Leadership Thinking Through Managerial Psychology

Business organizational needs are met successfully when there are leaders in place who understand their people, industry, and societal concerns. Organizations inherently involve humans who must be managed and directed to varying degrees, and managing is not always as streamlined as some may wish. Understanding the needs and goals of each individual or group is paramount for a manager to elevate from daily management to ongoing leadership. A good manager/leader should strive to have personal knowledge of a collection of leadership theories and applications that would serve them in different situations. People are complex beings, and great leaders have the ability to appeal to the psychological aspects of how to lead particular groups of individuals. Through this framework, leaders can have a better understanding of how to manage when necessary, and managers can in turn begin to learn how to lead. This chapter offers insight to an audience who can begin to identify a core group of leadership competencies, theories, and qualities to synergize their personal preference.

Effects of Contemporary Leadership Styles and Employee Engagement on Customer Satisfaction in the Retail Grocery Industry in the US

Competition within the retail grocery industry has reached an all-time high. Organizations looking to differentiate themselves from rivals are focusing on improved customer satisfaction. This quantitative research study investigated how customer satisfaction was related to contemporary leadership styles and employee engagement. Transactional leadership theory, transformational leadership theory, and charismatic leadership theory were used as the theoretical framework of the study. Regression analyses were conducted to determine the effect of contemporary leadership styles on employee engagement in addition to determining the extent of the relationship existing with customer satisfaction. The results of the study indicated both transactional leadership and transformational leadership positively impacted or increased employee engagement; however, transformational leadership proved to be a significantly higher predictor of employee engagement.

Trust and Organizational Leadership

Trust is a fundamental part of life. It also remains an essential exchange that fosters a relationship between a leader and employees and between other leaders. Without trust, it is nearly impossible for an organization to be successful. Organizational leaders must facilitate an environment based on trust to navigate the organization successfully. Without trust, organizations tend to derail from their vision and future possibilities. The world begins and ends with leadership, as John Maxwell once said, and leadership begins and ends on trust. Trust requires years of building and nurturing. Without trust, it is nearly impossible for organizations to build relationships or work successfully across cultures and borders. Working in the global economy we know we must act with the understanding that trust is an intricate ingredient when working effectively with global organizations, global teams, and international clients.

Organizational Development and Change Management Implement AR, AI, and PC for Steller Non-Profit Org.

Organizational development and change remains an issue, especially when communication and engagement among employees is lacking. This action research study identified issues and strategies essential to help with change management. The action research study focused on one non-profit organization by consulting with five employees with three years or more experience involvement in their local community for at-risk teens in Seattle, Washington metropolitan area. The researcher facilitated action research, appreciative inquiry, and process consultation to discover the issues Steller non-profit organization experienced, and moving forward to implement effective processes which can help them to achieve a desirable outcome.

Exploring the Strategies Needed to Successfully Migrate Ground Campus Instruction to Fully Online Higher Education Courses

The impact of COVID-19 has put immediate stress on institutions of higher learning to properly and successfully migrate their traditional face to face courses to fully online. There are several components to be considered in the rapid migration of courses online including the management and support of teaching faculty which includes instructional design and training support. Faculty are under extreme stress preparing for multiple modalities but some of the practices put into place over Spring are important as we move forward in the quest for high-quality online migration of land-based courses. This study seeks to explore strategies needed by higher education administrators to successfully migrate face to face teams to fully online ones and the components of helping to support the development of online courses from face to face in a short timeframe. The study investigates management theory, instructional design theory, and the perspectives of 12 administrators tasked with supporting the rapid migration of online instruction.

Leaders With Spirit

With the dawn of a new century, there is an emerging and exponentially accelerating force for global, societal, and organizational change. The socio-cultural and economic turbulence, the fast-paced technological developments are leading people towards a search for meaning especially at work. An average individual spends most of their adult life working and therefore seeks meaning via their work. This implies that our workplaces are one of the most important determinants of our well-being. Spiritual approaches to work are on the rise among today's working population. People search for solutions to be more grounded and not to get lost between the tensions created by their external world. Krieger underlines that there is clearly a deep crisis in human affairs at all levels from the individual to the organizational and to the societal. In this respect, this chapter aims to highlight the importance of spirituality in the workplace and discuss the role of spiritual leadership in the search for meaning both in the individual and the organizational realm.

Thinking Styles and Leadership Skills of Managers on Organizational Productivity

Psychological aspects, a great concern of managerial psychology, include emotions, thinking, attitudes, and motivation of the employees in managerial positions, which ramifies the productivity of the organization. Managerial thinking and leadership skills are important components in achieving organizational goals. Organizational productivity is a strong indicator for managers in the growth which has direct relationship with organizational performance. Efficacious leadership skills in managers like interpersonal skills, team building, flexibility, emotional intelligence helps in meeting the goals which simultaneously increases the organization productivity and performance of the employees. Strategic management approaches by the managers to increase productivity at successive levels. An executive manager is an agent of change who lets a subordinate work according to him and then he converts the follower into a leader through team quality management (TQM) programs and effectiveness. The managerial implications are discussed which helps to establish cooperative innovations.

A Literature Review of CEO Servant Leadership and Social Responsibility in American For-Profit Organizations

The aim of this chapter is to synthesize the literature on servant leadership and corporate social responsibility demonstrating conceptual and theoretical convergence. Servant leadership emphasizes ethics, positive psychology, and maximizes optimistic behavior and can be associated with CSR which has an ethical and humanistic framework. It is hypothesized that servant leadership is linked with both individual employee development and purpose-driven, stakeholder-based community relationships in for-profit corporations. The research gap that exists between CSR and servant leadership requires this study to analyze operational definitions through the perspective of ethics and spirituality. This study indicates that a positive relationship may exist between the perceptions of followers and attributions of servant leadership and CSR. With CSR, CEO servant leaders enhance employee psychological well-being, loyalty, improve financial performance, and address genuine social concerns.

Lived Experiences of Women Over 50 Who Lost Their Jobs

The study includes a transcendental phenomenological approach to describe the lived experiences of women over 50 following job losses, the barriers faced to reemployment, and the ways by which women overcame the barriers to reemployment, and compares these experiences to the experiences of men. The data gathered from a convenience sample of 10 women between the ages of 56 and 74 provided in-depth descriptions of participant experiences following job loss. The findings indicated that women and men view and cope with job loss differently. Further studies could lead organizational leaders and policy makers to a more in-depth understanding of the experiences of women over 50 following job loss and provide guidance when considering strategies to address the unique needs of older workers seeking reemployment.

Organizational Dynamics Around Sexual Harassment Interventions and Occurrences in Clinical Training Healthcare Environments

The clinical training of healthcare professionals and the delivery of safe healthcare is reliant on a vigorous organizational safety culture, one where the workplace and medical training environment is free of hostility and harassment. Sexual harassment and sexual misconduct are significant problems for women in healthcare. For all staff members, it is imperative that the hospital has clear, solid policies and, even more importantly, procedures and communication of those procedures for reporting problems concerning harassment. This research inquiry uses case study action research in the context of an OD intervention in school of health science and medical center that provides clinical and medical training and community patient care. The organization has significant organizational cultural issues around harassment. Results indicate the need for more proactive strategies around leadership and organizational cultural change that can apply to medical schools, schools of health science, and medical centers.