preview

Shared Leadership Papers

Good Essays

Shared Leadership Leadership has been studied a countless amount of times, but there is not one leadership style that is proven to be the best for an organization. The complexity of today’s business environment makes leadership increasingly more challenging. There have been continuous arguments about how it is becoming more difficult for any single individual to possess all of the skills and abilities required to competently lead an organization today (Kocolowski, 2010). Therefore, I believe having a leadership team of varying personality types or leadership styles, to such extent, is an effective way to manage the diversity in the workplace and the continuous changes in the world of work. Shared leadership can be defined as a dynamic interactive …show more content…

Shared leadership is a team environment that consists of three dimensions: shared purpose, social support, and voice. Shared purpose exists when team members have similar understandings of their team’s main objectives and takes steps to ensure a focus on collective goals (Carson, 2007). Shared purpose is the whole reason why the team exists and what they are working towards. This is the fundamental factor that leaders are trying to motivate the individuals around them to achieve. Social support is the extent to which team members actively provide emotional and psychological strength to one another (Carson, 2007). Social support consists of feeling recognized and supported within the team in which they belong. Social support is a crucial shared leadership factor that can determine the level of commitment from the team members. Voice is the degree to which a team’s members have to input into how to team carries out its purpose (Carson, 2007). The voice dimension provides a common sense of direction and the support demanded within a team environment. Carson concludes that the three dimensions work together to create an internal team environment that is characterized by a shared understanding about purpose and goals, a sense of recognition and importance, and high levels of involvement, challenge, and cooperation (Carson, …show more content…

I have had numerous jobs in my past, and have been exposed to very efficient management or leadership teams, and ones that have been significantly weaker and were evident in the work environment and employee attitudes. My reflection piece is outside of the typical work environment and is going to be based on my experiences attending University on a hockey scholarship; and my positive experiences with shared leadership. Although a hockey team may seem like an informal example of a successful shared leadership experience, the strategies executed by the leadership roles on the hockey team could be very easily transported into my future careers. The hierarchy of this specific example was the Head Coach of the hockey team, a Captain and three Assistant Captains; one being myself. To paint a picture, a typical workweek as a student athlete consisted of early morning one hour on ice skate, a full day of classes, an hour off-ice workout session, and an evening two-hour on ice skate. It was a very big commitment to balance the schedule of full time school and a full time job being an athlete as well. We were held to a different expectation than some of our surrounding students. The coaching staff, through weekly grade reports, closely monitored our GPA, and we were expected to maintain a higher minimum average than what the school specifies in order to compete

Get Access