WHAT IS SITUATIONAL LEADERSHIP?

After reading the "One minute manager" of Kenneth Blanchard i found this paragraph one of the most interesting,...

The Situational Leadership method from Kenneth Blanchard and Paul Hersey holds that managers must use different leadership styles depending on the situation. The model allows you to analyze the needs of the situation you're in, and then use the most appropriate leadership style. Depending on employees' competences in their task areas and commitment to their tasks, your leadership style should vary from one person to another. You may even lead the same person one way sometimes, and another way at other times. Blanchard and Hersey characterized leadership style in terms of the amount of direction and of support that the leader gives to his or her followers, and so created a simple matrix (figure).

Leadership Behavior of the Leader
· S1 - Telling / Directing
- High task focus, low relationship focus - leaders define the roles and tasks of the 'follower', and supervise them closely. Decisions are made by the leader and announced, so communication is largely one-way. For people who lack competence but are enthusiastic and committed. They need direction and supervision to get them started.

· S2 - Selling / Coaching
- High task focus, high relationship focus - leaders still define roles and tasks, but seeks ideas and suggestions from the follower. Decisions remain the leader's prerogative, but communication is much more two-way. For people who have some competence but lack commitment. They need direction and supervision because they are still relatively inexperienced. They also need support and praise to build their self-esteem, and involvement in decision-making to restore their commitment.

· S3 - Participating / Supporting
- Low task focus, high relationship focus - leaders pass day-to-day decisions, such as task allocation and processes, to the follower. The leader facilitates and takes part in decisions, but control is with the follower. For people who have competence, but lack confidence or motivation. They do not need much direction because of their skills, but support is necessary to bolster their confidence and motivation.

· S4 - Delegating
- Low task focus, low relationship focus - leaders are still involved in decisions and problem-solving, but control is with the follower. The follower decides when and how the leader will be involved. For people who have both competence and commitment. They are able and willing to work on a project by themselves with little supervision or support.

Effective leaders are versatile in being able to move around the matrix according to the situation, so there is no style that is always right. However, we tend to have a preferred style, and in applying Situational Leadership you need to know which one that is for you.

emotional intelligence (EQ)

emotional intelligence theory (EQ - Emotional Quotient)

Emotional Intelligence - EQ - is a relatively recent behavioural model, rising to prominence with Daniel Goleman's 1995 Book called 'Emotional Intelligence'. The early Emotional Intelligence theory was originally developed during the 1970's and 80's by the work and writings of psychologists Howard Gardner (Harvard), Peter Salovey (Yale) and John Mayer (New Hampshire). Emotional Intelligence is increasingly relevant to organizational development and developing people, because the EQ principles provide a new way to understand and assess people's behaviours, management styles, attitudes, interpersonal skills, and potential. Emotional Intelligence is an important consideration in human resources planning, job profiling, recruitment interviewing and selection, management development, customer relations and customer service, and more.

The EQ concept argues that IQ, or conventional intelligence, is too narrow; that there are wider areas of emotional intelligence that dictate and enable how successful we are. Success requires more than IQ (Intelligence Quotient), which has tended to be the traditional measure of intelligence, ignoring eseential behavioural and character elements. We've all met people who are academically brilliant and yet are socially and inter-personally inept. And we know that despite possessing a high IQ rating, success does not automatically follow.

emotional intelligence - two aspects
This is the essential premise of EQ: to be successful requires the effective awareness, control and management of one's own emotions, and those of other people. EQ embraces two aspects of intelligence:

• Understanding yourself, your goals, intentions, responses, behaviour and all.
• Understanding others, and their feelings.

emotional intelligence - the five domains

1. Knowing your emotions.
2. Managing your own emotions.
3. Motivating yourself.
4. Recognising and understanding other people's emotions.
5. Managing relationships, ie., managing the emotions of others.

By developing our Emotional Intelligence in these areas and the five EQ domains we can become more productive and successful at what we do, and help others to be more productive and successful too. The process and outcomes of Emotional Intelligence development also contain many elements known to reduce stress for individuals and organizations, by decreasing conflict, improving relationships and understanding, and increasing stability, continuity and harmony.

Top 10 ideas about what employees want from work

Every person has different reasons for working. The reasons for working are as individual as the person. But, we all work because we obtain something that we need from work. The something obtained from work impacts morale, employee motivation, and the quality of life. To create positive employee motivation, treat employees as if they matter - because employees matter. These ideas will help you fulfill what people want from work and create employee motivation.

1. What People Want From Work
   Some people work for personal fulfillment; others work for love of what they do. Others work to accomplish goals and to feel as if they are contributing to something larger than themselves. The bottom line is that we all work for money and for reasons too individual to assign similarities to all workers.
   
2. How to Demonstrate Respect at Work
   Ask anyone in your workplace what treatment they most want at work. They will likely top their list with the desire to be treated with dignity and respect. You can demonstrate respect with simple, yet powerful actions. These ideas will help you avoid needless, insensitive, unmeant disrespect, too.
   
