Leading Human Resources: An Analysis (part 2)

Management: An Applied Behavioral Sciences Approach (part B)

by

Charles Lamson

The most effective leaders are those who use their energies to accomplish desired results. Leadership focuses on action and implementation. Leadership, change, implementation, and results: These are the operative words for the new world order. They will become, as never before, core influences on an organization's environment, thus profoundly affecting the leadership of effective organizations. It is clear that exploding technology in such areas as communication will accelerate the pace of life as well as give individuals the freedom to be self-directed leaders. It is also clear that effects of globalization will intensify personal and organizational demands by subjecting everyone to the rigors of global competition.

This means that effective leaders must be able to diagnose, adapt, and communicate---all major themes of this analysis---to meet the needs of a rapidly changing and challenging world, a world in which inflexibility will not work. Leaders, even more than before, must become aware of each situation and be able to use the leadership style appropriate to that situation.

Organizations As Sources of Competitive Advantage

The sources of a competitive advantage have changed through social and technological development at various international levels. According to Ed Lawler of the University of Southern California, the sources have progressed from control of natural resources, through economic and financial expertise, to improved marketing ability, to control of technology, and to the improved use of human resources. It is the organizations---that is, their ability to marshal their skills in employing all of their resources---that are going to give them a competitive advantage. Vincent Omanchonu and Joel Ross, authorities on quality management, support Lawler's conclusion.

Historically, productivity improvement has focused on technology and capital equipment to reduce the input of labor cost. Improved output was generally thought to be subject to obtaining more production by applying industrial engineering techniques such as methods analysis, work flow, etc. Both of these approaches are still appropriate, but the current trend is toward better use of the potential available through human resources [emphasis added].

The Challenges of Leading an Organization

This analysis is about special skills that we need to meet those challenges. It presents fundamental behavioral science concepts and theories and simple-to-use behavioral science techniques.

Some concepts in the behavioral sciences give you some good ideas to think about, but they do not always tell you how or when to put those ideas into practice in the management of human organizations. We have all seen people who just show up in leadership and management situations. But success requires much more than just showing up. It requires the knowledge and application of tested behavioral science concepts, plus the "timing" skills to get things done. This analysis will help you not only to acquire the knowledge but also to develop the skills necessary to be a high-performing leader.

Leading, influencing the behavior of others, is not a single event. Leadership and management are full-time responsibilities that must be practiced every hour of every day. Each minute must be spent wisely. Of course, doing so is not easy. Leadership and management, because they involve the complexities of people, almost defy description and understanding. We have all known courageous men and women who have provided the vision and energy to make things happen in very difficult situations. But even after decades of research, we are still unable to identify with certainty the specific causal factors that determine leadership and management success at a specific time and place. This is because real-life situations are never static. They are constantly changing, with many factors or variables acting at the same time. Consequently, the behavioral sciences, unlike the physical sciences, deal in probabilities. Our purpose then is to help increase the odds in your favor, not to suggest rules. In the behavioral sciences, there are no rules.

What has long been needed is an approach to leadership and management that is both conceptually sound and practical in application. The writers of Management of Organizational Behavior: Leading Human Resources (Hersey, Blanchard & Johnson) have found---through their research and writing, their conversations with thousands of managers throughout the world, their consulting and seminars---that most people want an easy-to-grasp approach that is broad enough in scope to permit its application to different organizations and situations. Such an approach would promote a common understanding and language that would make it possible for managers to work together and act upon the problems they experience in managing their human resources. In developing these ideas and skills, they wanted to build upon the considerable legacy of the behavioral sciences by using a common language so managers could easily master the key ideas and skills. This analysis provides such a common language to help solve performance problems. It provides a valuable language that can be used on the job, in the home, and in every leadership situation. It provides a common language we can use to diagnose leadership problems, to adapt behavior to solve those problems, and to communicate solutions.

It is human nature to react to problems in an emotional way. This analysis provides a model for talking about performance  problems in a rational way that focuses on the key issues. We also wanted to present an approach that is intuitively valid and that is based on empirical evidence. The acceptance that Situational Leadership, espoused by Hersey, Blanchard & Johnson in Management of Human Resources, has received for more than 30 years has indicated that this approach is easily understood, accepted, and implemented at all levels of organizations. It is a fundamental approach to the management of organizational behavior.

In summary, despite changes in concepts of organization, successful leadership is fundamentally determined by leader-follower interaction in the pursuit of goal accomplishment, readiness assessment, leadership intervention, appraisal of the results of this intervention, and effective follow-up . . . all essential elements of what they call "Situational Leadership."

To be continued...

*SOURCE: MANAGEMENT OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR: LEADING HUMAN RESOURCES, 8TH ED., 2001, PAUL HERSEY, KENNETH H. BLANCHARD, DEWEY E. JOHNSON, PGS. 6-8*

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