Strategic leadership is an important element of the successful management of organisations. It involves thinking strategically, setting goals, developing a plan of action, and motivating others to achieve those goals. Strategic leadership requires assessing a situation quickly and accurately, determining the best course of action, and developing a plan to achieve the desired outcome. This essay will explore the importance of strategic leadership, discuss its key components and theories, and provide examples of successful strategic leadership.
A strategic leader is someone who has the ability to think strategically, identify opportunities and risks, and make decisions that will have a long-term impact on the success of an organisation (Samimi et al., 2022). The strategic leader’s role is to drive a business’s long-term success by making effective decisions. Strategic leaders possess the ability to think critically and creatively to make decisions that provide the best outcomes for their organisations. They use their visionary skills to create a clear path for the organisation, ensuring that all their efforts are focused on attaining its goals. Strategic leaders are also responsible for setting direction and aligning resources, creating a vision, and inspiring and motivating staff to ensure that the organisation is on track to reach its objectives (Shao, 2019).
To better understand strategic leadership, theories have been developed. These strategic leadership theories include transformational, servant, and authentic leadership. Transformational leadership is a theory that focuses on inspiring followers to fulfil their potential, create a vision for the future, and develop strategies for achieving it. Transformational leaders can motivate their team, create a shared vision for success, and inspire them to reach it. Transformational leaders have a strong sense of purpose and are able to motivate their teams to reach their goals. Key components of transformational leadership include providing direction, developing trust, and inspiring followers (Siangchokyoo, Klinger, and Campion, 2020). Examples of transformational leaders include Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Mark Zuckerberg. The second strategic leadership theory is servant leadership. This theory focuses on the leader’s ability to serve their followers and help them reach their potential. Servant leaders have a strong emphasis on ethical behaviour and are focused on the development of their followers. They seek to understand their followers, build relationships, and empower them to take the initiative and make decisions (Pawar et al., 2020). Key components of servant leadership include listening, guiding, and coaching. Examples of servant leaders include Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. The third strategic leadership theory is authentic leadership. This theory focuses on the leader’s ability to be genuine and to demonstrate their true values. Authentic leaders are driven by a strong sense of purpose and strive to create a meaningful impact in their organisations. They strive to develop a deep understanding of their followers, to communicate openly and honestly, and to create an environment of trust. Key components of authentic leadership include being self-aware, ethical, and open to feedback. Examples of authentic leaders include Barack Obama, Oprah Winfrey, and Sheryl Sandberg.
Examples of successful and failed strategic leadership: Steve Jobs was a successful leader with a clear vision and innovative products. Jobs was a visionary leader who had a clear vision of where he wanted to take the company and the industry. He developed innovative products, motivated and inspired his team, and negotiated deals and partnerships that helped Apple become the world’s most profitable company. Marissa Mayer (Yahoo CEO) failed due to a lack of strategic vision and ineffective leadership. Mayer was unable to turn around the struggling company and ultimately failed to achieve any of her ambitious goals. Her lack of strategic vision, ineffective leadership, and failure to address the company’s talent shortages are all prime examples of what not to do when leading a company. This could be partly due to barriers to effective strategic leadership, including difficulty anticipating and planning for the future, balancing short-term and long-term goals, and motivating and inspiring the team (Pitelis and Wagner, 2019). Strategies to mitigate these barriers include creating an open and trusting environment and providing feedback and support. Additionally, focusing on developing team skills is important for long-term success.
Thus, transformational leadership is the best leadership style to help organisations achieve organisational ambidexterity. Transformational leadership encourages employees to think innovatively and to strive for continuous improvement (Guzmán et al., 2020). Examples of successful applications of transformational leadership can be seen in companies like Amazon, Nike and Apple. Amazon is a prime example of a company that has successfully used transformational leadership to achieve organisational ambidexterity. Amazon has invested heavily in exploring new capabilities, such as artificial intelligence, machine learning and cloud computing. These investments have allowed the company to exploit existing capabilities by leveraging the power of these technologies to create new products and services. Amazon’s CEO, Jeff Bezos, has been credited with the company’s success due to his ability to inspire and motivate employees to think outside the box and explore new opportunities (Gradinaru et al., 2020). It is argued that transformational leadership is particularly effective in “enabling organisations to explore new opportunities and exploit existing capabilities” (Tarba et al., 2020). Similarly, transformational leadership is effective in “stimulating creativity and innovation”, which are necessary for organisations to achieve organisational ambidexterity (Baškarada, Watson and Cromarty, 2016). The empirical evidence of the company’s success further supports the argument that transformational leadership is the best leadership style to help organisations achieve this goal. Amazon’s success in exploring new capabilities and exploiting existing ones has allowed the company to become one of the most successful companies in the world. This success is a testament to the effectiveness of transformational leadership in helping organisations achieve their goals.
In conclusion, strategic leadership is essential for the success of any organisation. It involves the ability to create and implement a strategy that takes into account the organisation’s vision, objectives, and resources. Strategic leaders can identify opportunities, develop strategies to capitalise on those opportunities, and motivate their teams to execute and implement them. Through effective leadership, they can create an environment of shared commitment and collaboration that leads to success. Moreover, strategic leaders are flexible and adaptive, allowing them to adjust to changing organisational and market conditions.
Reference list
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