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September 17, 2017
Leadership Interview Analysis
In this interview on leadership, the interviewee I selected is one of my friends, his name is Zhao Renjie. Zhao has worked in the financial industry for 7 years and is currently the general manager of a business department at a securities company. In the fourth years of Zhao's work, he was sent to Guizhou Province by the head office to set up a new business department. At present, under Zhao?s guidance, the business department has been operating steadily for three years, and its performance has been steadily developing. Therefore, Zhao has a wealth of professional knowledge and management experience in this field and deserves to be shared with others.
With the knowledge of leadership, I will focus on the three dimensions of ?leadership and followership communication styles? to analyze Zhao's leadership, and then, draw relevant conclusions. These dimensions are: 1. Authoritarian, Democratic, and Laissez-Faire Leadership; 2. Task and Interpersonal Leadership; 3. Traits, Situational, Functional Leadership.
“You can't imagine how difficult it is to start a new business department alone!” This sentence is zhao?s opening remarks. Our interview began with his memories of setting up a new business department. Zhao had not been to Guizhou Province before he received the appointment of the head office. When he came to Guizhou with the task of setting up a new sales office, his first thought was not to recruit new employees, but spent a week talking with his team about how to carry out this work. “Only by listening to all useful opinions can we make a good start， even though we have a tight schedule.” Obviously, Zhao does not mind spending more time as a democratic leader in order to gain the rewards of democracy — more support and cohesiveness.
Democratic communication also runs through the day-to-day operations of the sales department. Zhao insists on having two regular meetings a week, Monday and Friday (the head office only requires the general managers to hold a regular meeting once a week in their business department on Monday) and he encouraged everyone to speak out at the meeting. As mentioned in the textbook，researchers have found that democratic leadership is often most effective. It?s associated with increased follower productivity, satisfaction, and involvement. Indeed, it is not uncommon for employees to present constructive suggestions at the regular meetings every week，and his subordinates would invite him into the WeChat Group to discuss some work. But, democratic techniques are time consuming. Thus, after Democratic discussions, overtime often follows. Simply, in China, overtime is no big deal.
When we analyze Zhao's leadership behavior from the perspective of Task and Interpersonal Model, the Blake and McCanse’s Leadership Grid is worthy of reference. According to this theory, communication styles are divided into five categories, basis on the degree of task-orientation and interpersonal-orientation，namely，Impoverished Management, Authority Compliance, Middle-of-the-Road Management, Country Club Management and Team Management. According to interview, Zhao's leader communication style can easily be located into the style of Authority Compliance. This kind of leaders are highly concerned with completion of tasks but demonstrate little concern for interpersonal relationship. The leader believes that efficiency can be achieved only through appropriate work arrangements and the elimination of poor staff. Such a style can increase the output of company in short time but due to the strict policies, high labor turnover is inevitable. In order to achieve the goals of department, Zhao introduced the KPI (Key Performance Indicator) to evaluate the performance of employees. He has also set up some rewards and punishments policies to drive the sector forward. According
to these policies, for instance, if an employee's performance has been below the KPI standard for two months consecutively, he is likely to be fired. In this way, the sales department's performance improved steadily at the beginning of the establishment, but it also paid the cost of employee turnover. Nowadays, outside of work, Zhao will organize staff to carry out outdoor collective activities one to two times per month, such as climbing, Cara OK, and sports, to release work pressure and improve interpersonal relationship. He admitted that he is trying to turn into an intelligent leader with Team management communication style.
Zhao is an introvert and a studious person（As his good friend, I know that clearly.）From the view of Traits and situational approaches to Leadership（Path-Goal theory）, he is unlikely to be a passionate leader or a supportive leader. But his character helps him acquire higher problem-solving skills，expertise and tacit knowledge and to be a achievement-oriented leader or a directive leader. Contemporary research into leader traits has focused primarily on five categories, and ?problem-solving skills? is one of them. According the research, leaders who are better at identify and solving problems are more likely to advance their careers. Experience with problem solving builds tacit knowledge, or understanding how to succeed in a particular environment. However, investigators note that to benefit from experience, leaders must have the ability to draw lessons from that experience. Zhao told me that he always had his moment of quiet introspection. That means he will also consciously think about how to acquire knowledge from experience. In Path-Goal theory, two situational variables are most influential in the selection of an appropriate leadership communication style: the nature of followers and the nature of the task. Diligent in thinking, also let Zhao make strategic adjustments according to the situational change. That's one of the reasons why he decided to conduct skills training and outdoor activities every month according to the employees needs. From a functional point of
view, the high esteem for democracy, the personality of studious, and the experience of building a department， all of these make Zhao play two leading roles in his department: an opinion seeker and a standard setter. In task-related roles, an opinion seeker solicits ideas asks questions information provided by others, and asks assessments of procedure. In group-building and maintenance roles, a standard setter applies standards to the evaluation of the group process. This explains why Zhao insisted on holding two regular meetings weekly and asked employees for advices on making company policy.
In 1974, after analyzing 163traits studies publish between 1949 and 1970, Ralph Stogdill concluded that both personal traits and situational factors influenced leadership. Reviewing the Blake and McCanse’s Leadership Grid theory, leaders generally adopt one leadership style, which they use in most situations. This is called a dominant style. A second orientation from the model may be used as a backup style. A smart leader will “switch” between these two styles depending on the situation. So, if you have the chance to take part in Zhao's regular meeting, you'll sometimes see, after serious discussion about work, Zhao will also asks his staffs for advice about the plan of weekend trips or barbecue.