Leadership in the Workplace

Leadership is a very important aspect in any group activity but in some occasions it can fail and jeopardize the smooth running of an institution or a group.  I have personally failed to meet my expectations in my roles as a leader of a group and have attributed this several factors such as shifting my focus due to unimportant issues, concentrating on other peoples work, lack of development on self. Another cause of my leadership failure was poor communication, which resulted from disorientation due to lack of focus, my followers could not possibly understand my intention. I also feared taking some risks and this made me to take some unreasonable actions. I had also developed a tendency  to do only what I had previously tried or has been proven to work and I failed to attempt new innovations which were not key to my initial success.

My credibility as a leader was also wanting and as we all know, when the integrity of a leader ceases the achievement of results becomes more important than the means used to achieve them. I had been manipulating my followers due to lose of empathy as I had lost empathy and in turn they felt used up or taken for granted. My self management was poor as a leader and it resulted in fatigue and stress and it was worsened by insensitive people surrounding me. The perception that leaders are superhuman and running on unlimited energy by others worsened it and I failed to take care of my physical, psychological spiritual and emotional needs. I had also moved away from my initial dream due to lack of fulfillment and fun in my work being due to lack of motivation and I lost fulfillment in leadership.

The most likely reason for my failure was shifting my focus on what was initially important. Whatever jump started me to the top was lost and I was distracted by leadership trappings such as notoriety, praise and fame. I started thinking small due to my focus shift and lost my ability as leader to think big. I micromanaged, got consumed by unimportant things and lost contact with what is happening on the ground, my tendency to perfection (Cole, 2010) worsened this. My inner vision and character made me to be action oriented and I lost touch with development of myself.

My possible solutions to my shift in focus were to focus on several aspects of leadership. I maintained group cohesion by increasing team building activities which ensured the workers were motivated. I also improved their working conditions and ensured I rendered humble services to my followers. Details were organized such that events were scheduled and possible problems could be foreseen. I no longer feared competition from my followers after realizing that in order to achieve my goals work duties must be shared and that I can not do all the work on my own. I also became more imaginative in handling emergencies and on planning how to effectively guide my followers. I gave credit to my followers for what has been achieved because they took part and in return they worked hard .I increased my loyalty to avoid distrust in the team. I also exercised my authority as a leader without instilling fear among the followers.

My proposed solutions worked out well because I looked at myself honestly and after finding out my problems I took the necessary actions. This helped me to avoid any looming disaster and further leadership failure henceforth. It also helped me to sustain a leadership that is healthy and also fulfilling to myself and followers. I also involved my followers in the evaluation my leadership which provided a picture of my failures from an outsider's point of view.

The disparity between success in the workplace and failure in the workplace highly depends on the effectiveness of leadership. Leadership determines whether the organization will make profits or losses or whether it will ultimately achieve or not achieve its laid down objectives. Effective leadership is more than just mere managing and supervising people, assigning tasks, setting decisions and financial administration. Leadership that will see to it that the organization achieves its core mandate and creation of a healthy working environment involves motivating, stimulating, instilling confidence, heartening, building constructive communication and building healthy working relationships.

A leader who wants to succeed in taking the organization to its aspired level must ensure that they believe in the power of teamwork and should develop skills aimed at building and enhancing teamwork. The leader should be flexible such that the leadership style suits different contexts and scenarios and different categories of individuals. Among the chief challenges facing a leader is solving problems within the work place. The problems ranges from financial, administration, resource allocation, people problem among others. Since a leader deals with individuals who are so much different, the leader is prone to encounter hard times dealing with various problems and this becomes the test of leadership. An open mind, integrity that entails trust and respect and a sound ethical system, and good communication skills will be so much important in moments of solving problems.

Leadership involves laying out objectives and combining financial, capital and human resources through the process of achieving the goals. A leader ought to set a performance plan. A performance plan is a tool that is used in the management process; it sets the arena for the individual or organization success. It entails setting expectations and goals so that the individuals will channel their energy and resources towards achieving the laid down objectives. Clear communication of performance standards, goals and objectives is paramount in the processes to ensure its success. At the same time each member of the team should know their job, overall responsibility and the required results and how they fit in the main organization's plan.

A performance plan assists in building partnership between various stakeholders, it sets the phases of success, identifies what workers and leaders ought to do to achieve the objectives and makes it easy to evaluate performance.  A clear specification of the desired results should be stipulated and the time frame of achieving the results, the results expected should directly contribute to the mandate of the organization. The plan also stipulates the measures that will be adopted in case the results are achieved or not achieved; standards and tools of evaluating performance ought to be put in place.

A performance plan is an important aspect of building team work; it details the process of combining all the efforts to achieve the organizations goals. In additional provides opportunities for continuing employee professional and personal development. A flawless performance plan helps workers develop responsible, dynamic, meaningful and participatory teamwork.