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Example research essay topic: Theories On Qualities Of Leaders And Followers - 1,388 words

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... t be able to articulate his or her vision effectively to the rest of the organization. Sash kins visionary leader must not only have the ability to generate visions, but he or she must also have the charisma and communicative skills to articulate the vision and convince followers to believe in the vision. Westley and Mintzberg (1988) termed their visionary leadership as a sort of drama. The authors proposed that a visionary leader first of all has a vision, then goes on to communicate it to other members of the organization, and then realizes it by empowering his or her followers to help him or her achieve the vision. The authors suggested that an alternative image of visionary leadership could be that of a drama and go further with this analogy when they wrote that Visionary leadership creates drama; it turns work into play.

The bulk of Westley and Mintzberg's paper on visionary leadership focused on the rhetoric tools or exercises that a visionary leader could use to help him or her articulate and communicate his or her vision to the followers. Some of the tools mentioned include repetition, representation, and assistance. This visionary leadership theory assumes that a visionary leader has to be charismatic as well. In fact, a big portion of the theory revolves around the leaders ability to articulate and communicate his or her vision to the followers. Summary of Charismatic and Visionary Theories A summary comparison of the eight charismatic and visionary theories is presented in Table 1. One seemingly common theme of all the above leadership theories that have been reviewed above is that they subsume vision within charisma or vice versa.

Graham (1991) noted that the concepts of charismatic authority, celebrity charisma, and other charismatic leadership theories all share an assumption that the charismatic leaders are also visionary figures. We would like to point out that the ability to generate a vision is not the same as the ability to sell it. Whereas intelligence, analytical ability, expertise, and knowledge are the main properties of a visionary individual who is able to generate visions (Katz and Kahn, 1978, Peters and Austin, 1985, Simon, 1987; Westley and Mintzberg, 1989; Bryman, 1992; Yukl, 1992), the ability to effectively sell a vision or an idea, on the other hand, has more to do with an individuals rhetorical ability and social skills. Another obvious focus of all the leadership theories is that all of them seem to be spelling a formula for the perfect leader; it is just that the emphasis is different in each theory. While the charismatic leadership theories focus on charisma, the visionary leadership theories focus on vision with both groups assuming one concept to subsume the other. Perhaps the reason theorists combine charisma and vision together is that all of them want to write about great leadership and great leadership is likely to need both charisma and vision to make it possible.

Doing so, however, may confound our understanding of the two vital constructs. Although most theorists have somewhat listed out the qualities or characteristics of leaders with charisma, for instance, good communication skills, each theory looked at charisma from a different angle. For example, Conger and Kanungo (1987), Metal (1990), and Shamir and his colleagues (1993) saw charisma more as an attribution phenomenon, with Meindl focusing his theory most explicitly as a follower-centered one. House (1977), on the other hand, focused on the effects that charismatic leaders have on their followers in addition to the traits and behaviors of charismatic leaders. Thus, while Conger and Kanungo's and Meindl's concepts of charisma would be better at explaining why some individuals are perceived by others to be charismatic and why some are not, Webers and Houses conception of charisma would be more useful if we want to identify the personal characteristics of charismatic leaders that distinguish them from non-charismatic individuals.

As such, there has not been a convergence in the definition of what charisma is. We feel that there is a need to derive a convergent definition from all these theories. As for vision, the above leadership theories have not considered explicitly what it takes to be a visionary leader. Our idea of charisma is more consistent with the concept of charisma proposed by House and his colleagues, Shamir and his colleagues, Bass, and Sashkin. Unlike Conger and Kanungo, Meindl, and Westley and Mintzberg, we think that charisma is not a purely attribution phenomenon, that is, based solely on the leaders behaviors and the perceptions of followers. While we agree with the above researchers that charisma has a significant attribution component, we feel that there are real charismatic traits, behaviors, and effects that a leader could actively exercise and control in order to influence followers.

The notion of charisma proposed by Conger and Kanungo, Meindl, and Westley and Mintzberg, seems to suggest that charismatic leaders are just spin-doctors and that charisma is primarily attribution. We believe that such a focus detracts from the amount of active influence that charismatic leaders have in real life on their followers. When one wants to examine the role of vision in leadership, a visionary leader should be judged on his / her ability to come up with a vision. Not having the ability to move people with his / her visions does not make the leader less of a visionary. Some scholars (Conger et al. , 1997; Kets de Vries, 1998) have suggested that visionary leaders may not be recognized due to their inability to let people know that they have strategic visions because they do not convey them or are not able to sell them or are not able to mobilize followers effectively. As such caution is needed when determining whether a leader is visionary or not, even though we know he / she is not charismatic.

Based on the focus on either charisma or vision, some of the well-known charismatic leadership or visionary leadership theories would actually be more appropriately labeled the other way round as visionary leadership or charismatic leadership theories, respectively. For instance, Conger and Kanungo's behavioral theory of charismatic leadership is so centered on vision that their description of a charismatic leader revolves around the leader being a visionary. Therefore, it maybe more appropriate to rename it as a theory of visionary leadership than a theory of charismatic leadership. Another mis-named theory is Westley and Mintzberg's visionary leadership theory. Their theory centers a lot on the communicative abilities of the leader and how he or she is able to attract followers and reach out to them. It is, in our opinion, more a theory of charismatic leadership than visionary leadership.

As seen in this review, the common practice of including both vision and charisma in charismatic leadership research leads to the inevitable confusing situation and lack of agreement among scholars on what exactly charisma is. We hope through this study to be able to distinguish between charisma and vision and consequently present a more coherent understanding of charismatic and visionary leadership. HYPOTHESES We believe that charismatic individuals have a profound ability to understand other peoples needs and desires. True charismatics are able to draw a following because they are able to say things in an appealing way that reach out to their followers innermost desires. Their strength lies in their ability to convey messages in a most convincing manner that charms their followers.

Charismatic leaders have very good communication skills and are very interesting and lively. Often charismatic leaders portray themselves as individuals who are not unlike their followers in terms of needs, desires and aspirations, so that the followers can easily identify with their leaders and support their cause. Charismatic leaders evoke emotional effects from their followers. On the other hand, visionaries are more likely to be intellectually inclined and deep-thinking individuals.

In addition, they possess intuition that is developed through many years of experience and substantial learning. Visionary leaders are intelligent in that they are able to digest and organise a large amount of information into a complex and intricate web of knowledge and from which they develop their vision. Visionaries can find innovative and radical answers to present problems and future ones, which have yet to surface, with their knowledge and analytical ability. Of course, the best kind of leader would be one who is both charismatic and vision...


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Research essay sample on Theories On Qualities Of Leaders And Followers

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