Coaching as a tool of Leadership Development

Leadership is said to be an essential management function that supports in maximizing efficiency and to attain the goals of the organization. The leader is the person who initiates the work by discussing the plans and policies with the juniors from where the operations actually commence (Adair, 2013). A leader does not only perform the work of supervising, along with this he/she also assists in the roles of the subordinates. In order to lead a team, it is very important for a leader to be confident so that he/she can motivate others to work (Catranis, 2017). Management is very important for every organization as it organizes the factors of production accumulates and arranges the resources, incorporation of resources in an operative manner to attain goals. It guides group efforts in the direction of accomplishment of pre-defined goals. By describing clearly, the objectives of the company there will be no waste of effort, money, and time (Appelo, 2010).

Leadership and Management should go side by side, but they are not considered the same thing. Both the concepts are complementary, but it is essential to know how both of them are different, which will be explained in this paper.   

Leadership and management are important for the success of the organization. This report is being presented in order to highlight the concept of leadership and management, which will involve the explanation of theories and different approaches used to develop managers and leaders. Besides this, it will describe the tools of mentoring and coaching for developing management and leadership. Further, analysis of the success indicators for the management and leadership development programmes will be described. In the end, analysis of the methods will be done that are used to evaluate performance and support in the improvements in the performance.

Coaching as a tool of Leadership Development

While thinking about the ways of developing a leader, the normal suspects that initially come in the mind are webinars stretch assignments, articles, training, books, and projects. However, without having a guide, the leader may not grab the maximum from these experiences, or practice what they have learned. A coach who is qualified and experienced can make the difference in bringing outcomes and return on investment from the efforts of leadership development. Coaching makes mastery and simply enhances on the job performance and increase employee engagement by the leader (Pardey, 2012).

Coaching for leadership comprises, assisting the leader in cultivating better capability to acquire from reality on the job experiences. Whereas coaching is definitely a method to strengthen knowledge procurement in other ways, the actual learning takes place when the leader puts on new knowledge, philosophies, and conventions to a real-life application. A coach supports leaders to concentrate on experience, show and looks at diverse actions they can take in future (Puett, 2017).

Mentoring as a tool of Management development

One of the most important tools of management is mentoring. The procedure that takes place between two people who assess issues of each other,  deliver the finest solution in order to cover any problems and to improve performance by constantly observing and offering feedback on the job done, is known as Mentoring. A mentor can make use of various styles and scale to support development, offer feedback, information source, and personal development, offer opportunities and identify an outline to shadow and to reach the organizations. The collaboration is the key mentoring component that should be present between the mentee and his mentor (Albaqami, 2016).

Mentoring as a tool of Management development

The Training and Development American Society has frequently prolonged its qualified prominence from training to workplace learning and performance and HRD that is human resource development. Today, the workplace has converted into the learning centre. Trends are considered as the directions towards developmental, which specify how an arena is changing with time. Some of the trends of workplace learning are:

Category of Facilitators and Participants are diversifying- Conventionally, the workplace-learning participants are majorly in-service and mature workers in industries. However, it has been identified that the kind of practitioners and participants of workplace learning are diversifying. For instance, the United Kingdom’s higher education is moving from supply-led to demand-led.

Emerging Approach Focus is practice-based systemic learning- Workplace learning is considered as the dynamic procedure to resolve workplace issues by knowledge. It is about not only informal. Non-formal and formal learning at the workplace is about learning personified and entrenched in the work contexts. The Centre for Vocational Education Research of Australia (NCVER) describes workplace learning as “the training or learning accepted in the workplace, frequently on the job, comprising on-the-job training in the usual working circumstances, and on-site training, which is operated away from the procedure of work (example in a training room)”.

The learning time flexibility has been increasing- According to Garrick and Usher, the information learned from workplace learning is moving to an emphasis on problem-based knowledge, which is considered by the outcomes of learning that are performance-based in place of time and discipline related. More work at home schemes and flexible hours of working also upsurge the learning time flexibility. Additionally, the utilization of e learning by a range of new communication and information technologies (ICTs) has supported people in learning new things that were previously at times impossible. For instance, Ketter stated that with the economic recession challenges, tools of social media shattered onto the act of workplace learning (Lee and Lai, 2012).

The objective of learning at the workplace is performance that is both organizational and individual. In the recent years, it has been identified that learning is very effective at the time it gets integrated with the actual work. There are various strategies in the business settings that support integrated learning and development, some of them are:

Understand the work- If learning gets integrated with the work than it means that the work has been understood in a proper manner. Interacting with people, observing people, using suitable tools of analysis, and thinking like the performer are the activities, which helps in understanding the job. Understanding the performer’s world, daily pressures, tools that are used by them and the way they make use of it, is very important. Moreover, to understand the work job processes, inputs, and mechanism of feedback for job officers are very important aspects.

In addition, learning and using various tools of analysis, are suitable for various types of performance- analysis of task for visible work, for knowledge Cognitive walk-through and output-focused analysis of performance for both. Value stream analysis and process analysis are valuable for seeing work in terms of the wider system. All the specified and other various methods of analysis, are serious tools for identifying methods in creating learning systems into a workplace or being job deprived of troubling the learner (employee) with unrelated or bulky programs and tools, which are not applicable for the daily workflow. An appropriate analysis of the job and tools are the solutions and not the barriers.

Critically evaluate trends in workplace learning

Linking learning and information to the process of business – It is always discussed with regards the linking of training onto the strategies of an organisation, which of course are being taken seriously. Further to this, the main link to the strategy is cross-functional processes of the business. The well-organized process of business is structured to achieve the objectives of the organisation. Each work or job is determined by a procedure, explicit or implicit. If it is implicit, it has to be nearly invisible and only a few enhancements can be done before the start on learning development.

