Management Operations

Comparison between the different roles and characteristics of a manager and a leader.

Leadership is simply defined as an art of motivating or influencing a group of people to act towards achieving a predetermined common objective. However, a leader is an individual that holds a dominating and superior position amongst a group of people, having the power to influence and control that particular group. Leader is also defined as an individual that embodies the methods and techniques of leadership in order to achieve common future goals. The term management can be defined as a process by which the objectives of an organization are accomplished with the help of efficient utilization of present resources whereas, a manager is an individual to which management task is assigned. It is the function of the manager to plan, organize, control or direct possible ways on order to achieve the desired goals of an organization. The different roles of leaders and managers in an organization are explained as below. Order assignment help from our experts!

Characteristic of Manager

• Experience- It is must for a manager to have a professional experience so that it may be possible for him/her to lead the operations of an organization.
• Knowledge-A manager should be knowledgeable enough about the methods by which an organization can be positively managed.
• Reliability- It is a compulsion for a good manager to be reliable enough to the employees. He/She must be available in time of need by the employees and in turn should provide them with all the necessary support.
• Delegation- Delegation of work is to be facilitated by a resourceful manager, so that all  the required targets can be achieved in time (Naomi, and Huiyu, 2018).

Characteristic of Leaders

• Courage- A good leader must be courageous enough to handle criticism and ridicule.
• Confidence- A leader must be confident enough to lead a group of individuals by himself.
• Optimism- Being optimistic about ant situation helps a leader to maintain positive work environment within his/her team (Friedrich, Griffith, and Mumford, 2016).

Role of a leader and function of a manager when faced with different scenarios.

A leader is defined as any individual who can influence a group of people altogether in order to achieve a predetermined goal. Mostly, the role of a leader in an organization is concerned with leading a team of people in order to achieve given goals in time. However, a manager is defined as any individual that works to achieve the objectives of the organization. It is the job of a manager to set goals for the employees. The role of a leader and a manager can be better understood with the help of examples given below.

Situation I (Launching a new product): Consider the case of Rolls Royce, where the company has decided to launch a new product in electric car segment. In this particular scenario, it is the role of a manager to develop required sales strategies and set goals for the leaders regarding the same. It is then the leader to communicate the necessary information regarding the working of design and description of new electric car to team members. It is also the role of the leader to suitably mentor and motivate its team members to ensure their positive performance in the initial sales. It is the role of the manager to increase the customer value of the new brand with the help of educating the public regarding various properties and features of the car in general. A good leader should advise its subordinates to capture initial customer feedback regarding the overall quality of the electric car and communicate the same to the manger. The manger must learn from the shortcomings based on the feedback received and must plan new and improved strategies to accomplish the goals in time. get dissertation help from our experts!

Situation II (Conflict management): In order to develop a new electric car segment like Rolls Royce, have recruited new employees in the workplace and there arose a rivalry between new and old employees which resited in the conflict between them. Here, it is the role of a leader to function as a negotiator between the employees. In this situation a leader must work to present the situation of employees in front of the management. The manager must abide by the rules of the company and come up with necessary solutions. It is the responsibility of a manager to take suitable decisions to settle the conflict. Finally, a leader should facilitate easy communication between both the parties to successfully counter the problems until situation gets normal. Furthermore, it is the responsibility of the manager to develop new strategies to avoid such type of conflict in the future (Rahim, 2017). Hence, the team leader must provide a clear vision to the employees to positively work for the organization.

Theories and models of situational leadership, system leadership and contingency

Leader is a person who is responsible for motivating and influencing team member for effective performance to achieve organisational goals. Leadership theories explains the various traits and skills required by leader for influencing employees to enhance their performance.

Contingency theory: In this theory leader match its leadership style with situation so it does not adapt to the situation. This theory emphasis that leader should choose appropriate leadership style by matching it with the situation (González-Cruz, Botella-Carrubi and Martínez-Fuentes,   2019). Good leader should have ability to evaluate needs of employees and situation in order to effectively influence people in the organisation.

Advantages: Contingency theory is dynamic in nature thus leader can use different leadership styles for different individual and situation.

Disadvantages: In practical contingency theory is complex so become difficult for manager to handle the situation.

Fiedler's contingency Theory: This model matches style of leadership with situation with the help of LPC to get best result out of it.

High LPC Score: It includes such leader that focus on people oriented which means they try to influence people by building strong relationship with them.

Low LPC score: Such leader are task oriented thus influence people by considering task and positional power.

Situational: This theory explains that no single leadership style is applied to all situation so a leader should use various leadership style in order to motivate different individuals (Maurer and London, 2018). Leader should effectively evaluate the task, working environment and other factors for increasing performance of employee for attainment of organisational goals.

Advantages: Enhance employees performance by providing good and flexible working condition.

Disadvantages: Ineffective result in case of task oriented environment.

Hersey and Blanchland's Leadership Styles:

Telling: In this leader inform and explains people about their work.

Selling: In this leader influence people to use of new and innovative idea for achievement of company goals.

Participating: In this style leader encourage ideas and opinion of employees to create feeling of belongingness and part of organization for effective achievement of company goals.

Delegating: In this leader delegate authority and responsibility to employees thus leader involvement is less.

System leadership: This theory is based on sound principle of human behaviour that helps leaders to pursue such leadership that is suitable for every individual thus it helps in enhancing performance of employees (Roe, 2017). Leader by providing good working condition is able to influence employees to work together and coordinate their efforts for achievement of company goals.

Key elements as per situational context

Major product and service launch: For launching new product in case of contingency it can leader can use task oriented leadership style. In case of situational it has to inform about the product, influence them to adapt to new idea, encouraging their view and opinion and providing certain authority for effectively launching of new product. System leadership it has to provide good working environment to pursue employees.

Conflict management: In case of contingency, situational and system leadership leader has to build strong relationship with employees thus has to follow people oriented style.  It has top provide good working condition and strong inter relationship in order to reduce conflicts between employees. Thus, by using such leadership leader is able to effectively motivate and influence employees to enhance its skills and knowledge for attainment of organization goals.

CONCLUSION

It is concluded that there is a large difference in the roles and characteristics of managers and leaders in an organization. It is further concluded that different models of approach in operations management can largely increase the efficiency by which overall business goals are achieved.

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