Leadership Analysis
The paper reflects on reviewing the interview of Mr. Bhusan Patil, the owner of Nirman Gold. The company has currently reached the top position in the Laundry market, sheet metal component, and parts in India. The owner Mr. Bhusan is one of the most transformative people I had interviewed(Badura, et al., 2020).
As an honest individual, he agreed that micro-managing, trying to do every job by himself, always staying busy did not work out for him. As he shared his journey, it was evident that he had been through a stage of transformation as he needed to improve employee efficiency, trying to find space for himself and retain employees.
Image 1: Nirman Gold Headquarter
Source:((Nirmangold Group of Companies, 2020)
The pursuit of a challenge has brought him to change the approach to leadership style. It is not often that chance comes to interview a company owner who is admitting to change the style of leadership after realizing the shortcomings. The telephonic interview with Mr. Bhusan Patil was quite an experience.
An evidence-based analysis of the leadership will be conducted in the later section. The shreds of evidence are drawn from the interview questionnaire attached at the end and the replies provided by Mr. Bhusan through the telephonic interview. The evidence will help to draw and analyse his style of leadership.
The employees working under Mr. Bhusan were the factory workers. In the beginning, as Mr. Bhusan had reflected, ‘Earlier, I used to tell my people, these are things you need to do and people used to follow it.’Theoretically, Mr. Bhusan had a practice of authoritarian leadership style.
He was responsible for dictating the course of work, troubleshoot if any problem would arise during the work(Wang & Xu, 2019). The subordinates were mere individuals whose work was to carry out the order and inform Mr. Bhusan if any problem occurred. However, Mr. Bhusan eventually found out that the approach was not fruitful in the long run. The employees were not developing, and they were not satisfied with the approach.
Image 2: Delegating Leadership
Source: (Guhr, et al., 2019)
Realizing the fact, Mr. Bhusan turned to Delegating Leadership Style. As he mentioned in the interview “Later on, I delegated the work.” Delegating leadership style is known for employee mobilization, including them in decision making(Harrell-Cook, et al., 2017).
As the sector where Nirman Gold functions is a highly competitive sector with challenges from cities like Maharashtra, Mr. Bhusan needed to have a group of motivated employees, aligned with the organization, and have the eagerness to learn. Hence, change in leadership brought him a much-needed approach to success.
The interesting part of Mr. Bhusan is that he was more authoritarian in the past, and now he is a delegating leader. The previous leadership style, which kept the authority in hand, the culture was slow and unsatisfactory.
‘Earlier, what I used to do is, I used to be always busy on the phone call and the factory and still work was not up to the mark.’
This approach from Mr. Bhusan left the employees as a means to fulfil the command. In the long run, these employees were unsatisfied, and they left the job for other companies. Besides, the absence of Mr. Bhusan was hampering the work in the company, and any issues would stall the daily work(Prabhu, et al., 2019).
It is the same problem which is faced by the authoritarian leadership. He was separated from the employees as a business owner. According to Forbes, authoritarian leadership is psychologically detrimental to the employees. Besides, the authority of the boss is tolerated just for the sake of the position rather than being enjoyed.
Image 3: Process of Delegation
Source: (Harrell-Cook, et al., 2017)
“I used to do all the things, and now they are delegated.”
Authoritarian leadership makes the employees fear their boss. The image slowly removes the support from the employees where they would share ideas to solve any issue. Besides, highly competitive in industry vertical is a highly demanding change to improve employee initiation(Tang, 2019).
Employee detainment is an integral aspect of success in modern-day competition(Buil, et al., 2019). Therefore, authoritarian leadership is not healthy for the organization and its success in the long run.
“After upgrading myself when I started delegating the things, empowering them, guiding them, I started getting the results.”
Mr. Bhusan changes his approach to leadership, and he found employees generating better results. He upgraded to delegating leadership style, which allows him to distribute the work among the employees and give them the freedom of working. The employees are empowered with decision making and choice(Downe, et al., 2016).
The approach was developed during the 60s, and it was explained as handing the responsibility from the leader to a worker. Delegation is defined as the act of sharing responsibility in the form of work or objective to lower-level employees(King, 2016). When the trust is vested upon the employees, Mr. Bhusan quotes
“I found more time, people are also enjoying, and I found that people are not leaving my industry.”
He further added that:
“When employees are not performing up to the expectation, we must introspect, what is exactly wrong.”
The leader has to identify and analyse why the employees are not performing. The introspection will help to identify the problems whether employees lack training, lack of proper delegation, or other issues. Employee satisfaction is an important aspect of achieving the goals for a leader(Murase, et al., 2019).
When delegation leadership is followed, the employees are empowered, motivated, and feel like part of the organization. A delegating leader is also providing more leverage to employees by guiding them and providing scope of development.
Mr. Bhusan started upgrading himself as a leader by learning and developing skills and knowledge.
“My ultimate goal as a leader is my company should run without my interference. Whether I am looking at it or not, it should keep growing at its pace, my every employee should be happy and feel proud they are working with me.”
The idea which reflects in the above quote by Mr. Bhusan reflects that his learning and development have introduced him to a broader context of leadership(Khan & Wajidi, 2019). The idea of delegation is reflected when he identifies the ultimate goal of him as a leader will be to see the company runs even in his absence.
Mr. Bhusan prefers checking the progress after a time-bound task is allotted to the employees. The progress tracking helps him to see the situation and observe any problems. In case the employee fails, Mr. Bhusan gets involved in maintaining the deadline(Kearney & Gebert, 2009). He approaches the time-bound job as a team to complete it within the given deadline. Hence, intervention from Mr. Bhusan occurs only when the situation demands it.
