NMIMS Global Access

School for Continuing Education (NGA-SCE)

Course: Management Theory and Practice
Internal Assignment Applicable for December 2018 Examination

Answer: 1

Leadership is not just an act, it is a process of influencing or directing others in such a

way that their attitude and behaviour acts towards their visions and goals. Leader’s main
responsibility is to provide direction to employees and motivate them to work collectively
to meet the organizational goals and objectives. Leaders are responsible for guiding,
managing and controlling the performance of the team.

According to Keith Davis, ‘Leadership is a human factor, which binds a group

together and motivates towards the particular goal.’

Characteristics of a Leader
1. A leader is a person who takes responsibility for every decision taken. He is
responsible for making towards goals and objectives.

2. A leader is unbiased, ethical and responsible while taking decisions.

3. The leader should be mature and intelligent person.

4. A leader should be consistent, a random leader cannot get the trust of his team
members. Leader should maintain transparency within team while communicating
goals and objectives.

Leader is one who is efficient in time management, can guide employees to work in
right direction. He should also be capable of messaging change under complicated
circumstances. He should build good relationship with external and internal customers
and be able to gap the bridge between top management and the people working at
the lower levels.
Types of Leadership

There are different type of leadership styles that exists in work environment. There is
never one size fit all leadership style for any organization. Leadership always depends
on attitude, personality, approach or working patterns of leaders.

Different types of leadership styles are as follows:

Autocratic Leadership: This type of leaders have control over their staff and they
rarely consider work suggestions from others. They don’t want to share their power.
This kind of leadership is best suited for the organisations where the job is routine and
needs only limited skill set.

Democratic Leadership: It is a participative kind of leadership, where the leader

takes the input from team members and encourage them to participate in decision
making.

Free Rein Leadership: In this kind of leadership, there is no restrictions on

subordinates and they are free to take their decisions and perform accordingly. This
leadership is effective where the employees are highly trained and experienced.

Action Oriented Leadership: In this kind of leadership, leaders define the guidelines
that what should be done and how to do it. Leaders are only interested in that, the
work is done on time.

Transactional Leadership: In this type of leadership, leader establish the chain of

commands and execute the disciplinary power and motivate employees by giving
them rewards for their performances. This kind of leadership can be effective for short
term tasks.

Transformational Leadership: In this type of leadership, main key elements are

team building, motivation and collaboration among employees at the different levels
in the organisation. The leader who shows the transformational leadership, they
inspire the subordinates through effective communication and their main aim is to
executing the transformational changes to bring major changes in the organisation.
Charismatic Leadership: Charismatic leadership is that where leader is the role
model for team and drives other towards the accomplishment of goals and objectives.
They infuse their personal charm, high amount of energy and enthusiasm in his team.

Bureaucratic Leadership: In this style leaders strictly follows organizational rules and
policies. Here adherence to the rules, procedures and a defined hierarchy are very
important. There are close set of standards to ensure the accuracy of work

Situational Leadership: There is no specific leadership style followed in this kind of

leadership. Effective leadership depends on the situation. Here complexity of work
plays an important role in what leadership style to adopt for any given situation.

In case of M/s Subodh Enterprise, is not able to make profits, and there is
concern about people also as employees are highly demotivated. To overcome
from this kind of situation the organisation requires a Democratic type of
Leader.

Democratic leadership is a management style in which all team members participate

in decision making process. Everyone in the team gets the chance to participate,
exchange their ideas. This can be the most effective style of leadership, and this style
of leadership values the participation and affirmation of the subordinates.

A democratic leader shares decision making and problem solving responsibilities with
team, while retaining the ultimate decision with him. In this kind of leadership, team
involvement, engagement and participation is highly encouraged. This type of leaders
encourage the team members to set workable goals and recognize their achievement.
Team members feels more engaged in process. Democratic leadership can lead to
better ideas and more creative solutions to the problems. As team members are highly
motivated, they feel more involved inn project and takes care about the end results. If
employees are highly motivated and leader design a result oriented plan,
organizational goals are well described to team members; then organisation can
achieve the desired results.
Answer: 2

Decision is an art of selecting or making choice from different alternatives. It is a

process of selecting or choosing right course of action among the different given
alternatives for achieving the desired results. The main aim is to identify the problem
and finding out the solutions to that problem. It is a logical process which includes
identifying the problems, collecting relevant information, selecting the best
alternate, implementing the decision and finally the follow up.

Decision making plays an important role in management. It is the most important

component in managerial activities and plays a vital role in planning process. The
ability to make good decision is the key to successful managerial performance.

According to Koontz and O’Donnel ‘Decision making is the actual selection

from among alternatives of a course of action.’

In an organisation decisions are made on the basis of its needs and preferences, and
it is important to make decisions within the certain time of period. If the decisions are
not made in right frame of time can affect the organizational performance.

Effective decision making involves two aspects, the purpose of which, it is

intend to and the environmental situation in which it is taken. If these two
aspects are ignored, then even best and correct actions may fail to get desired
results.

