WEEK TWO: Types of Leadership
There are various types of leadership roles in an
organization. They extend from the executive leadership role to the project
leader. Each has different sets of responsibilities to the organization and
each leadership role utilizes skill sets that require influencing people to
move the business towards the vision.
This week’s theme focuses on those levels that are most visible to the
students either because they are seen from afar as being on the top or because
they seek to become involved personally: executive, managerial, and team
leaders.
In completing the following learning activity, students will
examine the role of each leadership type and the skill sets associated with
them.
Executive Leader: Are leader that are often seen from afar.
They are the people at the top. Their
role is to design the vision, mission, structure and culture of the
organization. It is their ideas that provide the framework upon which the
manager builds. The job of the executive
leader is to be the social architect. An executive leader creates the vision,
mission, structure and culture and is change agents.
Managerial Leadership: Leaders create followers through influence
while managers lead people and manage things (overlap is the skills needed to
lead people to do things)
Leading Teams: In
this role, guidance, direction, instruction, motivation and leadership are
provided to a group of workers for the expressed purpose of achieving an
outcome.
Learning Activity #1
Read the course material for this week.
Develop and post a list of the characteristics of the
executive leader that distinguish a leader from a manager.
Research and find one leader that you would define as a
successful executive leader as described by the list of characteristics that
you made.
Explain the reasoning for selecting the chosen leader and
for the list criteria used to make the selection.
Learning Activity #2
“Leading from where you are” means taking a leadership role
in any job held.
Take a few minutes to reflect about whether you have ever
led from where you are? Using your
experience in the workplace give an example of when you “led from where you
are.”
Remember leadership in this context means an action that
leads others to an action that benefits the organization but is not necessarily
within the job description. Be sure to
define what “leading from where you are” means.
Be sure to use the course material to support your
reasoning/explanation.
