Signature Assignment - Leader Interview and Synthesis

Running head: LEADER INTERVIEW 6

LEADER INTERVIEW 3

Leader Interview

Marvin R. Campbell

University of Phoenix

Presentation of Interview

This conversation takes place with D. Greenhouse, president, of a mid-sized snack foods corporation. This account will be from an owner and president’s perspective in running daily operations. The experience and skills are of one owner’s perspective and may or may not apply to similar industries.

Leadership Style

One might ask what leadership style is. Each leadership style has their own nuances and similarities. Winston and Patterson (2006) defined leadership as: A leader is one who influences followers who have diverse gifts, abilities, and skills and focuses the followers on the organization’s mission and objectives. Meindl, Ehrlich, and Dukerich (1985) refer to leadership as a leadership performance dismissing other factors that might be of influence. 

Research Questions

The research questions that were asked of my company’s president during this interview were:

· What can leaders do to inspire teams to perform at their best?

· What challenges do you face in maximizing team performance? What do you do to alleviate these challenges?

· What are the top 5 leadership skills for successfully building and leading teams?

· How do excellent leaders develop followership?

· What are some important decision-making strategies that leaders might use? Which of these strategies do you feel is most effective and why?

· What are some ethical concerns faced by leaders? How might you deal with these ethical concerns?

Discussion of the Questions

D. Greenhouse (personal communications, March 5, 2020) responded to the research questions with his experiences. In response to research question one. Leadership should pay people what they are worth, do not punish for failure, and do not micro-manage your employees. Ultimately, treat your staff with respect and trust in what they are doing for you and the company.

Going on to research question two, the discussion lead in the following direction. Some of the challenges that I have experienced are building trust, delegation of important tasks, and not to have meetings to have meetings. Some of the things that have worked for me have been to trust your leaders are making wise decisions and not wasting their co-workers time. One of the hardest things as an owner has been to let others make the important decisions concerning the business and its future. It has been my practice if you trust your employees, they will in turn trust you to lead them.

Responding to research question three, leadership building and teams. Five of the skills that have worked for me over the years are: communications, commitment, bringing on new staff with relevant work experience, trust, and did I say trust. Followership of leaders can take on a wide variety of points for each leader.

Followership is different for each leader and each industry. What seems to work for me, and my company are to trust, trust, and trust your employees. You need inspire your people to contribute in many ways. Something as simple as a suggestion box or having them sit with another department. Many things come of even this simple task. You develop comradery and you have someone asking questions that does not know that part of the business. Besides trust, the most important thing is to give your people the recognition that they have earned. Something as simply as mentioning them in a newsletter, or a weekly email update about the company.

Some important decision-making strategies that leaders invoke are acknowledging what works for you, checks and balances at all levels, and in-trust in your people. Each one of these are very important for a small business such as ours. To me probably trusting in your employees to do the right thing and to speak up when they see something that does not look right.

Ethical concerns of leaders are numerous, and each leader faces their own dilemmas. As you are aware that fully trusting someone that is working in your best interest is challenging. Like yourself, Marvin, bringing you on has been a long drawn out process of us trusting your skills and your communications. I know that some leaders struggle with micromanaging their people. But I do not have the time or energy to manage everything that is happening in every communication with our company. I hold you accountable for your actions. Financially for example, I trust you and our outside auditors to accurately report on the numbers and report on ligation that we might be faced with. I employee a series of checks and balances to get to my comfort level with any concerns.

Improvements

What three improvements do you feel will enhance or develop your leadership? That is a great question. Communications to your employees is vastly understated in every company, ours is no exception. Ethical concerns are always a concern of any leadership: did you make the right choice with them, are there enough checks and balances, and finally to come up with new ways to inspire us.

Summary

I would like to thank you Mr. Greenhouse for taking time out of your busy schedule to sit with me and offer your views on leadership. We have discussed several questions of the universities about leadership. Leadership’s good and bad, and ways that you believe will improve your leadership.

References

Northouse, P. G. Interactive: Leadership: Theory and Practice Interactive eBook. [University of Phoenix]. Retrieved from https://phoenix.vitalsource.com/#/books/9781544325194/

Schyns, B., & Bligh, M. C. (2007). Introduction to the Special Issue on the Romance of Leadership. Applied Psychology: An International Review, 56(4), 501–504. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1464-0597.2007.00301.x

Winston, B. E., & Patterson, K. (2006). An integrative definition of leadership. International Journal of Leadership Studies, I, 6–66.