In the article “Leadership Skills for Driving Innovation”, John R. Ryan argues that creativity, and the ability to nurture it, is going to be the most important leadership skills for the future. The main focus in the article is that you would “never fool yourself into thinking your business doesn't have time or money to foster creativity”. In the article he presents a plan for leaders to unlock innovation in his or her company through collaboration. This focus on spending money to collaborate innovation, even during economic crisis, made me think of other things that could be more necessary. I wonder if what Ryan argues for can lead to “Ethical Egoism”.
Ryan´s plan has many similarities with the “Team Leadership” approach in Northouse´s book. According to Ryan, the right style of leadership is important to create innovation, and the breakthrough ideas almost always arise from collaborative creativity. He does not suggest actually team, but that people inside the organization must collaborate and the steps he presents are applicable in the Team Leadership model. Leadership Decisions is the first step in the model. The leader will decide if he or she should take action or monitor the situation. The leader will also decide if the issue needs task or relational support, and if he or she will intervene internally or externally. The main focus of this article is that the leader needs to take action to handle an insecure future. Ryan aims that the people in the organization need to change how they think (relational) and that the leader provides the followers with the environmental resources that’s needed (externally). In the Team Leadership model means external operations for the team and executive action that the leader acts to prevent any negative changes in the environment from hurting the team. That’s I similar to Ryan view because he suggests that the leader should stimulate collaborative creativity to make the company succeed in an unsettled future. Next step in the Team Leadership model is the Leadership Actions. Ryan states that the leader must give the fundamental resources of people, time, money and intellectual property to succeed with the collaboration. That is comparable with negotiating support (secure necessary resources, support etc.) under the External Leadership Actions in the model. The last step in the model is Team Effectiveness, where development (cohesiveness of the team etc.) is one of the parts. This could be comparable with Ryan´s opinion that people inside the organization must collaborate to be motivated and feel satisfaction during to process to create innovative solutions.
This focus on spending money to succeed with innovation is a strategy to make the company succeed, but could it also be an ethical question? Ryan suggests that companies even during bad times would spend a lot of money on resources for collaborating. Does the Team Leadership Model create a too strong focus on the team that will lead to that the other things are forgotten? How about individual achievements or community good? Obviously, the company must have a strategy to succeed, but to what costs? In Northouse´s book states Ethical Egoism that a person should act so as to create the greatest good for herself or himself. Ethical Egoism is common in some business contexts to make decisions to achieve its goal of maximizing profits. Is the strong focus for innovation only a strategy to succeed or an example of maximizing profits and Ethical Egoism?
- Eva-Lena Juhlin
This is a great post about Team Leadership Model, I really liked how you went through each step and then related it back to the article. I too agree that people inside the organization must collaborate to be motivated and feel satisfaction during to process to create innovative solutions. This theory is something I feel every struggling company should look into being that innovation is one of the key elements for a company to succeed.
ReplyDeleteWhen Lena talks about the Team Leadership Model focusing too much on team and losing focus on other vital areas of the organization I can see where things could go bad. If a company spends too much time innovating and creating new ideas but then forgets about all of the other works in progress, a company can develop a "snowball" effect where they feel the only way to make things better is to focus on the team.
Organizations need to be well rounded in all of their resources and time spent on certain projects. Ethical Egoism is something that all leaders should practice and I believe that in doing so a company will thrive and flourish!
-Kyle Turner
I completely agree with you Kyle. An organization does need to be well-rounded with their resources, but I also do believe the article displays a great example of how innovation can lead to success. More recently companies have been taking the "green" route which has been a good example of ethical egoism (as long as the companies are actually doing good and not just trying to seem that they are!). I do agree that a company can spend too much time focusing on innovation and moving forward when they should be spending time on other projects within the organization. All in all, I believe that a company needs to be well-rounded and focus its resources on multiple projects.
ReplyDelete-Lauren Mowers
I agree with both of you, organizations need to be well rounded in all of their resources. This strong focus on innovation could be a successful plan, but at the same time I think they should have multiple projects in their mind. Maybe the innovation approach does not lead to maximizing profits and Ethical Egoism, but it helps a company to think a new way. The Team Leadership model has a broad format that explains how and if a leader should take action in a certain situation. Maybe the innovation approach is a better use in combination with the team leadership model. A leader can use the model to decide if the innovation is something that benefits the company.
ReplyDelete- Eva-Lena Juhlin
Team building activities for employees at work have many benefits. These activities are specially designed to boost team morale as well as their efficiency and productivity. Here we have some of the best fun ideas for virtual team building activities, to make your office employee engagement event innovative and successful.
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