Relationship-based Approach to Leadership
Itay Talgam’s video, “Lead Like the Great Conductors” really
resonated with me. Having the opportunity to be a part of an orchestra I
completely understand the importance of the conductor. To many, he doesn’t look
like he provides much in the way of leaderhip. In fact, the last clip Talgam
showed was of a Conductor who simply stood there and provided leading facial
expressions while the orchestra performed brilliantly. I have had the
opportunity to have several different types of conductors and truly understand
the feelings that come along with the differences they each provided.
The conductor is the leader and the player follows. Depending
on his conducting/leadership style the orchestra will portray that in their
music. Like the conductor who was overly excited, you could see the players
moving around in their seats as the excitedly played their parts. The conductor
who stood there barely making a move while he turned the pages was a bit
boring, showed little interest in the players who were playing, and simply
provided a steady beat. It showed in the music.
Leadership is like that. You get out of it what you put into
it. Like the conductor with his orchestra, the leader needs to have a good
relationship with his followers. The conductor also has a relationship with the
music; he knows it, feels, it, and shows it through his leadership style.
Talgam mentioned how the players rarely looked up. I
understand why. Part of it is because they can see his movement in their peripheral;
they are watching, just not directly. The other part is because of the trust
the player/follower has in their leader/conductor. This was shown to me once
while we were rehearsing for a contest that was happening in a few weeks. Our conductor
had to take a few days off due to a family emergency so a substitute conductor
stepped in so we could still rehearse. We were a mess. We did not know this conductor,
his style of conducting, nor did he take the time to get to know us and how we
played. There was a lot of looking around at each other, relying more on what
our team mates were doing versus listening to our leader. There was a mistrust
there and we were all reluctant to follow him.
The relationship
between the leader and the follower is definitely an important one. It can make
the difference in how well the job gets done. When the followers have a better
attitude towards their leader, they are more likely to perform their absolute
best.
The relationship-based approach to leadership may come a
little more natural to most of us. We naturally form relationships in life
without trying, so when we apply it to our leadership style it has the potential
to produce a great team. However, I also believe it needs to be in conjunction
with other leadership styles, like transformational for instance, in order for
it to not fall into the trap of alienating certain members of a team.
After learning the different styles of leadership I think
the best approach is to apply the leader-member exchange (LMX) along with
path-goal theory. This leadership style would take each individual team member
into account, what their leadership preference is, and base it on a dyadic
relationship. There would be mutual trust and understanding and a willingness
to go above and beyond expectations.
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