Leadership

Leadership, a critical management skill, is the ability to motivate a group of people toward a common goal. Leadership has sometimes been described as taking people to a place that they would not normally go to on their own. Once a sound strategic planning process has determined what that place should be it is the leader's prime and fundamental responsibility to assure that there is cultural alignment with the vision and that the full resources of the organization are effectively brought to bear to achieve that destination. Leadership has never been an easy proposition. Throughout history observers have wondered if there were enough capable leaders to manage the challenges facing all types of organizations. Today, businesses and organizations face something of a "perfect storm" of problems that have profound implications for current and future leaders. Leadership is a process by which a person influences others to accomplish an objective and directs the organization in a way that makes it more cohesive and coherent. Leaders carry out this process by applying their leadership attributes, such as beliefs, values, ethics, character, knowledge, and skills. Although a person's position as a manager, supervisor, lead, etc. gives him/her the authority to accomplish certain tasks and objectives in the organization, this power does not make that person a leader, it simply makes him/her the boss. Leadership differs in that it makes the followers want to achieve high goals, rather than simply bossing people around. According to a study by the Hay Group, there are 75 key components of employee satisfaction (Lamb, McKee, 2004), it has been found that:

• Trust and confidence in top leadership was the single most reliable predictor of employee satisfaction in an organization.
• Effective communication by leadership in critical areas was the key to winning organizational trust and confidence:

Organizational climate is directly related to the leadership and management style of the leader, based on the values, attributes, skills, and actions, as well as the priorities of the leader.