Mr. Bhusan quoted:
‘In my opinion, when you start work to keep developing yourself and have your leadership style.’
The type of leadership one can adopt highly depends on the type of person, attitude, thought process, team attitude, a situation of the business, connection with the customers. There is no good practice for leadership style(Buil, et al., 2019). When Mr. Bhusan felt that his autocratic approach to leadership was no giving delegation to others, he decided to change the approach to delegation leadership.
As a plan for personal development, Mr. Bhusan keeps in touch with the people in the market. He focuses on learning what new changes have come to the market, new technologies to be adopted, and learned(Gao, 2017). When he communicates with the employees about development and learning, there is a scope of improving one’s knowledge and ideas. Besides, the employees are staying motivated and continue with the organization.
“My leadership style can be described by delegation, making the people responsible.”
Mr. Bhusan had changed to the delegation model of leadership, which made the employees more responsible. It is the most significant development by Mr. Bhusan, which changed the entire idea of how he identified work, how he delegated, and engaged employees more within the organizational culture and context(Drescher, 2017). He ensured that employees are trained and given a chance to develop to work with more delegation from the owner. As a leader, Mr. Bhusan had identified the effectiveness of a leader on the larger picture. His leadership ideas and analysis are based on employee success and the overall development of the employees as well as the organization.
“We bought a new machine and people were not habituated with the machine. Whenever there was a problem with the machine, they would contact me. In that case, we gave contact details of the manufacturer, and a challenge of 15days. The Supervisor had to learn about the machine in fifteen days.”
The recipe for the success of Mr. Bhusan lies in his ability to encourage employees to learn and develop themselves. The delegation is done not just for the sake of delegation in itself. The delegation was a method of engagement used by Mr. Bhusan. This engagement would empower employees, make them more responsible towards the company, and ensure that they learn and grow as they work(Guhr, et al., 2019).
Mr. Bhusan found comfort in delegating the tasks, and with the right training, he expected a successful result from the employees. It aligned the employees in sync with the government and their approach.
Empowerment, guidance led to results from the employees. This result was not possible when Mr. Bhusan was struck in the factory; constant phone calls trying to micro-manage every aspect. The work was not satisfactory and up to the mark. When delegation was introduced, Mr. Bhusan was relieved of excessive work, and the scenario was becoming more productive(Hamlin & Patel, 2020).
As a result, the employees were happier and engaged with the organization. People are satisfied with the work, and they are choosing to stay back. As Mr. Bhusan’s leadership focused on employee satisfaction, the results were achieved within a short time.
The motive behind introducing delegation leadership was to empower the employees. After implementation, the employees had a major role in completing the daily work with their judgment and decision making. They got a chance to exercise their experience, learning, and skills, which was valued by the outcome or results.
Performance improved to the expectation after Mr. Bhusan started introspecting complex situations(Harrell-Cook, et al., 2017). Instead of taking up the challenge in his own hands and solving it, Mr. Bhusan chooses to mobilize the employee team to find a solution. Employees were working as part of the organization rather than working like machines.
Employees were trained, explained about the task, and how the task was to be done. Furthermore, introspection ensured that the employees are not over-estimated or over expectation of performance is not vested upon any individual. It can help to create a balance between the employee and the task.
‘Earlier, I used to decide everything and tell my people; these are things you need to do. People used to follow it’.
The problem with this earlier approach, as per Mr. Bhusan, was that employees would stop the moment when they faced a problem. This slowed down the process and work. The impact of delegation changed the scenario towards a more positive approach.
Now the employees were the problem solvers, and Mr. Bhusan allowed them to do the decision making(Drescher, 2017). When the employees were given the power of decision, they were able to brainstorm and get more involved in the tasks.
Mr. Bhusan’s first approach of autocratic leadership style turned the employees into machines. They were not satisfied with the job and were present to follow orders. The pressure was developing on Mr. Bhusan as he did not get free time for family and others. The change of leadership style to delegation, empowerment, and engagement of the employees changed the scenario.
The business of Mr. Bhusan, Nirman Gold, sat in a competitive market where an entire state is rivalling it. In this given scenario, the company needed employee involvement, development, and engagement(Badura, et al., 2020).
The change of leadership, developing personality as a better leader has helped Mr. Bhusan. The effect was observed on his changed vision of success. Mr. Bhusan wanted to take the company and employees to the extent that they can be able to deal with company work even in the absence of their boss. The result of empowerment was received, and the company is fast flourishing in the market.
References
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Appendix
- How are you related to the company and your responsibilities towards the Nirman Gold?
- How much is your workforce?
- Can you name three adjectives that better describe you as a leader? And how much you rely on it?
- Leadership style that best fits under your management and how often it changes?
- What do value more, achievement of goal or employee satisfaction? An example that supports your choice?
- What are the factors that has brought these changes?
- Are you comfortable delegating tasks to your employees?
- How would you deal with the situation if they don’t perform up to your expectation, especially if the task is time bound?
- How do the differences in location, culture, people and mindset affect your leadership style?
- How do you motivate and inspire the workforce, could you share some instance?
- What is your ultimate goal as a leader?
- Do you think any limitations in your leadership style? If yes what are they?
- How do you deal with these limitations?
- What do you think about creating one`s own leadership style? What would be the most important thing to keep in mind?
- How do you measure success?