Mr. Ajay has to purchase seven printer for different departments. He has to take formal
approach towards purchasing the printers. He needs to compare the different brands,
quality, prices, and vendors. He needs to compare the features of different types
of printers and to find out which product’s after sale service is good.

Decision making is a systematic process and he needs to follow the steps

involved in decision making which are as follows:
Defining Problem and collecting information: The first step towards the decisions
making is to identify the problem which can be solved by purchasing a product and
make the thorough analysis of the problem that what exactly is required to solve that
problem. After identifying the problem, he need to gather the information regarding
product specifications. Information can be collected from different sources one to one
interaction, new papers etc.

Developing Possible Course of Action or Alternatives: Manager has to collect

information to find out all possible solutions to the problems. But it should not take
much time and resources to identify the alternatives.

Evaluating Alternatives: Evaluate, whether the need identified in previous step

would resolve through these alternatives or not on the basis of feasibility, implication
and associated risks. In this step the alternative which have higher potential will be
selected and those are not feasible will be eliminated. Then place the alternatives in
a priority orders and explicit list of alternatives is ready.

Selecting the Best Alternative: Now the list is ready with alternatives, now manager
is required to choose the best alternative among the list which can solve their purpose
and meet the requirement using the limited resources at given time.

Implementing the Decision: Now is the time to take the action by beginning the
implementation of the best alternative is selected.

Follow up: This is the last step of decision making process. It is to be identified that
the decision is taken is successful in achieving the defined objectives and meets
acceptable standards. In case if there are any deviations, corrective actions can be
taken on time.

By following the above process Mr. Ajay can buy best printers in the market at
competitive prices and within the given span of time.
Answer: 3

Conflict between corporate cultures

In an organisation, different individuals belongs to different cultures come together and
interact with each other. Culture is based on shared attitudes, beliefs and customs.
Various cultures bring different beliefs, ideology, values and perceptions. As a result there
may be conflicts and makes it difficult for individuals to work. Conflict in the work place is
inevitable and spring up for all sort of reasons, disputes over resources, rewards and
remuneration, power and influence, strategical goals, priorities and personality crashes
etc. Conflicts can be raised due to discrimination on the basis of color, sex and caste.
Difference often arises because of the language people use and communication become
a problem in work place. Sometimes mangers become biased due to same cultural
background and then other employees may feel victimized.

(a) Types of Conflicts

There are many types of conflicts may arise in work place due to cultural differences.

1. Interpersonal Conflict: Clash between two or more individuals in an organisation

is called interpersonal conflict. It can be same department or from different
departments.

Interpersonal conflict can be classified in three categories.

Vertical conflict: Conflict between manager and his subordinates is called as

Vertical Conflict.

Lateral Conflict: Conflict between any two individuals at the same position is
called as Lateral Conflict.

Diagonal Conflict: These conflicts are between people at different positions

without any direct superior subordinate relation.
2. Intrapersonal Conflict: Conflict between two individuals because of clash in
thoughts, principles, ideologies. Professional performance is negatively affected
due to irritable and erected behavior, for individuals who involves in conflict.

3. Intergroup Conflict: Conflict between different groups in an organisation is called

Intergroup Conflict. These groups can be formal or informal.

4. Intragroup Conflict: These kind of groups arises within the group or department.
The performance of whole group or department gets effected due to these conflict.

In Mr. Amit’s case, in his team all seven team members are not aligned are having
conflicts within the group, so there is Intragroup Conflict. On the other hand, Mr. Amit’s
team is not having good rapport with production department and R&D department, So
there is Intergroup Conflict as well.

(b) Number of techniques are there to resolve the workplace conflict

1. Avoiding: People generally avoid conflicts by looking away the conflict. It can be
avoided by changing the topic or denying any situation which can lead to problem.
There can be many reasons for avoiding the conflicts like no intentions to getting
stressed due to conflict. These techniques are adopted where people don’t want
to arguments or rivalries. For resolving administrating conflicts this technique is
best.

2. Accommodating: This technique is adopted in the organisation where individuals

wants to build up good relations with other individuals. In this technique people
show high concern for others.

3. Competing: In this technique individuals are highly assertive in nature and take a
stand take a stand for what they know and what they want. In case of conflict,
these kind of people like to dominate others. This kind of technique can be adopt
where one have to take quick decisions in case of emergency.
4. Collaborating: Sometime this technique is also called win-win strategy as this
style ensures that both the parties are satisfied and willing to work together to
achieve the common goals. This is to be considered as the best style for resolving
conflicts.

5. Compromising: In this style people are both assertive and cooperative. In

compromising people believe in give and take or can say you win some and you
lose some. This technique can be effective where both parties are equally powerful
and willing to cooperate.

Conflict is normal part of any organizational setting, the challenge of conflict lies in
how one can choose to deal with the conflict. Unresolved conflicts may have serious
impacts on the individual’s productivity. However it may have positive impacts also
like increase in individual’s performance due to competitive feeling, generation of new
ideas etc. If conflicts are ignored for long time it may effect organisation’s
performance.