3. Provide Feedback That Has an Impact
   Make your feedback have the impact it deserves by the manner and approach you use to deliver feedback. Your feedback can make a difference to people if you can avoid a defensive response.
   
4. Top Ten Ways to Show Appreciation
   You can tell your colleagues, coworkers and staff how much you value them and their contribution any day of the year. Trust me. No occasion is necessary. In fact, small surprises and tokens of your appreciation spread throughout the year help the people in your work life feel valued all year long.
   
5. Trust Rules: The Most Important Secret
   Without it, you have nothing. Trust forms the foundation for effective communication, employee retention, and employee motivation and contribution of discretionary energy, the extra effort that people voluntarily invest in work. When trust is present, everything else is easier.
   
6. Provide Motivational Employee Recognition
   You can avoid the employee recognition traps that: single out one or a few employees who are mysteriously selected for the recognition; sap the morale of the many who failed to win, place, or even show; confuse people who meet the criteria yet were not selected; or sought votes or other personalized, subjective criteria to determine winners.
   
7. Employee Recognition Rocks
   Employee recognition is limited in most organizations. Employees complain about the lack of recognition regularly. Managers ask, “Why should I recognize or thank him? He’s just doing his job.” And, life at work is busy, busy, busy. These factors combine to create work places that fail to provide recognition for employees. Managers who prioritize employee recognition understand the power of recognition.
   
8. Top Ten Ways to Retain Your Great Employees
   Key employee retention is critical to the long term health and success of your business. Managers readily agree that their role is key in retaining your best employees to ensure business success. If managers can cite this fact so well, why do many behave in ways that so frequently encourage great employees to quit their job?
   
9. Team Building and Delegation: How and When to Empower People
   Employee involvement is creating an environment in which people have an impact on decisions and actions that affect their jobs. Team building occurs when the manager knows when to tell, sell, consult, join, or delegate to staff. For employee involvement and empowerment, both team building and delegation rule.
   
10. Build a Mentoring Culture
    What does it take to develop people? More than writing “equal opportunity” into your organization’s mission statement. More than sending someone to a training class. More than hard work on the part of employees. What development does take is people who are willing to listen and help their colleagues. Development takes coaches, guides and advocates. People development needs mentors.

How To Manage Older Workers ;-)

The work force is aging as baby boomer move toward retirement. Gen X managers need to learn how to motivate and manage this talent pool of older workers. Both generations have very different views of the other and will need to learn how the other generation operates. It is up to the managers, Gen X or otherwise, to take the lead and create the climate in which older workers will remain engaged and productive.

Here's How:

1. Throw out all your assumptions.
   You may think older workers are harder workers or that they are difficult to train. Get rid of your stereotypes. Your older workers are individuals just like everyone else in your group. Treat them as such.
   
2. Remember the range of ages.
   You wouldn't treat a seasoned manager of 35 the same as a 21-year old right out of college. Don't think the 15 year gap is any less in your older workers. A worker at 55 and a worker at 70 have different goals and needs. As a manager, you may need to look at groups getting ready to retire (55-62), retirement age and still working (62-70), and older worker who want to keep active or who need to work (70+). Each group presents different management challenges.
   
3. Communicate, communicate, communicate
   Don't assume that the older worker knows what you expect of them. They don't have the same background as you. Be very clear what you want done and what the measurements of completion and of success will be. "Bill, take care of that for me" is not enough. Try "Bill, I need you to prepare the department's budget for the next fiscal year. Use the numbers from last year and add 10% on everything except training which should go up 15%. I need it by Tuesday".
   
4. Value their life experience.
   Your older worker have been around. They have seen a lot. They have done a lot. Recognize the value of this experience. Learn from it. Encourage the younger members of your team to learn from it. The lessons from the "school of hard knocks" are invaluable.
   
5. Train them.
   Older workers need training as much as younger workers - just as much, just as often. The subject of the training may be different, but the need is the same. And don't believe that older workers can't be trained. They are just as receptive as their younger peers.
   
6. Meet their security needs.
   Older workers probably need benefits more than the younger workers. They need medical coverage, vision care, and financial planning. Make sure your company's benefits plan meets their needs too.
   
7. Motivate them.
   Any manager's key job is to motivate their employees. Older workers have different motivational "hot buttons" than their younger counterparts. Opportunity for advancement is probably less important than the recognition of a job well done, but see step #1 above.
   
8. You don't have to "be the boss".
   The older workers grew up in a hierarchical society. They know you are the boss. Most of them were bosses at some point too. Get on with leading the department and don't waste time posturing. It won't impress them anyway. They've seen it all before.
   
9. Be flexible.
   Your older workers, depending on age group (see #2 above) may want flexible hours or a shorter work week. For those of them that need that, be willing to be flexible. You need their talent and technical skill so do what you need to to keep it available. Do not, however, assume that all older workers want to go home early. Some may be motivated by working the same long, hard hours that they have always done.
   
10. Use them as mentors.
    Let them coach and encourage the younger workers. Most older workers have a wealth of knowledge and experience that they would love to pass on. Give them the opportunity to do so and your entire organization will benefit.