There are three learning objectives of leadership that students should know, which are definition of leadership, traits and behaviors of leadership and the different approaches to leadership.
Leadership is the process of influencing others to achieve group or organizational goals. (Williams & McWilliams, 2010, p.277) Firstly, the role of leaders can be described as architect, because they always lead the direction of operate a business or organization. Also, leadership is a position that based on a long period. Therefore, leaders should concern about the change and outcome of the organization. In addition, one of the responsibilities of leaders is that inspiring and motivating the employees. However, some leaders do not pay enough attention to coming up with a smart decision to lead the organization, while they focus on completing the tasks without mistakes.
Secondly, in general, the effective leaders usually are successful with the similar set of traits or characteristics. Such as, they desire to lead and drive the whole team and members. Also, leaders must be educated, so they possess the professional knowledge of business. And therefor, leaders are strong at cognitive ability. The emotional of leaders should be stability, and the personality of leaders is important. For example, they should be self-confidence, honesty and integrity. On the other hand, a leader structures the roles of followers. Such as set goals, give directions, set deadlines and assign task. And the consideration of a good leader can depend on that is the leader friendly, approachable, and supportive and shows concern for employees. Also, a good leader is capable of adapting and fitting the different situations.
Thirdly, there are two different types of leadership, charismatic leadership and transformational ship. In charismatic leadership, the relationship between leader and follower is very strong. This kind of leaders model values consistently with a clear vision. And they expect the employees to perform efficiently and display their confidence by communicating with employees. However, transformational leadership focuses on generating awareness and acceptance of group’s purpose and mission. The followers usually can achieve the performance more than they intended or thought possible. This type of leadership constituted with charisma or idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration.
Google is an American multinational corporation specializing in internet-related services and products. The major revenue of Google is from advertisement. Google made great achievements in search engine. Also it made success of other products, such as Gmail, Android and Google Translate. Google is well known by everyone all around the world, it has an informal corporate culture. And it the most attractive corporation for the graduating students would like to work. Google encouraged their employees to spend 20 percent of their work time on projects that interest them. (Wikipedia, 2013) This approach did work. Google also has many philosophy principles. For example, “you can be serious without a suit”, and “work should be challenging and the challenge should be fun”. (Wikipedia, 2013)
In my opinion, Google should be identified as transformational leadership. Google has more and successful innovations by carrying out the intellectual stimulation. Also, it promoted the performance of company. Google is an idealized work environment for many graduating students in universities.
Leadership is important for the organization, because a great leader can inspire followers to have confidence. Therefore, it can influence the efficiency of group’s performance, and then achieve the goals.
Reference
“Our Philosophy”. Google, Inc. Retrieved June 20, 2010.
Mediratta, Bharat (October 21, 2007). “The Google Way: Give Engineers Room”. The New York Times. Retrieved June 20, 2010.
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