Introduction
To understand the differences between leadership and management, an individual should consider his own experience with the terms.
- The concept of leadership always includes one individual’s influence on a person or a group of people.
- The influence could occur as a sequence of multiple aspects that include trust, care, and inspiration.
- The leader does not necessarily use his power to command his followers, he becomes a leader for earning the followers’ trust, showing how much he cares for the followers, or simply inspiring the group.
On the other hand, management is a collection of skills used to organize activities within an organization or company in an effective way. There are several differences between leadership and management: in terms of coexisting, management could function without leadership, while leading could not exist without managing (Portolese et al., 2018). In terms of scale, leadership paints the future picture and determines long-term plans; management controls daily tasks and short-term targets. A leader leads people, meaning that leadership is more people-oriented, while a manager manages objects and tasks and orients people on task completion. In the same way, managers pursue a goal of attaining effectiveness from the employees, while leaders focus more on building effective teams. Managers follow fast tier-based relationships to set objectives and goals for employees, while leaders use leader-follower connections to ensure long-term cooperation.
Leadership Qualities
To describe specific leadership qualities that are essential for the field of healthcare, one should address the widely accepted model of the big Five Personality Traits introduced by Goldberg (Bauer et al., 2016). The model rates an individual according to five traits: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. Each of the traits could be adapted to paint a portrait of a perfect leader for Winter Valley Hospital:
Openness stands for an individual’s willingness to have new experiences. The leader should be open to decisions like improving the current system of job roles and duties and their distribution while also being objective and not showing favoritism towards certain employees.
Conscientiousness implies an individual’s ability to take the initiative and be capable of organizing the working process. The leader of the Winter Valley Hospital needs to lead by example and follow the actions they recommend the employees to follow. The issue with different timing of employee’s notice on organizational changes should be addressed.
Extraversion is related to leadership as extraverts are most likely to make meaningful connections. The leader should value the employees’ work, show respect to colleagues, and understand where they are coming from as individuals. The extravasation aspect also implies providing feedback to the workers in a way that would not discourage them.
Agreeableness speaks to the leader’s ability to avoid conflicts while also protecting his point of view. As one of the employees complained that the employees do not have precise duty boundaries, the leader should solve the problem with the power of authority and not give the issue a chance to result in an embroilment.
Lastly, the neuroticism aspect implements the leader’s ability to control his emotions and not show his temperament. Some employees complained that they do not feel motivated and feel that they are doing significantly more than their colleagues. It is the leader’s duty, in this case, to keep the employees motivated by stating the organizational mission.
Ethical Leadership
Ethics and ethical leadership play a significant role in organizational process and organizational efficiency. The concept of organizational ethics includes the leadership and the trust aspects. The management and leaders build trust based on ethics that is connected to the employees’ motivation (Bauer et al., 2016). Ethics are shown in the decision-making process, precisely in assessing the situation, considering all points of view within an organization, taking an insight into possible consequences, and monitoring the outcomes. The management at Winter Valley Hospital should implement ethical behavior to solve the reported employees’ complaints of favoritism in the organization and lack of motivation.
Soft Skills
Communication and the quality of communication are important, specifically in healthcare. As a significant part of healthcare workers face workplace incivility, it is important to use certain skills to provide effective communication with patients and employees. The soft skills include the skill of conflict management essential for the healthcare field, as the field provides services in cases of emergencies and involves professional ethics (Hahn & Popan, 2020). The soft skills address the leader’s emotional intelligence, ability to manage stress, good listening ability, and overall empathy (Portolese et al., 2018). In the case of Winter Valley Hospital, soft skills could be used to mentor the employees and increase motivation. Employees’ complaints showed that the management could increase the level of motivation by providing feedback and possibly showing respect for the employees while setting an example of meaningful communication and ethical behavior.
Leadership Styles/Models
There are several different leadership styles/models, but not every leadership style is appropriate for the healthcare field. Some of the key styles widely used to engage and motivate employees are:
- Autocratic Leadership Model, where the leader makes all decisions and supervises the process closely through coercive motivation, implying that there is no input from the employees.
- Charismatic Leadership Model, where the leader is perceived as a figure of inspiration. The motivation used in this model is described as inspirational and relates to transformational leadership rather than transactional leadership.
- Democratic/Participative Leadership style, in which the leader encourages the employees to participate in making the decisions. This leadership style implies the election of representatives from units that could participate in the decision-making process on par with management. This leadership model is more suitable for Winter Valley Hospital as employees tend to show a high level of motivation and contribution to the organizational goals.
- Inspirational Leadership style, where the leader develops enthusiasm among employees by connecting their own personal goals to the organizational mission.
References
Bauer, T., Erdogan, B., Short, J., & Carpenter, M. A. (2016). Principles of management Version 3.0. FlatWorld.
Hahn, A., & Popan, E. (2020). Professional ethics. [Abstract] Salem Press Encyclopedia.
Portolese, L., Upperman, P., & Trumpy, B. (2018). The art of leadership and supervision Version 1.1. FlatWorld.