Strengths And Weaknesses Of Clendenin Leadership Style

Clendenin is faced with two options, one of which really has the potential to help him develop himself as a leader. One of Clendenin’s apparent weaknesses is the lack of variation he demonstrates in his leadership styles. According to Goleman’s Leadership That Gets Results, leaders can do one of two things to help expand their repertoire: build a team where they lack or develop their skills. Obviously, the latter is more beneficial to leader as they can bring those skills with them. However, Goleman also points out that development of these styles is reliant on having strong emotional intelligence. Clendenin has shown that he is self-aware through his honesty and desire to build a relationship with Tom Gunning. He realized his need for help, …show more content…
As Kickpatrick and Locke mention in Leadership: Do Traits Matter?, traits alone do not make for a successful leader. Actions must go alongside. However, Clendenin seems to have drive, leadership motivation, integrity, self-confidence, cognitive ability, and knowledge of the business. While he may not have had these traits coming in, he was able to build them on the job. Now he simply needs to take the actions to supplement these traits. He must work on implementing the vision, a characteristic of the authoritative leadership style. Clendenin has experience setting difficult goals, and getting his followers to complete them. However, he needs to work on truly motivating his employees to reach these goals by promoting innovation and change and reinforcing it at every stage instead of simply letting his team work on their …show more content…
Clendenin has been very successful, with his four promotions. However, he has yet to really fail. Therefore, in accordance with Argyris’ Teaching Smart People How to Learn, Clendenin will likely only identify and solve problems that he finds. He will be less likely to reflect on his own thinking, and this will cause him to be more defensive and likely to take responsibility for his own failures. This can create an environment that does not truly explore all opportunities. While it may be difficult for him, Clendenin could benefit from leaving his current successes and opening himself up to failure. It could also present the opportunity for his subordinates to provide specific examples of his performance as a leader, but this would be tricky considering he may get defensive already. This approach would need to be used with caution. However, it could allow him to see what others see and make changes to his leadership style before he starts in this new