004).
In 1998/99 a study conducted by a task force organized to assess the situation of the civil service performance management system revealed the following weaknesses: the system is focusing on employee behavior rather than the actual job performance, it involves subjective measurement criteria rather than judgment based on objective measures, its objective is not forward looking to identify staff development, there is no systematic review of appraisal results, there is no proper feedback system, it does not include organizational and team performance measurement system Consequently, in 2001/02 the government adopted the implementation of Result Based Performance Management System (RBPM) in the public sector. However, the evaluation result of the system revealed that the implementation was not successful to attain its intended objectives. The major problems identified were: the ratings were not based on concrete evidences, development of the system was not based on strategic plan of the institutions and it does not include organizational and team performance measurement system (ibid). This implies the importance of measuring performance at organization level, at department or team level and at individual level. In response, government tried to add a new initiatives like BPR and BSC Reform Programs with the aim of developing, efficient and effective civil service through institutional reforms (MoSC, 2013).
However, the Ethiopian public service institutions have tried to enhance its organizational performance through different reform packages. Getachew and Rechard (2006) indicated that the progress of the reform programs and the effectiveness of organizational performance are also uneven and have large variations among regions. According to them, the real challenges are associated to lack of effective leadership and lack of adequate good governance.
Unfortunately, the Addis Ababa City Government is no exception to the abovementioned environment. According to the 2014/15 report of the city government, weak performance of public sectors in the city are attributed to ineffective leadership and lack of good governance in service delivery.
Therefore, the major concern of this study is assessing organizational performance of the selected bureaus in Addis Ababa City Government by using the eight good governance principles developed by United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP, 2013).
1.2 Statement of the Problem
Performance management enables organizations to ensure effective utilization of resources, efficiency in their processes and brings about acceptable results. But as indicated in the background of the study, performance measurements are not given attention in integrated way and lack of effectiveness in leading organizational performance is a common problem in Ethiopia. For example, a study by Getachew and Richard (2006) on the challenges of civil service reform in Ethiopia revealed that lack of effective leadership, lack of adequate knowledge & skill affect leaders in leading performance. However, this study is limited to see performance by identifying the sub-component of the programs more relating with BSC in its analysis, it didn’t see pillars of good governance in measuring performance.
Similarly, a study by Zerihun (2015) on effective leadership and organizational performance has indicated that many of the government organizations have challenged in leading organizational performances. According to him, the major problems responsible for this state of affairs have been identified as lack of motivation and communication of the vision, commitment to reform is inadequate, many institutions are lacking visionary leadership, and the accountability relationship between government and public service providers has not been clarified. Moreover, the writer has underlined the necessity of undertaking a similar study in another context.
Besides, Tesfaye and Atakilt (2012) on result based performance management in Ethiopia indicated that performance management system is disconnected at the top that weakened accountability of leaders in the public sector. Besides, agencies responsible for performance management have not developed systems to monitor and evaluate performances of public organizations and their leaders. However, this study has not indicates the relationship of leadership and performance management.
Another study by Hilena (2015) on leadership challenges in implementing organizational change in Ethiopian Electric Power Utility indicates that the challenges leaders face in leading organizational performance results from poor working culture, fixed mindset, inadequacy of skilled man power, the existence of unethical(corrupt) behavior, incompetency in decision making activities and resource constraint. But this research did not forward challenges in leading performance in light of good governance pillars.
Coming to Addis Ababa City Government, Meheret (1999) noted that the public sectors in the city faces performance problems that have prevented it from providing efficient governance and improving the level and quality of services. According to him, a brief discussion of some fundamental organization and leadership problems is in order as a prelude to suggesting possible solutions to reform the performance of public sectors of the city. This study suggested that other studies have to be carried out to further assess challenges of leadership in leading organizational performance.
Besides, the researcher also has some experiences of learning the challenges in leading public sector performance; which manifest in the form of poor public service delivery, lack of good governance and mal- administration of public resources.
Hence, the gaps identified by the local studies and the experiences of the researcher call for this research to be conducted the study and contribute some solutions to solve the challenges in the area of leadership.
1.3 Purpose of the Study
The purpose of this study is to uncover challenges of leadership in leading organizational performance in Addis Ababa City Government. With due respect, the outcomes of this study could indicate the practices and major challenges of leadership in leading organizational performance, attitudes of employees towards managing performances and the extent of leadership effectiveness in implementing good governance principles.
