Leadership

PSYCH 485 blog

Leadership Training from Teachings of The Wizard of Westwood

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wooden pyramid.jpg

          Just like almost every other kid in America I’ve also had to opportunity to get involved in a number of organizations in both high school and college.  These have included the Boy Scouts of America, a fraternity in college, Penn State’s Dance Marathon, and Campus Crusade for Christ.  The one thing all of these organizations have in common is that they seek to turn ambitious kids into leaders.  While this isn’t their primary purpose for existence, it’s crucial to the success of the individual organizations.  Many times this leadership training involved going away to a camp or a seminar to be “taught” how to lead.  This notion that a person can learn what they need to know to lead is known as the skills approach to leadership (Northouse, 2013).

                The Wooden Institute is a 4 day long leadership conference organized by the Beta Theta Pi Fraternity.  The skills that are presented at this retreat are based on the theories of the late John Wooden (nicknamed the Wizard of Westwood), former head coach of the UCLA Men’s Basketball Team.  One point to be made regarding interpreting the lessons of John Wooden is that while his lessons in success and leadership were life lessons, he used basketball as his canvas.  The word “skill” in his “pyramid of success” refers to the natural athletic ability of a player (more like the trait approach to leadership).  In either case, John taught all of these building blocks to his players (Biro, 2001).  At the Wooden Institute these lessons were passed onto us in preparation for future leadership roles in our organization. 

These skills of self-control, friendship, team spirit, and the rest are at the conceptual level of the three skill approach designed by Robert Katz.  These types of skills are more necessary at the middle and upper levels of leadership where more of a directional vision is required (Northouse, 2013).  This probably indicates that the fraternity expected the people attending this conference to become very successful, higher level leaders either in their individual fraternity chapters or later in their careers.  Building up strong leaders is important for every organization especially one like a fraternity in which nearly every day to day decision is made by the undergraduate members.  Using my past leadership role as a THON chair I can recall numerous times when I used the lessons learned on this long weekend to get the group together and on the same page.  I believe that the skills approach to leadership is a very valuable and useful tool for organizations to use in ensuring proper preparation for leadership.  In my opinion many aspects of leadership can be taught.

Biro, B. (2001). Beyond success: The 15 secrets to effective leadership and life based on the legendary coach john wooden’s pyramid of success. Penguin Publishers.

Northouse, P. G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice (6th edition). Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications.

Are Leaders Born or Made?

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After study both the Trait Approach and Skill Approach to Leadership, I am left puzzling over the idea of whether someone is born a leader or if anyone can learn to be a leader.  The Trait Approach looks at personality while the Skill Approach looks at competencies (Northouse 2012).  Personally, I lean more to the side of the Trait Approach because I have seen too many individuals in leadership roles who were not effective leaders.  There are also many examples in history of men and woman with no training in leadership who were incredibly effective leaders.

Business programs in colleges are filled with leadership courses teaching both principle and practice.  Smith and Forbes (2001) worked to create a leadership course within an MBA curriculum based on the Skills Approach.  After a trial class they found that the most effective course of action was to assess their traits through testing (such as the Myers-Briggs personality assessment) and the student’s career goals.  From the collected information a course of action would be put into place that would use both the student’s traits and personal goals to create an MBA program to suit their needs.

To me this shows that an effective leadership program is a combination of both the Trait and Skill Approach.  It lends to the idea that there needs to be certain personality traits in an individual that can be augmented through skills training.  You cannot teach things like charisma, but you can teach someone with charisma how to communicate more effectively. 

Something else that is often overlooked about leadership is that a leader is not doing it alone.  Taking the President of the United States as an example (and I am looking more at the title then the individual) he has a staff and a cabinet that help him stay up to speed on what is going on and give there expert opinions on situations that come up.  It is not a single individual in a room alone deciding how the country will react to something, but a group of people working together towards a common goal.  This holds true even looking at most businesses.  A boss usually has support staff and managers that serve under him and are looked to for opinions on business related decisions.

In conclusion, I would just like to say that I don’t think a leader is born or made, but instead is a combination of both ideas.

 

 

References

Northouse, P. G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice (6th edition). Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications.

