INTRODUCTION
This paper would be evaluating leadership skill with the focus on Microsoft corporation and its leader in relation the various leadership skills two amongst the leadership skills would be subjected to critical evaluation, efforts would be made to critically evaluate the factors that drives a good leader and how they affect a brand like Microsoft, benefits, limitations, etc and a conclusion of research and findings. Leadership is a major factor that drives the success or failure of an organisation, good leaders foresee (vision) a need for change and forward movement of an organization and influence, inspire, motivate others into participating in strategized activities that can bring about such positive impact (achievement of goal). The best way to be a good leader is by being an example, Microsoft was founded April 4, 1975, by Bill gates ( alongside Paul Allen), the corporation is not only multi-departmental but multinational , that develops licenses, sells computer software, consumer electronics just to mention a few. Its best known software products are the Microsoft Windows line of operating systems (window mobile, vista, 7,8 etc), Microsoft Office office suite(excel, Microsoft office word, ), and Internet Explorer web browser
CRITICISMS OF MICROSOFT Microsoft faced several criticisms which includes; outsourcing to China and India, and their poor working conditions at a factory that manufactures some of Microsoft 's
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My own experience in leadership has been achieved during the last three and a half years working at Lufthansa technic Malta. The company has been operating in Malta for the last 12 years in which there has been a rapid growth in the company operations creating opportunities and developments. For the last two years I’ve had the opportunity to start working as a shop leader, developing my skills and gaining
According to Yukl (Yukl, 2013) one of the many definitions of leadership is “the ability of an individual to influence, motivate, and enable other to contribute toward the effectiveness and success of the organization”. Therefore it is of importance to have an effective leader in an organization to guide the company in the correct direction, in order to achieve the company’s’ main goal.
Good leadership is also important to run a business. Usually, in companies, management stresses more on decision- making skills. They believe a timely and smart decision will help their company to succeed. They forget that implementation of those decisions are as important as making those decision. Without a proper implementation , there will be no results. Like there is a saying that, it’s easier to said than done. Similarly, making a decision will change nothing, its how to get things done in a timely and an effective way will help an organization to accomplish their goals. Leadership is crucial in implementing decisions correctly and successfully.
The basic premise for leadership is the process of influencing other people to follow your lead in order to accomplish a goal. It is about the relationship between the leader and the followers. A good leader tries to motivate people to bring about positive changes revealing a common objective without using coercion or manipulation. Leadership is not about control, but permitting interaction and communication between the leader and the individual followers. With empowering others, leaders build a foundation of collaborative thinking and encourage an atmosphere of personal involvement; a leader can strengthen the respect and loyalty of his or her followers. Leaders can affect this process by applying their own personal characteristics, such
Leadership is defined in Webster’s Dictionary as the “action of leading a group of people or an organization.” Leadership is also the ability to set trends, inspire, motivate, and sway others to produce desired results. There are different styles and ways of performing leadership and a good leader has the ability to take ordinary people, put them all together, and hopefully yield successful results. For organizations to have sustained results from their performance there must be a good balance of business insight, technical and interpersonal skills, and good team dynamics. A leader must know how to use all these areas as well as trust and communicate with their people in
As a growing debate, the question at hand is whether great leaders are born with specific leadership traits, or if one can be taught certain traits over time. According to (Wikipedia.com) the approach of listing leadership qualities, often termed "trait theory of leadership", assumes certain traits or characteristics will tend to lead to effective leadership. I believe that leadership traits such as honest, competent, initiative, inspiring, hardworking, intelligent, and the ability to lead the masses, are some of the leadership traits one should possess. Within this paper, I will examine the overall concept of leadership traits, while observing the traits that were, or can be associated with successful leaders.
