Transformational Leader or "Cookie Cutter" Manager??

The Transformational Leader

Transformational leadership "recognizes and exploits an existing need or demand of a potential follower... (and) looks for potential motives in followers, seeks to satisfy higher needs, and engages the full person of the follower" . Through transformational leadership followers embody the values of the organization and become leaders.

The Transformational leader strives to achieve a true consensus in aligning individual and organizational interests. In true consensus, the interests of all are fully considered, but the final decision reached may fail to please everyone completely. The decision is accepted as the best under the circumstances even if it means some individual members’ interests may have to be sacrificed.

Authentic transformational leadership builds genuine trust between leaders and followers. They increase the awareness of what is right, good, important, and beautiful, when they help to elevate followers’ needs for achievement and self-actualization, when they foster in followers higher moral maturity, and when they move followers to go beyond their self-interests for the good of their group, organization, or society.

The truly transformational leader who is seeking the greatest good for the greatest number and is concerned about doing what is right and honest is likely to avoid stretching the truth or going beyond the evidence for he/she wants to set an example to followers about the value of valid and accurate communication in followers.

There is a moral justification for the transformational leader’s efforts to achieve value-congruence between the leader and the led. When it is achieved, both are more satisfied emotionally. Much of this congruence results in leaders being seen by followers as more considerate, competent, and successful and followers are more satisfied with their jobs.

Leadership and followership in transformistic organizations are predicated less on positional authority and more on interdependent work relationships centered on common purposes. Individuals who assume leadership roles have sound visioning, interpersonal and organizational skills, and the desire and willingness to lead. Effective followers are distinguished by their capacity for self-management, strong commitment and courage.

When organizational participants are empowered to act as effective leaders and followers based on core values and a unifying purpose, the potential for unprecedented advances and exceptional outcomes are greatly enhanced.

Transforming leadership is elevating. It is moral but not moralistic. Leaders engage with followers, but from higher levels of morality; in the enmeshing of goals and values both leaders and followers are raised to more principled levels of judgement.

The Cookie Cutter Manager

As opposed to transformational leaders, the cookie cutter manager treats everyone the same. There is no alignment of values or beliefs. Using the culinary analogy, when you roll out a batch of cookie dough and apply a cookie cutter, you get the shape you desired, clearly and neatly defined. But you also find there's some material left over, sometimes quite a lot. While the extra dough can be rolled out and cut again, eventually you're left with a remaining lump of dough that doesn't fit the required shape.

In bureaucracies cookie cutter management is still alive and well, but it is becoming recognized that cookie cutter management needs to be abandoned and in its place transformational leadership installed.

Free Enterprise in the Public Sector - Intrapreneurualism

in-tra-pre-neur (In¹tre-pre-nur) n. A person within a large corporation who takes direct responsibility for turning an idea into a profitable finished product through assertive risk-taking and innovation [intra(corporate) + (ENTRE)PRENEUR.] -inftrapre-nouri-al adj. -intra-pre-neuri-al-ism n. -in'trapre-neuri-al-ly adv.

From the aforementioned link --------

If we are to get really good problem-solving in our decentralized corporation,- we must introduce a system that gives the decision to those who get successful results., not to the inoffensive ' Such people will be willing to take moderate risks and will be more concerned with achieving results than with gaining influence. These are among the characteristics of the successful entrepreneur. What is needed in the large corporation is not more semi-independent departments run by hard-driving yes men'. but something akin to free market entrepreneurship within the corporate organization.

Here are some principles I predict will prove useful in establishing employee entrepreneurs who work Within the corporation. I will call this new class of intra-corporate entrepreneurs, "intrapreneurs".

(1) To become an intrapreneur, an individual must risk something of value to himself. It may be just the time needed to complete the business plan and preliminary research while carrying out his normal duties. It may in some cases involve financial sacrifices such as having no salary increases until the new business becomes a success, or even a 20% salary decrease until project bonuses arrive. What is risked should be negotiated for each project.

The risk serves several functions. It tests and later increases intrapreneurial conviction and drive. It binds the corporation in an implied contract not to stop the intrapreneur for any reason other than poor performance. Finally, it helps other employees to rationalize the intrapreneur's extraordinary rewards.

(2) The rewards of success in an intrapreneurial project must be shared between the corporation and the
intrapreneur in a well-defined and equitable way. This cannot always be pre-negotiated, as the researcher may not know in advance where his research leads. Therefore, there must be a trusted committee to "buy" completed research from its intrapreneurs for some pre-established fraction of its value to the company as determined by an established accounting system. The integrity and impartiality of this committee must be above suspicion.

(3) The intrapreneur should have the opportunity to build up something akin to capital. The successful intrapreneur would earn in addition to his cash bonus, complete control of a definite amount of R&D funds, funds which he would have a completely free hand in investing on behalf of the corporation in his future R&D projects. We will call these funds, "intra-capital".

People have enormous potential for goodness, for insight, for creativity, for intimacy, and for work. Much of this potential is trapped within the constraints of today’s huge hierarchical organizations. The development of the entrepreneur is a step toward freeing individuals, our organizations, and our society to use our potential for building fuller, more meaningful, richer and more productive lives for us all. The signs of imminent change surround us.

Being A Bureaucrat

I remember studying in school about Max Weber and his thoughts on "bureaucracy" and "bureaucratic organizations". If I recall correctly, Weber argued that it is in the very nature of bureaucracies to grow larger and become more inefficient. Weber's theories would give rise to the belief that as a bureaucrat you need not aspire to greatness, as "good enough for government work."

