Peer review

WW1: Tata: Leadership based on ancient principles

Haiqiang Jiang, Beneil Bet-Yadegar, Gabriela Hernandez, Sean Abesamis

BUS5-16 Sec 62

9/2/21

Tata’s leadership style is a unique type of leadership, and it sets a good example for a lot of us who aspire to be leaders ourselves. There are many different leaders in history that handle situations in their own unique ways. Tata is a unique leader in his own right because of the way he handles things on top of the clear values he shows.

The Tata company cares so much about their values which are integrity, responsibility, excellence, pioneering, and unity. Tata has grown because of the leadership of Ratan Tata. He believes in putting people first. An example of this is when he worked with an executive named Cyrus Mistry and Ratan Tata found out that he didn't have the right intentions. He cared more about the profits than the values of the Tata Group. Ratan Tata reacted to this by removing him from the Tata Group.

Culture plays a strong role in Tata’s business since it stated, “its leadership and management principles hold back to India’s ancient culture and religion based on values of integrity, hospitality, humility, kindness, and selflessness.” All ideas and morals from the Tata company come from the Parsi’s family roots. Their company takes in all ideas from the diverse background that India has, they don’t let social and language barriers stop them from taking in new ideas everywhere.

The management style that Tatas’ company shows can be applied elsewhere because many of Tata’s leadership traits overlap what is recommended for every leader, such as always listening to your peers, improvising, and having good chemistry with your peers. The Tata company also expects change and is always willing to move forward for example, when they were first founded they were just a private trading company then in 1902 they incorporated the idea of a hotel industry. Later on in the future they go on to build India’s first Luxury Hotel, the Taj Mahal Palace.

Tata has very strong leadership skills, as his leadership is characterized by not being arrogant and treating employees equally. He is a humble person which makes employees believe him very much. Also, he provides assessments that are checked by the TBEM criteria which “includes deployment of business practices for excellence in leadership and strategy and deployment of operational excellence. It reviews the approaches by which the company understands its customers and employees” This demonstrates the importance of the employees because it allows them to see where they can improve on and help train the employees more.

Tata always looks to improvise, which also demonstrates his response and sensitivity as a leader. Therefore, when encountering urgent difficulties, he always deals with the problem very quickly. There are many important factors in culture. For example, India has a lot of cultural diversity which are leading advantages in culture compared to other countries. Therefore as an aspiring leader, people should take these things into consideration and create opportunities as well as take opportunities themselves.

There are many types of leaders in history that showcase leadership in their actions, and many handle situations in their own, unique ways. Tata’s leadership style is unique in his own way, and shows many good habits as well as strong culture and values. He has set a great example of how to be an effective leader to all of us that aspire to be one.

References:

Source: Leadership Skills, Qualities, and Styles of Ratan Tata (thestrategywatch.com)

Source: Jamsetji Tata| Tata Group

Source: Tata Code of Conduct | Tata Group