The time processes of business are recognized, the process phases could be utilized to effectively insert applicable resources of learning. Every process of business involves “knowledge leverage points” – these are points where the main information is required for optimum performance. These can be key decision points, requirements of data collection points, and requirement of planning, etc. and it varies by kind of process and job. Moreover, generation of knowledge is as essential in contemporary knowledge work as delivery of knowledge, hence it is important to inspect the way knowledge could be gathered by practice and made obtainable to the broader group at those similar points of knowledge leverage (Performance X Design, 2009).

Today, organizations are investing in the leadership development programs to make their leaders and managers strive in being best and bring out their maximum efforts towards performing their job. This is logical as the long-term success of the company is based on making successful and strong leaders for the future. Some of the indicators of the success of leadership development programs are:

Establishing leadership competencies – The initial step in enhancing the development strategy is to make a group of competencies therefore, a list of vital requirements that every current, potential and future leader of the company need to possess (Monarth, 2015). Discussing with the senior management or leadership team about what are the needs of the business in relation to leadership. It is essential to define, as a group, the particular skills of leadership and behaviours desirable for the success of the business. It is important to ensure that everything is clear about these needs as it is good to be specific (PMC Training, 2014).

Next step is to observe the present group of employees and find out employees with the leadership potential. With the set of competencies, it becomes easier to observe how an applicant measures up. Here it is essential to look at the tools of training and development that can support these individuals to enhance the growth of their skills in leadership.

Use of methods of evaluation to measure return on investment – As with various business aspects, it is important to ensure that there is a balance between costs and benefits. Along with this, it is essential to reflect a return on investment to the main shareholders, to demonstrate the leadership development investment’s value (Phillip, 2015). According to Kristen Harcourt, there are three essential points for creating an effective leadership development programs:

• Understanding the requirement for leadership
• Recognizing employees with potential to fulfil these requirements
• Functioning to create methods of evaluation (Chinn, 2017)

Examine strategies for integrating learning and development within wider organisational strategy

The existence of a clear mission statement- This is the indicator that measures the presence of a strong sense of direction in the written mission statement. Possessing a strong statement of mission offers strategic rational about priorities of the organization like needs of the client. Without the statement of mission, the company might execute successfully but a statement of mission supports in maintaining a focus of the staff towards the attainment of long-term objectives and Offers Company a sense of identity (Tamkin, Hillage and Willison, 2012).

The existence of Clear statement of values- The statement of values is defined as the organization’s ethical principles. Values are ethical principles and beliefs that motivate the mission of the organization. These values in the company provide meaning to work and create the foundation of staff commitment. This indicator helps in measuring the presence of a strong set of principles in order to assist staff attitude and behaviour (Management Science for Health, 2006). 

Defining the needs of company’s leadership- A good “square one “practice is to think of any precise leadership gaps that the company has or can face. For instance, any leader of the company thinking to get retire soon. In addition, if the present leader is thinking of leaving, one has to bear in mind what characteristics and attributes will be missed by the business.

Along with this, the long-term and short-term strategic goals of the company should also be considered. For instance, if the company is on moving towards growth in high speed, then the leadership development program of the company must be allied to confirm the business possess the correct leadership in the premises to fulfil the priorities.

Develop, do not train- It should be understood that leaders can be encouraged and developed, but they cannot be manufactured. While making a program of leadership development, a business must think about the way to place the applicants into the circumstances that need them to grow and learn. Examples contain offering opportunities to the candidates to step up the time other leaders are not in place or to cooperate with the co-workers in different departments on a distinct project (Half, 2017).  

Recognizing the management diversity – It has been seen that the developers need to be associated with the truth of managerial work. While establishing development programmes, it is significant to look for the diversity of management attitudes, experience, and skills that exist in the company.

If managers have to emerge efficiently, their individual needs of development should be measured in a cautious and orderly manner (Wisdom IT services, 2018).

A complete employee appraisal is frequently a sum up of various diverse performance evaluation methods. Business can make use of one process of evaluating the time to judge the performance of the employee, but while utilizing the methods of multiple evaluations it will get the wider image of the zones where there is need of improvements in the employee (Root, 2018).

Self-evaluations and review- The self-evaluation is most of the time effective when it is mixed with a performance review. In this method, the worker is instructed to evaluate his own performance with the help of filling a form that involves multiple-choice questions, essay type question or it can be the combination of the two (Grote, 2011).

360 evaluation- Employee’s developments are comprised of growth made in their own department and the efficiency of their connections with the organization. A 360-degree evaluation of performance is the method that is comprised of input from the executives and other various departments of the company in which an employee has worked in on a frequent basis (Durai, 2011).

Conclusion

Practices of leadership and management are valuable to the success of the individual and for the organization. For attaining the benefits of different approaches of both the concept, it is very important to apply them in the organization. This report will guide and direct the ways to apply those approaches and get professional information on management, and leadership, and aid as a self-study exercise in order to possess the knowledge of the fundamental skills of management and leadership that can be applied at different departments of the organization. The report has also provided the understanding of the leadership and management theories and their application through relevant skills of leadership and effectiveness of teams. Further, the approaches to evaluate the leadership development programs has been presented which reflected that leaders are not created they can only be developed through effective training and development programs. Moreover, it has also identified that management development programs can be evaluated by evaluating the individual needs of the managers within the organization.

References

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