1.4 Objectives of the Study
1.4.1 General Objective
The general objective of this study is to assess the challenges of leadership in leading organizational performance in Addis Ababa City Government.
1.4.2 Specific Objectives
This study specifically attempts to:
- identify leadership challenges in leading organizational performance.
- describe leadership mindset in leading performance.
- assess attitudes of employees towards managing performances.
- assess to what extent leadership is effective in implementing good governance principles so as to enhance organizational performance.
1.5 Research Questions
The researcher will intended to answer the following questions after her study:
- What are the challenges of leadership in leading organizational performance?
- What are leaders’ mindset in leading organizational performance?
- What are the attitudes of employees towards managing performances?
- To what extent leadership is effective in implementing good governance principles to enhance organizational performance?
1.6 Scope of the Study
The scope of the study is delimited to five bureaus (Micro & Small Enterprise, Education, Health, Construction and Trade bureau) of Addis Ababa City Government. The rationale is that these bureaus are identified as key sectors of the city government because of their largest impact on the development of the city. The target populations of the research were comprised bureau heads, process owners and employees working at different levels of the selected bureaus. The issue to be addressed was practice and challenges of leadership in leading organizational performance by using the 8 good governance pillars as operational variables.
1.7 Limitation of the Study
In undertaking this study the researcher confronted some limitations associated with data gathering. Respondents were busy due to multiple managerial roles. Furthermore, few questionnaires were unreturned though their number is insignificant to affect the research findings and some challenges were observed to interview bureau heads of the selected organizations. Also the researcher faced difficulties to find related studies in the area of pillars of good governance in Ethiopian context.
1.8 Significance of the Study
The central theme of this paper is to assess the challenges of leadership in leading Organizational Performance in the Addis Ababa City Government. Hence the findings of this study will be useful to the stakeholders including:
- Addis Ababa City Government: It helps the city government to identify major challenges of leadership in leading oorganizational performance of the five selected bureaus of the city government so that similar assessments can be conducted in other sectors in providing more information and it also enables the city administration to know what kind(s) of policies, strategies, and solutions should be framed.
- Bureau Leaders: Importantly, the finding of the study is expected to give appropriate information for leaders of the study area to use as evidence to take suitable measure against the practice and challenges in leading organizational performance of their respective Bureaus.
- Future Researchers: It use as a reference for those who are interested to conduct further study on the problem. It will also be an indicative document and may develop empirical data.
1.9 Organization of the Study
This Paper organized into five chapters as described below. Chapter one comprises background of the study, statement of the problem, purpose of the study, objective of the study: general and specific, research questions, limitation, significance of the study, and definition of key terms. Chapter two presents, the review of related literature on theoretical frame work, empirical studies and conceptual frame work. The third chapter presents, the research design and methodology, source of data, process of data collection, the instruments used for data collection and the system to analyze data. Chapter four deals with the results and discussion of the result of the study. Chapter five presents summary of the findings, conclusion and recommendations.
CHAPTER TWO: REVIEW OF LITERATURE
2.1 Introduction
This chapter of the study will provide relevant literature from different publications of scholars and documents that the study considered. The chapter is divided in to three sub categories. The first part of the chapter presents the theoretical literature that are related to the challenges of leadership and organizational performance in public sector organizations, the second chapter presents the empirical studies conducted in the area of the challenges of leadership and organizational performance in the situation of different countries and the third part presents analytical framework of the study.
2.2 Definition of Leadership
Leadership has many and diverse definitions given by different scholars at different times that it is elusive in getting a single working definition. However, the diverse definitions given at different times are the reflection of the mindset, as there are development, there are changes in the way we see and define things. For instance: as Rauch & Behling (1984) leadership is defined as the process of influencing the activities of an organized group toward goal achievement. According to this definition, leadership is all about inspiring others to undertake some form of purposeful action as determined by the leader. Kouzes and Posner (1993) pointed that leadership is a reciprocal relationship between those who choose to lead and those who choose to follow. This definition evinces that leadership is an influence relationship between leaders and followers who intend real changes that reflect their mutual purposes.
More recently the leadership concept and definition is reviewed by many others. For example: according to Yukl (2010) leadership is the process of influencing others to understand and agree about what needs to be done and how it can be done effectively, and the process of facilitating individuals and collective efforts to accomplish the shared objectives. For the purpose of this study, the researcher uses this definition.
