Authentic Leadership

Authentic Leadership

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Leaders need to make a determination of the management style that they will put in place basing on the needs of the team as well as their personal strengths and preferences. Authentic leadership is a type of style of management whereby leaders make use of transparent and genuine behaviors to bring forth relationships at the workplace for them to foster trust (Crawford et al 2020). Authentic leadership style puts emphasis on the honesty, transparency and genuineness of the leader at the workplace. With these, the leader is able to build honest and strong relationships where the members of the team have trust on the leader. Authentic leaders are able to inspire motivation and trust in their team members which results from authentic and consistent leadership presentation.

Leaders who inspire effective action and relate well with their team members are very important to the success of a business. The perception of employees on authentic leadership is a strong predictor to the satisfaction of a job and has positive impact on the work-related happiness and attitudes. Authenticity in the work environment brings forth several benefits which include: greater productivity, better relationships with colleagues, high trust levels and positive working environment (Thompson, 2015). The professionals who wish to make career advancement and impact their firms for a long time need to invest their time and effort to become an authentic leader.

Authentic leadership is made up of four components according to (Thompson, 2015). These include:

Self-awareness. Authentic leaders constantly assess and reassess their weaknesses, strengths and values in the work environments. This enables the leaders to be authentic and share their values and practices with their team members. Self-awareness practice includes self-reflection, requesting for feedback, staying aware of the experience, particularly in the work environment.

Balanced leaders. Authentic leaders need to take into account the opposing and supporting opinions and ensure they consider both. Taking a critical look into the opposing ideas is able to help the leader identify the potential pitfalls and flaws. Balanced processing as well encourages the employees to be honest and open and share their opinions when making decisions in the workplace.

Rational transparency. An authentic leader needs to be transparent willingly in their workplace relationship and maintain honestly when sharing feelings and thoughts. This includes giving constructive feedback to the members of the team whenever necessary and admitting when they make a mistake. This makes them lead by example hence put across the practice of honesty and transparency among their team members.

Internalized moral perspectives. An authentic leader puts forward the company’s needs before their own feelings and needs. The success of an organization is the leader’s primary objective even in cases where they might face some challenging situations.

There are some behavioral elements that can be seen in an authentic leader. An authentic leader speaks the truth. They do not say things to please others but constantly talk truth. By speaking the truth, they are not disrespectful but are honest, clear and authentic (Crawford et al 2020). Secondly they have a rich moral fiber. They have a strong character which gives them more power. They are aligned with their values and walk their talks. This makes people respect, trust and listen to them. Authentic leadership as well courageous. To go against the crowd, a lot of courage is needed. A lot of inner strength is needed to do the right thing even when one is aware that it’s not an easy task. According to (Crawford et al 2020), leaders as well deepen themselves. A leader’s job is to go further on a matter. They know themselves intimately hence nurturing a very strong self-relationship. They are aware of their weaknesses and exercise their strengths. Finally, authentic leaders care for themselves. These leaders realize that for them to do great things they need to feel good. They exercise, eat well and care for their bodies.

Emotional Intelligence has a role to play in authentic leadership. As Nelson & Low, (2011) state, emotional Intelligence is the relationship that exists between thinking, feeling and acting. Authentic leadership and emotional intelligence are related closely. This can be illustrated by taking a look at some of the things an authentic leader is expected to do. These involve things like bringing every employee’s opinion to the table, showing up to ensure service to the team members and the company, forging new relationships as well as ensuring the organization’s workforce is released to full capacity (Kotzé & Nel, 2015). In each of these practice, the leader is completely reliant on the emotional intelligence which they highly develop. This is because the impact of every decision, interaction and initiative made by the leader in dependent on the way they engage with the people around them.

There are 6 emotional intelligence skills which offer support to the success of an authentic leader. These include reality testing, self-actualization, emotional self-awareness, self-regard, independence and social responsibility (Miao et al 2018). When we examine these skills deeply, we are able to note that self-actualization connects to a great plan and as well sets inspiring goals. Reality testing on the other hand is a leader being fair, grounded and unbiased. Self-regard is being aware and confident of the personal limitations and strengths. Emotional self-awareness requires one to be mindful of the emotional impact that they pose on other’s performance. Self-responsibility involves a team player who supports and models the company norms, rules and culture. Finally, independence entails accountability, decisiveness, and making decisions which are aligned to the overall organizational good.

My choice of an authentic leader in Warren Buffet. Warren is a business tycoon, American investor and the chairman as well as CEO of Berkshire Hathway (Hagstrom, 2013). I have selected this leader because he depicts real commitment focused on improvement of stakeholder value over a period of time. These stakeholders include the community, customers and employees. He is both a great teacher and a great leader who is an independent thinker and challenges conventionally accepted ways of doing things. He additionally explains his reasoning in an uncomplicated and sound way.

With the discussed elements of an authentic leader and factors of emotional intelligence that fuel the authenticity of a leader, I can be able to assess myself based on these factors. On self-awareness, I can rate myself at 5 on a scale of 10. This is because I sometimes overlook some weaknesses which might impact my decisions negatively. I most times also fail to acknowledge the opposing opinions as I weigh more on opinions that are supporting my point of view. Another element of an authentic leader is rational transparency and I can say for sure that I am as transparent as I can be as I ensure I maintain honesty at all times. I also put forward the needs of the company before mine and ensure I achieve the mandate of the organization in every way possible. On emotional intelligence, I find bringing every employee’s voice to the table being quite challenging as I at times practice biasness relying on the opinions that do not oppose mine as mentioned earlier. I also ensure I show up to ensure the assigned work is done and forge new relationships that are beneficial to the organization.

I believe there are some areas which I might need to work on to ensure that I become a better authentic leader. I need to improve on self-awareness, whereby I will be able to recognize my weaknesses and work on them. Secondly, I need to work towards being a balanced leader whereby I can be able to listen to both the opposing and supporting opinions and be fair with both of them. To incorporate emotional intelligence, I need to ensure that I welcome every opinion to the table to be able to get a variety of opinions. With these improvements, I believe I can make a very big difference in the leadership position.

In conclusion, it is evident as organizations make the commitment to make authenticity stand out in their business strategy, leaders enhancing their capabilities can be a big boost to the organization and to their careers as well. No matter where one is professionally, there is need to take time to better oneself, heighten emotional intelligence, put the leadership skills in practice and embrace on a mission which can translate into substantial returns for oneself, the team and the entire organization.

References

Crawford, J. A., Dawkins, S., Martin, A., & Lewis, G. (2020). Putting the leader back into authentic leadership: Reconceptualising and rethinking leaders. Australian Journal of Management, 45(1), 114-133.

Hagstrom, R. G. (2013). The Warren Buffett Way. John Wiley & Sons.

Kotzé, M., & Nel, P. (2015). The influence of trait-emotional intelligence on authentic leadership. SA Journal of Human Resource Management, 13(1), 9.

Nelson, D. B., & Low, G. R. (2011). Emotional intelligence. Boston: Prentice Hall.

Thompson, N. (2015). The authentic leader. Macmillan International Higher Education.

Miao, C., Humphrey, R. H., & Qian, S. (2018). Emotional intelligence and authentic leadership: a meta-analysis. Leadership & Organization Development Journal.