Not all leaders are famous like Martin Luther King, most leaders are ordinary people; you can walk down the street and run into someone and not know that they are a very powerful leader. I personally know of a good leader that is an ordinary person; my father. Although some people believe that leaders are born and not made, I believe that anyone can become a leader if they have enough courage and are thick skinned. There are many words that people come up with when they are asked to describe what makes a good leader. The most popular characteristics used to describe a good leader would be a good listener, responsible, and decisive. When you think of what makes a good leader you should also ask what kind of education they have and what
The Trait Approach was the 1st systematic attempt to study leadership. In the 20th century it was known as the “great man” theory. This approach takes a look at the leaders personal attributes such as but not limited to: motivation, energy, intuition, creativity, persuasiveness and foresight. Some of the traits that are essential to this list include: intelligence, self-confidence, determination, integrity and sociability. Thus it focuses mainly on the leader and not on the followers or situations. The strengths of the Trait Approach includes: 1) it is intuitively appealing, 2) it has research to back it’s theory, 3) it highlights the leader, 4) it identifies what the traits of a leader should have and whether the traits we do
A good leader needs to have many particular characteristics. Some of these are obvious, such as that they care about what you are doing and always puts you before themselves. Also another trait of a good leader is that they always keep promises they make. Some of the subtle attributes of a good leader are that they do not hide behind bad news. Moreover, they are easy people to talk to and they have a good if not excellent sense of humor.
The leadership abilities and competencies of a leader are integral parts to the success and effectiveness of their performance and their team and followers. The development of these aspects of leadership is a dynamic process that includes a variety of interpersonal factors (Day, Fleenor, Atwater, Sturm, & McKee, 2014). Such qualities like self-motivation is a requirement to the development of leadership skills in that “identity, meta-cognitive, and self-regulation processes are thought to be crucial to the refinement of knowledge structures and information processing capabilities associated with leadership expertise.” (Day et al., 2014, p. 68) Self-regulation is of particular importance for goal-directed activities and adapting to change (Karoly, 1993). Self-regulatory skills are taken for granted, and most people are not innately effective self-regulators (Latham & Locke, 1991) which can factor into their leadership development. As well personality is said to have an impact on leader skill development and performance through patterns (Mumford et al., 2000) and certain traits to be predictive of effectiveness (Day et al., 2014). What is also important is that Li, Arvey, and Song (2011) “found self-esteem to be strongly predictive of leadership role occupancy across both genders as well as predictive of the rate of leadership advancement for females” (Day et al., 2014, p. 76). All of these are significant underlining factors to leadership development for any
Studies show that many leaders’ failures are attributable to interpersonal skills such as building relationships, leading teams, developing a positive work environment, effective communication and inspiring trust (Eblin, 2011). These skills become even more important when the basic element of the business is the person. It is evident that leaders must master these skill sets to be successful as a leader in their industry.
Leadership is a term on which no one can develop a mutual consensus as it carries a different meaning for ach individual. Some people may consider a person as their leader who is capable of taking them away from hardships, some people may consider the one as their leader who is quite charismatic and can show them dreams of a bright future or some people may consider that man as a leader who can make them progress by devising wise strategies for them etc. There is, somehow, something very common in all the perspectives that are the philosophy behind the definition, which is related to choosing a best of the best person as their leader. Nobody wants to have a person as his leader who doesn’t have knowledge of the needs and aspirations of his
Leadership plays a critical role in the achievement of organizational growth and exhibit the best performance in the industry. Leadership determines the success of an organization as it is important to understand that the companies that perform excellently well in the industry are inspired by the conduct and attitude of their leaders. Leaders need to institute measures and mechanisms that will substantially improve the performance of their companies and project a good corporate image. It is important to acknowledge that corporations never fail but leaders do as they are charged with the primary mandate of ensuring that all the operations of the companies are structured for excellence.
I believe good leaders have the desire and willpower to become an effective leader. Good leaders develop through a never ending process of self-study, education, training, and experience. I think one of a leaders’ main goals should be to inspire their workers into higher levels of teamwork, which can be acquired through continual work and study. Good leaders should constantly be working and studying to improve their leadership skills. Leadership is defined as 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