Leadership strategy
By Maria Johnsen
Why many companies are not able to make a
financial progress and development?
Nowadays we know how important is the role of marketing in industry
profitability and the importance of winning over competitors.
These facts have come in large part from the economic infusion into the
study of leadership strategy. Strategy has been narrowed to a
competitive game plan, separating it from a company's larger sense of
purpose and the exaggerated emphasis on competitive advantage which has
drawn attention away from the fact that strategy must be a dynamic tool
for the development of a company over time.
During all these years strategy has been lectured in various business
and computer sciences schools. It was identified as the most important
duty of the chief executive officer (a person with important
responsibility). The ubiquitousness SWOT model taught managers to
improve their company' s internal strength environment. Later
cooperative planning and standards emerged analysis were added their
own frameworks. It has been a period that strategy tool kit became far
richer because of it. That said, something has been lost along the way.
It has become more formulation than implementation! That is why
companies experience financial loses every year and leaders blame it on
the world's financial crises, employee's bad work performance and so
on.
Take Norway as an example: Most of the executive managers, directors in
the major government co- operations and private sectors have problem
with leading their enterprises to the right direction! They do need
leadership coaching.
They follow the same cliche formula that has been employed for many
years at the company all over again and changing managers and employees
do not help it at all! The main issue is that whoever comes in and
takes the boss's place does the same procedures all over again with
some minor so called " changes": A new guy!
Most of the departments have fear from making changes. Why? Because
they have fear from becoming a failure or losing their big fat paycheck
every month! They are not sure about as to whether ot not the new idea
could be working.
They should understand that by implementation of the new strategies
they will breathe a new life into company's existence and survivance.
I used to work as a system designer at one of the Norwegian major
companies in Trondheim Norway. My job was to fix system errors develop
3 calculators for their portal, writing use cases regarding these
systems, developing GUI along with translation of the whole portal into
English language. Because of my good working performance I was moved to
a bigger 3 years old AND sensitive project.
As soon as I started my work at that department, I noticed within a few
days lack of co-operation among 35 employees who were programmers,
designers, system developers and system maintenance employees. These
problems clearly worried the company's top executives. That is why they
had to hire from a recruiting company a team of so called experts to
jump in and drive this boat towards the island of victory and great
result. However during the meetings I noticed that these young,
arrogant, hard headed project managers were following an old strategy
that would have been doing more harm than good to such big cooperation!
Such cliche strategy would also lead the company to major financial
problems. It was like making a hole in the same boat in a stormy ocean!
What do you think will happen to such boat? Bingo. That's what i
thought as well! I warned them about what they would face within a
short time and nobody were willing to listen to me. I resigned and
guess what? 3 months later, they declaired almost bankruptcy, over 150
programmers, project leaders, system designers either got fired or
resigned from that company! So what were problems you may ask.
Problems:
- The spirit of racism, harassment, mockery among employees
-Arrogant professional managers and project leader were unwilling to
co-operate with each other
- Unwillingness to listen to constructive criticism and suggestions
- Ordinary employees had to carry on the huge responsibilities that the
leaders dictated them to do, hoping to get finally the promotion
- Lack of leadership strategy
- Lack of implementing of new strategies that WORKS
- The high level of employees absence
- Dissatisfaction of work environment
- The new changes were not discussed with all employees during the
meetings if there were any changes at all
The result was obvious more financial problems and less profit with a
not user-friendly system.
I have been working in various departments both at the government and
private sector and unfortunately I noticed the same pattern everywhere.
Companies with satisfactory performance were able to implement the
newest technologies and recruiting the right people at the right
position.
The major problem at all these companies is to have fear from the
CHANGE and having the right knowledgeable leaders!
Over the past few years strategy has become a plan that positions a
company in its external landscape!
Strategy SHOULD GUIDE the development of the company and its purposes
over time.
What is missing?
The goal should be the value creation. It should be utilized a suitable
management strategy that is dynamic and open minded. It should give
form as an organic process that is HOLISTIC, Adoptive and open minded.
The time frame should be continuous and unending. The ongoing
activities should foster competitive and advantages must develop the
company through time.
In conclusion most strategies involve mystery. Interpreting that
mystery is a responsibility that the chief of strategist the CEO should
handle. The need to create and recreate reasons for a company's
existence sets the strategist apart from every other person in the
company. Mastering the management system is an important job that
should be given to the right people. 78% of people who are hired are
NOT right for the job. This is one of the major problems at the
Norwegian companies both at the government and private sectors. They
have typically two or three round interviews but the techniques that
they use scare away the right people .They put the wrong people in the
positions which should belong to the suitable candidates.
It is clear that not only Norway but also many countries in the US and
Europe have the same problem in respect of recruiting the right
candidates. This issue may affect on a company's performance as a
result they lose more money by hiring the wrong person than the right
one. Why you may ask?
* A wrong person for the job concentrates on doing their job while the
right person will focus on getting the better result.
* A wrong candidate focuses on securing their job by having
relationship with employees at the different departments at the
company. This way the employer will not be able to fire him or her,
because there is no one else who can do his/her job and everybody likes
the person! The right person thinks of working as a team in order to be
more successful.
* A wrong person never share ideas with their colleagues , because all
they care about is monthly paycheck while the right person for the
company wants to find a way to lead the company towards more success as
a result he may get promotion and help the strategic plan to succeed.
Conclusion
It is important for the companies to be more focused on using the right
updated strategies, hiring right leaders and managers who care about
the success and company's development and employing the right
candidates. Result will be obvious financial gain, better working
environment and progress in development.
Management
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