2.3 Review of Leadership Theories
Starting from early 20th century numerous leadership theories have been evolved by scholars and practitioners who define, and explain the importance of leadership. In the recent literature of leadership there have been four major generations of theory: Trait theories, Behavioral theories, Contingency theories and Transformational theories. Accordingly, a fleeting review of these theories are presented below.
2.3.1. The Trait Theory
The Trait Approach arose from the “Great Man” theory as a way of identifying the key characteristics of successful leaders. It was believed that through this approach critical leadership traits could be isolated and that people with such traits could then be recruited, selected, and installed into leadership positions. This approach was common in the military and is still used as a set of criteria to select candidates for commissions (Bolden et. al, 2003). The problem with the trait approach lies in the fact that no consistent traits could be identified. How, for example, do we measure traits such as honesty, integrity, loyalty, or diligence? Another approach in the study of leadership had to be found.
2.3.2. The Behavioral Theory
Behavioral theory emphasizes what key behavioral patterns result in leadership. This theory is different from traits in that successful leadership is based in definable, learnable behavior than in born traits Behavior theory traces on what effective leaders do rather than figuring out who effective leaders are (Robbins, 2003). The behavioral theorists posits that persons could be trained to be leaders because behaviors, unlike traits, can be trained. It is through the understanding of behaviors of leaders that one may classify leaders under different categories (Bolden et al., 2003).
2.3.3. The Contingency or Situational Theory
Whilst behavioral theories may help leaders develop particular leadership behaviors they give little guidance as to what constitutes effective leadership in different situations. Indeed, most researchers today conclude that no one leadership style is right for every manager under all circumstances. Instead, contingency-situational theories were developed to indicate that the style to be used is contingent upon such factors as the situation, the people, the task, the organization, and other environmental variables (Bolden et. al, 2003). The theory states that instead of using just one style, successful leaders should change their leadership styles based on the maturity of the people they're leading and the details of the task. Using this theory, leaders should be able to place more or less emphasis on the task, and more or less emphasis on the relationships with the people they're leading, depending on what's needed to get the job done successfully (Hersey et al., 2006).
2.3.4. Transformational Theory
This theory is among the modern views of leadership philosophies. For instance, Burns (1978) who considered as the founder of transformational leadership theory viewed transformational leadership theory as the involvement of leaders in inspiring followers to commit to a shared vision and goals for an organization or unit. This theory focuses on the change and the role of leadership in envisioning and implementing the transformation of organizational performance. According to Bass & Riggio (2006), such leaders provide their associates with a sense of purpose that goes beyond a simple exchange of rewards for effort provided. They convince their associates to strive for a higher level of achievement as well as higher levels of moral and ethical standards. Through the development of their associates, they optimize the development of their organization as well. High performing associates build high performing organizations.
To sum up, whatever each of these theories has their own weakness and strength, they comes incrementally from “Trait” theories to “Transformational” leadership. The early theories tend to focus upon the characteristics and behaviors of successful leaders, later theories begin to consider the role of followers and the contextual nature of leadership. Therefore, transformational leadership has the potential for building a high level of commitment in followers in relation to the complex and uncertain nature of the organizational performance. Accordingly, the transformational leadership model of (Kouzes and Posner, 2002) which is based on years of empirical research, includes a series of qualities that must be possessed and practices that must be applied to provide an organization in every organizational leadership guidance on how to lead as well as practical suggestions of how to act during difficult situations.
2.4. Effective Leadership Practices
Based on the results of extensive research on the practices and skills of effective leadership in public and private organization, Kouzes and Posner (2002) have identified five practices of effective leaders. Hence, different scholars have suggested the importance and validity of this practices. For instance: according to Wart (2009) the leadership practice theory employed by Kouzes and Posner represent another approach in the transformational school and their approach is universal and empirical. With this regard, the five leadership practices identified by Kouzes and Posner are briefly presented as follow:
2.4.1. Modeling the Way
Leader modeling, or setting the example, has a dramatic impact on the effectiveness of the organization being led. In modeling the way, effective leaders know their own voice and are deeply committed to their beliefs, values and principles. Effective leaders’ act as a model for their followers and shows observable commitment to their organization. In doing so, they develop committed and loyal followers in their organization that work towards the achievement of organizational Performance (Kouzes & Posner, 2002).