Smith, J. E., & Forbers, J, B. (2001). Creating a competency-based leadership and managerial skills program: A model for smaller schools. Journal of Management Education, 25(2), 209-230. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/195727192?accountid=13158

 

We’ve Got Skills

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            Everyone has different skill sets that help them in their individual positions of work. The Three-Skill Approach by Katz (1955) identifies three basic skills for leadership- Technical, Human and Conceptual. These three different types of skills can be easily identified in the company that I work for. These skills are not set and can be developed through the skills approach.

            At the supervisory level of management in our company there is a high level of technical and human skill required.  These individuals are very active and interactive on the sales floor with employees and customers. Technical skill in our store would have to do with knowing our products and how to use them in a technical sense. If someone walks into the store and asks how to change out their toilet or hot water heater or how to patch a hole in the wall it is important that the staff be able to get them all of the products that they would need as well as assist them in the instruction of how to use it.  This is one area that is easiest to teach to existing and new employees. Each individual has training days in our store. On those days there is specific time set aside for technical training on the computer. There are multiple programs aimed at all of the different areas in the store like painting, plumbing, landscaping, power tools etc. At the supervisory level it is also important for these individuals to possess human skill. The ability to work with people is important for working with the other employees and being able to handle the customers in different situations (Katz, 1955). This, unlike the other two skills, is important at all levels of management-supervisory, middle and top management (Katz, 1955). 

            Middle management may be the most difficult, as this level requires a high level of all three. Recently I was in a situation where I had to spend time with one of the middle managers. He has been with the company for two years. He was covering for another manager on leave. He had to call me from two hours away to complete simple manager tasks. He did not possess the technical skills for receiving in orders or placing an order. I was able to teach him how to complete these technical tasks while using my human and technical skills. This demonstrates a lack of skills at the middle management level that I recently found and remedied with use of my own skills.

            The final level, Top Management, must demonstrate high levels of conceptual and human skills with less of an emphasis on technical skills (Katz, 1955). This can also be easily seen in the company that I work for. When the company was established 25 years ago there was one store. Thanks to the vision and conceptual skills of the owner and board of trustees, the company has expanded to 10 stores. There is a vision for the future of the company and having upwards of 25 stores. Without the conceptual and human skills of the owner and board there is no way that this goal can be achieved. There is less of a technical skill required at this level as the owner has very little interaction with customers that need technical assistance.

            Technical skill, human skill and conceptual skill have their importance at all levels of management. If one takes a close look at any company these skills can be seen in many managers if they are effective. One important idea of this approach is that these can be learned. The technical, human and conceptual skills are not set in stone in this approach, the can be learned and developed.

References:

Katz, R.L. (1955

References:

Katz, R.L. (1955). Skills of an effective administrator. Harvard Business Review,  33 (1),  33-42.

Dear Abbey

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The following scenario is derived from Leadership Theory and Practice, 5th Edition by Peter G. Northouse. (Case 3.1)

Dear Abbey,

My colleague, Dr. Adam Wood is the main investigator on a 3-year, $1 million federally funded research grant. Dr. Wood usually works alone, but for this project, he has 11 members in his team. There are two co-investigators (with PhDs), four intervention staff (with MAs), and five general staff members (with Bas).

Dr. Wood and his team have worked together for a year. The project is obviously underfunded and overextended. Team members are working more hours than they can be paid for; they are committed to the goals of the project.

 Dr. Wood has quite the reputation for research in health education. He publishes often. People seek his expertise and his advice. He is known for “big picture thinking.” Dr. Wood has become frustrated by his team. He dislikes many of the daily tasks that he is forced to do. Recently, he lashed out at our project meeting. He threw his notebook down and yelled at his colleagues for not doing their “fair share.” He is negative and demoralizing. He can never spare a complement. The team feels like they have received more work, but less credit and pay than they are entitled to and feel burnt out. (Northouse 2010)

Is there anything that can be done to turn this team around? What should Dr. Wood do?

