Becoming the kind of leader who can successfully promote and
lead systematic change takes time and commitment by the leader and a certain
amount of charisma. The first step to becoming such a leader is creating a
vision for people that they can believe in and follow. Yukl (2011) says that,
“Charisma is more likely to be attributed to leaders who advocate a vision that
is highly discrepant from the status quo, but still within the latitude of
acceptance by followers” (p. 262). Leaders whose ideas are too far out in left
field are not likely to have buy in by followers. Charismatic leaders, in
general, are also more willing to make sacrifices themselves to accomplish
their goals and followers appreciate that (Yukl, 2011). As a matter of fact,
the best leaders have, at one time, been good followers themselves and
understand what followers want out of a great leader. In my opinion, a likable
leader is one that I, as a follower, am willing to make my own sacrifices for
to promote change.
The leader of my department is a visionary and very
charismatic. However, many times, because she does not have great interpersonal
skills, her followers do not trust her and become intimidated by her. In
addition to having charisma, leaders need knowledgeable and trusting followers
to lead system wide change. If the followers do not understand or agree with
the vision of the leader, or do not trust this person, system wide change is
almost impossible to achieve. The leader cannot be an expert in all areas of
the organization and relies on the knowledge and trust of followers to make the
right changes and decisions for all systems in the business. The best followers and leaders develop a
trusting relationship and understand that they are not always there to agree
with each other. Followers should be able to let the leader know when bad
decisions are being made and the leader should be able to take that information
and learn from it. I think if the leader of my department had a better
relationship with her followers, she would be incredibly dangerous (in a good
way!).
We are currently in the process of trying to implement
change within the colleges with the implementation of the multi-modality
template. This template is one that has essentially been created for the online
environment and been adapted for use in other modalities. This project has been
in the works for several months now and was initially under the leadership of
my direct supervisor. Within the past 2 months, he was removed as head of the
project for several reasons. Among them was the fact that he was new to the
university and did not know many of the stakeholders in the project. He did not
have their trust and when he attempted to make decisions that were not popular,
some of the other team members went to his supervisor to complain. I do not
think he had a good concept of the big picture and he was not doing a good job
brining all of the parties together to work out the concerns and determine the
needs of the stakeholders. To make matters worse for him, instead of helping
him and providing mentorship, his boss simply took over the project with very
little explanation to others on the project. In my opinion, this leaves a
negative impression on those who still do not know him very well and does not
set him up for success when he works with these people in the future.
Although I can think of many times when leaders have been
successful, I think the most recent is the transition to Campus Solutions from
Datatel, the previous student management system. While the project was
technically led by University IT, on the Worldwide side, there was a leader who
called the shots and stood up for our needs. This person also happens to be a
long-time friend of mine but I had never seen her in a work environment before.
She was able to coordinate teams of subject matter experts and representatives
from Campus Solutions to design the product to meet Worldwide’s needs. There
was a lot of doubt surrounding the launch date of CS but she was able to allay
everyone’s fears and lead everyone through the change successfully. The speed
bumps that happened afterward were handled as they came along and, although I
am sure it was stressful and frustrating for her at times, she was able to keep
the confidence of all of her subordinates and complete the project.
As I have been reading about system-wide change, I have been
wondering if I have what it takes to lead such change myself. I have been
involved in a change project in a smaller context earlier this year when we
upgraded EagleVision. I had the help of many colleagues and did not consider
myself the lead, even though many important decisions were made by me in
relation to the retraining of hundreds of certified faculty. It was a group
effort and could not have been accomplished by any single one of us. So, reflecting
on that experience, I think that the most important aspect of leading change is
forming a great team that guides the change, like my friend did. The leader is
important in the role of visionary and mentor but those who are really responsible
for making the change happen are the followers. Putting them together in teams
and utilizing their strengths is a vital part of instituting change. "Teamwork
divides the task and multiplies the success” (unknown author).
References:
Yukl, G. (2011). Leadership in organizations. (7th
ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
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