Your officers will need to do some research to find out how the administrator whom they would like to nominate contributed to building a solid foundation for their Chapter, developed scholarship and other financial assistance programs and opportunities for members,  supported adequate funding for Chapter operations and events, engaged and participated in Phi Theta Kappa Programs, and advocated for the Chapter and increased its profile on campus.  They will have learned about the kinds of things that real leaders remember to do everyday — some key leadership functions — and Officers can recall these things when they are beginning their own initiatives:

• establish a strong foundation:  get the right people and basic resources on board
• develop and empower people with their futures in mind
• consider sources of additional resources to enhance impact
• stay mission-focused
• communicate, publicize, honor and recognize

You can also encourage the Officers to interview the administrators on campus to learn more about the reasons for their support and to personally thank the administrators for their efforts.  Conversations with college leaders have true win-win outcomes when your Officers learn from them and build their own confidence through the interactions, the administrators learn how their support is significant and appreciated, and strong connections between the administrators and the chapter continue to grow. 

Check out the resources available about the Hallmark Awards Program online, and don’t forget that the deadline for Phi Theta Kappa headquarters to receive nominations in the administrators’ awards categories is December 5, 2008!

[Monika Byrd, November 2008]

Questions or Comments about Phi Theta Kappa Leading Leaders articles may be directed to Monika Byrd, Dean of Leadership Development for the Honors Program Department.

In the Harvard Business Review article, “Leadership that Gets Results,” Daniel Goleman explains research showing that up to 30% of a company’s financial results are determined by the climate of the organization.  And what drives climate?  The leaders do.  Goleman’s research, more fully described in his book Primal Leadership:  Realizing the Power of Emotional Intelligence (with Richard Boyatzis and Annie McKee), showed that 50 – 70% of how people perceive their organization’s climate comes from the actions and behaviors of their leaders.  Leaders who aren’t measured by financial results can perhaps more easily fail to appreciate how profoundly the organizational climate can influence results.  How leaders go about motivating others, gathering and using information, making decisions, initiating new initiatives, and handling challenges make a difference.  The aim is a positive climate.

However, leaders cannot accomplish a positive climate by being upbeat and chipper all the time.  Goleman says that a leader’s mindset and actions must stay in tune with what’s going on in the organization — what he refers to as dynamic resonance.  “Good moods galvanize good performance, but it doesn’t make sense for a leader to be as chipper as a blue jay at dawn if sales are tanking or the business is going under.  The most effective executives display moods and behaviors that match the situation at hand, with a healthy dose of optimism mixed in.  They respect how other people are feeling — even if it is glum or defeated — but they also model what it looks like to move forward with hope and humor.”  Besides reading the climate and adjusting appropriately, effective leaders remain positive about the future, calm and relaxed, no matter what the current climate is.  Consistently modeling optimism and doing things such as eliciting and spreading good ideas rather than criticizing and blaming eventually pay off with an improved climate.   

It’s not uncommon for people to assume that leadership style is a function of personality rather than strategic choice.  Instead of always working in the “default” style that suits their temperaments, leaders who get excellent results ask which style best addresses the needs of a particular situation and the needs of the people in the group.  They have a set of competencies collectively called emotional intelligence that helps them to assess the situations and the people and that they employ to varying degrees, resulting in particular styles of leadership.

Goleman has done extensive research showing that the most successful leaders have strengths in the following emotional intelligence competencies:

• self-awareness
• self-regulation
• motivation
• empathy
• social skills

He identifies six basic styles of leadership and each makes use of the key components of emotional intelligence in different combinations.  So while an individual may be most comfortable and experienced with just one or two of the styles, the best leaders make use of them all by using all of the emotional intelligence competencies in the appropriate combinations and are adept at determining which style to use – meaning which of the emotional intelligence competencies should rise to the top.   If leaders understand that they are not changing themselves by changing styles and do it with confidence, others inside and outside of the group see that the exercise of emotional intelligence is a sensitivity to the circumstances around them and an ability to adapt effectively to the circumstances to increase the group’s effectiveness, not “flip-flopping” or manipulation.

Each of the six leadership styles is derived from emphasizing different emotional intelligence competencies, works best in particular situations, and affects the organizational climate in different ways, and people of different temperaments or personalities can exercise these styles in their own unique ways, and can exercise them all with the optimism which Goleman identifies as critical.  What follows are Goleman’s brief descriptions of each style, the kinds of situations for which each is appropriate or the kinds of mindsets people may have for which each is appropriate, and the drawbacks of relying too heavily on each.
 

1. The coercive style. This “Do what I say” approach can be very effective in a turnaround situation, a natural disaster, or when working with difficult people.   Use this style with caution, however, because in most situations, coercive leadership inhibits flexibility and dampens motivation.
2. The authoritative style. An authoritative leader takes a “Come with me” approach: she states the overall goal but gives people the freedom to choose their own means of achieving it. This style works especially well when an organization or group is adrift or when there are motivated people who don’t have a common direction. It is less effective when the leader is working with a team of experts who are more experienced than he is.
3. The affiliative style. The hallmark of the affiliative leader is a “People come first” attitude. This style is particularly useful for building team harmony or increasing morale. But it has a near exclusive focus on praise and poor performance can go uncorrected. Also, affiliative leaders rarely offer advice, which sometimes leaves people craving stronger leadership.
4. The democratic style. This style’s impact on organizational climate is not as high as you might imagine. By giving people a voice in decisions, democratic leaders build organizational flexibility and responsibility and help generate fresh ideas. But sometimes the price is endless meetings and confused group members who feel leaderless.
5. The pacesetting style. A leader who sets high performance standards and exemplifies them himself has a very positive impact on people who are self-motivated and highly competent. But other people tend to feel overwhelmed by such a leader’s demands for excellence — and to resent his tendency to take over a situation.
6. The coaching style. This style focuses more on personal development than on immediate tasks. It works well when people are already aware of their weaknesses and want to improve, but not when they are resistant to changing their ways.

Emotional Intelligence and leadership style are also critical in those situations when non-positional leaders want or need to “lead up” or lead outside their own organizations to gain support for the organization or an initiative.

More information about these styles and about emotional intelligence can be found in the sources listed below, and Goleman’s article also appears in Phi Theta Kappa Leadership Development Studies:  A Humanities Approach.  After reading the article, a dialogue with your chapter officers could begin with questions about each officers’ “natural” style and the emotional intelligence competency that is emphasized, about the situations with which they are involved and the style that might work best (a chapter meeting with lots of people advocating heatedly for different, great Honors in Action project ideas, a meeting with the Dean of Students to gain approval for funds to travel to the Phi Theta Kappa International Convention, a presentation to the Student Senate for a campus-wide initiative, a community Operation Green project with enthusiastic, energetic people, etc.).  The conversation could continue with ideas and support from each other for developing comfort with different styles.   

Sources:
Goleman, Daniel.  “Leadership That Gets Results.”  The Harvard Business Review, March – April 2000.  This article also appears in the text book, Phi Theta Kappa Leadership Development Studies:  A Humanities Approach, Fourth Edition in Unit 10 “Empowering Others,” pp. 462 – 474. 

Goleman, Daniel, Richard Boyatzis, and Annie McKee.  Primal Leadership:  Realizing the Power of Emotional Intelligence.  Boston:  Harvard Business School Press, 2002.

[September 2008, Monika Byrd]

Questions or Comments about Phi Theta Kappa Leading Leaders articles may be directed to Monika Byrd, Dean of Leadership Development for the Honors Program Department.