—A Colleague

 

Based on the skills approach, I would assess Dr. Wood’s leadership as poor. Dr. Wood has conceptual knowledge in health education and demonstrates problem solving skills in that area, that is he can see the big picture and plan for it. (Northouse 2010) Obviously, he was able to define a behavioral problem, gather information to formulate a hypothesis and generated a plan for completing his study. He obviously is very knowledgeable about his subject area. He is known to be a competent researcher. He is the foremost scholar on health education research. People come to him for advice about design methodologies, and theories.

          However, despite his knowledge and expertise in his field and his ability to problem solve there, Dr. Wood isn’t able to define a problem outside of his limited scope and devise a solution. He doesn’t recognize the problems with his study, or the problem that he is aggravating with his staff. He hasn’t thought about the fact that his staff are spending 20-30% more time on tasks. He is annoyed that he is doing most of the work, but he could try to adjust schedules, set up the field research data collection more efficiently, and talk to his staff to come up with a solution. He incorrectly identifies his staff as the source of his distress, “I wish I had never taken this project on. It’s taking way too much of my time. The rest of you aren’t pulling your fair share.” He doesn’t see the lack of resources, or the study and therefore budget design. (When Dr. Wood submitted his RFP, he would have had to include a sample budget.) Dr. Wood has a lot of health education knowledge, but I’m unsure about his amount of technical skill. He is a PH.D, so he would have worked his way up through testing new theories methodologies, to whatever degree technical skills are used in his research, he might have them. However, I think they are probably limited.

Dr. Wood has almost no human skills – the knowledge about and the ability to work with others. He doesn’t have “people skills.” He can only see his perspective having to do grunt work. He is unable to see the work his staff produces. Dr. Wood does not perceive that his staff is feeling unappreciated, over worked and underpaid. He doesn’t offer encouragement or coaching to assist with their work, but sulks about doing it himself. He also displayed a lack of professionalism during his dramatic entrance. His social judgment skills, the capacity to understand people and the actual social system wasn’t “turned on.” It showed that he could not get along with others. (Northouse 2010)

I don’t think Dr. Wood has the ability to lead the team effectively. I think that the work, to the extent that it’s possible, will get completed. I don’t think that the other workers will feel empowered. He doesn’t give them a voice in solving problems. For example, instead of just getting the money for the brochure, Dr. Wood could have introduced his contacts, or talked about organizations that offer low cost printing, or brainstormed a solution with his staff. He’s not helping them to expand or develop their skill set. Dr. Wood also lacks social perceptiveness. He knows how he functions, but he doesn’t understand how his team does. They are frustrated that he does not notice their hard work and dedication. They are under a lot of pressure and feel burnt out. Dr. Wood social performance is pretty lousy. His team would say that he doesn’t know how to communicate with them. Dr. Wood could have described his frustrations in a different way. He doesn’t seem to communicate well at all. Because of this, Dr. Wood doesn’t seem to operate with any behavioral flexibility (the capacity to change and adapt one’s behavior in light of understanding of other’s perspectives in the organization. (Northouse 2010) He doesn’t recognize other feelings besides his own. Plus, he team worried that he would use the brochure as evidence and “just another example,” which indicates that Dr. Wood’s behavior and lack of leadership skills are consistent.

If I were coaching Dr. Wood, I would address both problem-solving skills and social judgment skills. Dr. Wood needs to learn how to address problems with his team and resolve them in a non-combative, un-passive-aggressive way. This would include recognizing the real problem. (For example, is he stressed? Is he afraid he won’t meet a deadline? Did a specific person not complete a task and he had to step in? How will they close the hole in the budget?) Then I would work on how to talk to his colleagues to discuss trigger or volatile issues. He would also learn how to include others in brainstorming and problem solving. Right now, reading his history, it sounds like his colleagues use him as a trusted advisor, but he works alone in that respect. He comes up with the strategy and gives the solution to his colleagues. But he doesn’t work with them to achieve that outcome.

Dr. Wood and I would work on his social judgment skills because he would need them as he problem solves. He needs to be able to understand his staff and respect the attitudes that they have toward a problem or solution. He needs to be able to see through their eyes. If he learns how other people work best and what motivates them, he will make a happier and more productive work place for everyone.

Reference:

Northouse, P.G (2010). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Lost Angeles, CA: Sage Publications.

 

 

 

 

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