2.4.2. Inspiring Shared Vision
According Kouzes and Posner (2002), once the leader establishes a vision, he or she must enlist others in the vision. In developing a shared vision, effective leaders encourage constituents to examine the big picture rather than simply focus on the here and now. Effective leaders encourage others to envision where they want to be or where they want to go in their futures. Recognizing that they alone cannot lead an organization to success, effective leaders successfully communicate the need for a team effort in accomplishing a shared vision. Effective leaders listen to their constituents, encourage them to commit to the organization’s work, and help them feel satisfied as contributing members of the organization.
2.4.3. Challenging the Process
Challenging the process includes searching for opportunities, experimenting, taking risks, and confronting and changing the status quo. Leaders search for opportunities for themselves and others to exceed their previous levels of performance. Leaders who challenge the process are continuously searching for opportunities to improve and innovate, with little fear of experimenting and taking risks. Such leaders are proactive and unwilling to settle for the status quo. Effective leader help people learn from their mistakes, continuing towards success. Ultimately, leaders must build a commitment to the challenge of reaching new heights, supporting constituents along the way (ibid).
2.4.4. Enabling Others to Act
Enabling others to act involves, fostering collaboration by promoting cooperative goals and mutual trust as well as strengthening others by sharing power and information. When leaders who have not shared power and information try to be open and honest, their messages are perceived to be fabrications. Leaders who desire excellence realize that they must empower people to achieve excellence. Thus, establishing a culture of interdependence simply indicates that individuals rely on one another to accomplish the shared goals of the organization, recognizing that everyone must contribute in order for the organization to be successful. Finally, effective leaders create opportunities for various interactions so that individuals can network with one another, sharing their experiences and expertise as well as celebrating their accomplishments (ibid).
2.4.5. Encouraging the Heart
Encouraging the heart involves recognizing contributions and celebrating accomplishments. Recognizing contributions involves focusing on the organization’s shared vision and goals, expecting the best of others in their efforts to meet the established goals, paying attention to the work of others by listening to them and showing your care, and recognizing their efforts through thoughtful and creative ways. In addition to recognizing the contributions of others, effective leaders celebrate the victories of the organization. Such celebrations build a sense of community, make lasting memories of success, reinforce the goals of the organization, and demonstrate that the leader is aware of the contributions of her/his constituents (ibid).
2.5 Likert Styles of Leadership in Organizations
There are many styles of leadership by different scholars. This organizational development model is based on the Rensis Likert scale, known as Likert or Five Evolutionary Levels of Organizational Development (UNDP, 2005) and further developed and refined by Dennis Emberling. The stages of development clearly show the degree of autonomy prevailing in the organizations characterized by the styles; in particular around decision-making and the degree to which people are involved in the decision (Likert, 1967). Based on this model, there are five possible leadership styles referred to as levels and defined as follows:
Level 1: Coercive or authoritarian exploitive
The leader is highly authoritative and does not trust the subordinates. Decisions are made exclusively at the top of the organization. Communication takes the form of top-down commands. Managers requires harsh discipline and are not interested in initiative and opinions of subordinates (Hall and Leidecker, 1981). The managers entrust little confidence in their subordinates and in return, the subordinates fear their superiors and feel that they are inferior or different from them. The attitude of the leader (as dictator) is that employees are animals and machines to be used; more can be found to replace them (UNDP, 2005).
Level 2: Benevolent or Rules and Roles
The authoritative element still dominates, although some decision-making is delegated. Bureaucracy at its lowest form, obey rules no matter what (show no initiative or creativity), don’t make mistakes. Process is emphasized over outcomes. Continuity and reliability can be positive aspects of this level. The benevolent autocrat sees himself as a superior father figure who makes all the important decisions and then convinces his subordinates to go along with them. He may allow some decisions to be made by some subordinates within a framework set by him. Rewards as well as punishments may be used to 'motivate' people (Likert, 1967).
At this stage the weaknesses seen in the previous stage are corrected and rules and roles are crafted to be followed by everyone including the leader. Activities are managed through bureaucratic means focusing on process.
[...]
- Quote paper
- Israel Endale (Author), 2016, Assessment of Leadership Challenges in Leading Organizational Performance in the Public Sectors. The Case of Addis Ababa City Government, Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/434687
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