Leadership Development Tools and Practices Chapter 9

How can leadership be learned? – Leadership success is a mixture of innate ability combined with experience. Our would be leader must have the intellectual ability to be able to understand the leadership task as well as some mixture of personal characteristics in order to interact effectively with followers. Given those basic characteristics, as with any skill, our emerging leader would also need to have the desire to lead, the opportunity to develop those skills and then the opportunity to be in a situation to apply those leadership behaviors.

Behavioral Choice Model: Kurt points out that any leader has a wide repertoire of behaviors from which to choose as he/she attempts to influence potential followers to align their activities with the purposes of the leader. When the leader chooses appropriate behaviors, followers choose to follow. Choosing effective behaviors is a process learned through experience and feedback. Behaviors that result in followers choosing to follow are retained and honed. Behaviors that are ineffective or even counterproductive are discarded. From this model, we can conclude that a motivated individual with basic abilities can learn to lead. Leader’s success is also influenced by the context. I.e. success in one field does not mean success in another.

How do we learn? -

Learning theory / Key points of leadership development
Behaviorism
(stimulus–response) /
  • The theory focuses on the impact of external events (rewards) on the learning of behaviors
  • Rewarding behaviors reinforces those behaviors: thus learning occurs
  • Standards and goals should be clear to the learner
  • Feedback, clear and immediate, is key and is a type of reinforcement
  • For complex tasks, training should be structured in small, incremental steps, leading towards mastery of the task
  • Sporadic rewards are more reinforcing than consistent rewards
  • Ignoring behaviors will cause them to be extinguished in time
  • Punishment should be avoided as its impact on learning is unpredictable

Cognitivism
(mental processes) /
  • The theory examines the internal mental processes involved in learning
  • People have unique mental structures and will therefore learn indifferent ways
  • Learning will occur through repletion and variety
  • Concepts should be structured to present the same skill or concept in avariety of ways – reading, discussion, practice, observing and so on
  • The development of language is a key support for increasing cognitivecomplexity and therefore leadership effectiveness
  • Addressing subtleties and ‘areas of grey’ are important for complexskills such as leadership

Social Learning Theory
(Monkey see Monkey do) /
  • The theory explores how learning can occur by observing others
  • Leadership skills may be learned by observing role models
  • If the role model is attractive, charismatic or admired, observed skillsare more likely to be learned
  • Learning will be influenced by the treatment the role model receivesfor the behavior: the more positive, the greater the learning
  • Learning a skill does not necessarily mean an individual will use theskill
  • Learning must include ‘cues’ of when the learner is to use thebehavior

Androgogy
(Adults learn differently from Children) /
  • The theory focuses on how to make best use of the motivations ofadult learners, setting the learner squarely in the centre of the process
  • Because adults learn differently, the structure and processes oflearning methods should reflect these differences
  • Adults are most motivated to learn when there is immediateapplication of the skills, perhaps to solve a problem or assist with achallenge
  • Adults should help plan their learning
  • The teacher should be more of a facilitator, a peer assisting with thelearning process
  • Learning processes should be built on the past experiences of thelearner

Learning styles
(how individuals differ in learning styles) /
  • Advances the work of cognitivism by proposing four main learningstyles ( Activist, Pragmatist, Theorist, Reflector)
  • The styles interact and a person can move through a cycleincorporating all four styles
  • In practice the individual is likely to rely on one or more styles morethan others
  • Development should be structured to allow learning to occur via eachstyle in order to reach all learners
  • Is a method for learners to assess and understand their own preferredlearning style

Action Learning
(Learning by doing real projects at work) /
  • Focuses on the optimum way to structure learning experiences
  • Learning occurs best when learners combine programmed learningwith the opportunity to solve real-life problems in the workplace
  • Learning and problem-solving skills are typically enhanced through theuse of learning ‘sets’ or small groups, which support each other intheir learning and in addressing their projects
  • Teamworking, communication and feedback are skills that are learnedthrough the sets in addition to technical problem-solving skills, all keycomponents of effective leadership
  • Skills are learned by the individual, but the organization also benefitsfrom the resolution of issues
  • The process of learning is generalized across the organization throughthe learning of many individuals
  • The process is well accepted in many organizations as well as ininstitutions of higher education

Learning Summary

  • Leaders often need to provide leadership across their organization, influencing individuals and teams from other areas, areas over which they have no formal authority.
  • Organizational leadership is substantially different from individual and team leadership in that it may be required to consider organizational purpose, politics and history within the context of the wider community while involving any simultaneous situations within a longer timeframe.
  • A model of social power includes five sources of such power: reward power, coercive power, legitimate power, referent power and expert power.
  • Reward, legitimate and expert power may be viewed as positive and desirable methods to support leadership aims.
  • Coercive power is not likely to be as effective, because of its unpredictable outcomes, while few individuals will find referent power to be a long-term source of support within an organization.
  • Influencing skills are an additional source of leadership success in that they can be employed with little social power but also in conjunction with social power.
  • Kouzes and Posner identified five leadership practices of successful leaders that any leader may successfully employ: model the way, inspire a shared vision, challenge the process, enable others to act, and encourage the heart.
  • Organizational leadership and its associated influencing skills will be of increasing importance to leaders in the 21st century.