After doing a bit of research I found that according to Weber, the bureaucratic form has six major principles. Namely,

1. A formal hierarchical structure

Each level controls the level below and is controlled by the level above. A formal hierarchy is the basis of central planning and centralized decision making. This is similar to the chain-of-command model upon which military organizations are traditionally built.

2. Management by rules

Controlling by rules allows decisions made at high levels to be executed consistently by all lower levels. This is the classic cookie-cutter approach to management. Every peg must fit into a round hole, even if the peg is square!

3. Organization by functional specialty

Work is to be done by specialists, and people are organized into units based on the type of work they do or skills they have. Every person has a job and everyone will do their job. God forbid someone try to something outside the box of their job -- moving outside the box shakes up the entire status quo and steps on everyone who has grown secure within the limitations of their box.

4. Purposely impersonal

The idea is to treat all employees equally and customers equally, and not be influenced by individual differences. In order to be fair, it is mistakenly enshrined that everyone must be treated the same. If different people are treated differently, then it is agrued that they were not being treated fairly. In the ideal bureaucracy, to be equal you must be treated equally rather then being treated equitably.

5. Employment based on technical qualifications

To get the job you must fit the job description. In the ideal bureaucracy it does not matter what your attitude is or what diversity you present, you must have the checklist complete before you move ahead.

6. The Bureaucracy Grows Bigger

Theorist C. Northcote Parkinson demonstrated that the management and professional staff tends to grow at predictable rates, almost without regard to what the line organization is doing. He established the so-called Parkinson's Law - the bureacracy will grow largers.

Are Bureaucracies Ugly??

People in bureaucratic organizations generally blame the ugly side effects of bureaucracy on management, or the founders, or the owners, without awareness that the real cause is organizing based on the
bureaucratic form. It is bureaucratic to think that all functions of planning and control have to be done by management. Transformational leadership is not created.

It is bureaucratic to think that managers and managing are more important than the people who achieve the quality or satisfy individual customers. It is bureaucratic to think that the higher you are on the organization chart, the more important you are.

It seems to be a basic precept of bureaucracy that ambiguity is intolerable and must be resolved. Things must be black or white. There is no room for gray. That is why rules exist and must be applied in a cookie-cutter approach to all.

Ideally though, to achieve total quality or to consistently dazzle customers, your organization and your people must have some tolerance for ambiguity. You have to deal in the real world, facing real problems and real people. In the real world, there is a lot of gray. If you attempt to make things black or white, you miss too much. Rules can be unambiguous, while guidelines are ambiguous, e.g., "If the guidelines don’t work to achieve the mission, then forget the guidelines and do what it takes achieve the mission." That’s pretty gray.
The most widely held, and perhaps the most damaging, belief underlying bureaucracy is the belief that consistency, itself, has value.

Consistency is very important in piece parts that make up a product. And, in the absence of good reason for changing, consistency has value in relationships. But, consistency in choices or decisions can sometimes be a barrier to good quality, or to satisfying customers. For those striving for quality or customer satisfaction, it is valuable to believe that consistency is nice and comfortable as long as it achieves the desired quality or results in satisfied customers. But, the moment that it gets in the way of quality or customer satisfaction, forget consistency and substitute flexibility.

A sister to the idea of consistency is the idea that equal treatment for everybody is fair for all. All you can say about equal treatment for all is that it will result in unequal satisfaction for all. Bureaucracies value the process of equal treatment, but ignore the outcome of unequal satisfaction.

If you strive for an objective outcome, like quality in your product, or customer satisfaction from your service, then examine the idea that equal treatment for all is good. I suggest to you that equal satisfaction for all customers is a better strategy than equal treatment for all customers.

How do you want to be measured–by the treatment you give or by the outcome you achieve? Customers are only interested in getting satisfied. If equal treatment doesn’t satisfy them, then they expect you to treat them unequally. If you are legally or morally wedded to the conclusion that unequal treatment is unjust, then pay attention to the idea of choices. Giving the customer lots of choices makes it possible to provide as many different treatments as customers tell you they need in order to be satisfied.

One example is the Florida Department of Motor Vehicles, the people who provide drivers’ licenses. Until recently, they treated everybody the same. To get a license, you went to the office and stood in line. They didn’t give appointments. By treating everybody the same, they made some people really dissatisfied.
Then, they began offering appointments. If time is important to the customer, the customer can call up for an appointment. If time isn’t that important, or you need something today, you can come anytime and wait in line. By offering a choice, they increased the number of citizens who are satisfied with their service.
Another false belief that is common in bureaucracies is the idea of the "slippery slope": "If I do it for one, I have to do it for everybody."

This is an argument that pops up almost automatically in bureaucratic thinking, and is another sister to the belief in consistency and equal treatment for all. This idea is so pervasive because there are some situations in which it is true. The error is in over-generalizing the idea and applying it where it is patently false and sometimes even foolish.

Organizations that value total quality or customer focus want their people to make decisions and choices based on the mission outcome and not on the process. So, the process becomes much more flexible, as long as it is aimed at achieving the desired outcome. If you have to wrap the product in green to satisfy this customer, you wrap it in green. If you have to deliver the paper to the third floor for this customer, you deliver it to the third floor. You trust that people are reasonable and understanding, and you realize that "flexing" the process to satisfy one customer doesn’t mean that you will have to make that same accommodation to all customers.

When quality or customer satisfaction is everyone’s goal, then problems don’t have to be solved by managers alone. Empowered people, aspiring to continuous improvement, can be trained to not only solve the immediate problem, but also to find the root causes and fix them.