Introduction

This report is based on a case scenario where the senior lead consult has been contacted the head of human resources for Wonder Products. The company asked the senior consult to choose a candidate suitable for the position of Senior Director for the Energy Bars Division. The head of the human resources have vouched for three potential candidates: Nancy Drew, Dane Evers and Joe Johnson and it is the role of the senior consult to select one of them based on their interview transcripts. In this respect, their management skills, leadership skill and leadership styles have been evaluated to identify the suitable leader for the job role.

Management skills of each candidate

The management skills of each of the employees have been described in detail. Initially, starting with Nancy Drew, she has been working with Star Lite Foods a medium scale food company for the past 20 years. She has been serving as the Vice president for product development for the past three years where the company has been looking to expand into the field of energy bars. Nancy likes to delegate so the employees have the time to plan, collaborate with other members of the team and monitor their performance. Moreover, she provides full autonomy to her team members allowing them to pursue products and marketing required for each products which results in higher degree of freedom and better results. Therefore, she focuses on developing her subordinates by providing them the opportunity to grow. She collaborates with the team effectively to achieve results and completely trusts them.

In case of Dane Evers, he was the founder of Evers Vegetarian Foods and has grown to become a company of $400 million annual sales within just 12 years. Even though Evers depends on the employees and encourages them to be involved in major and minor decisions. He likes to be aware of all the things happening in every department which implies that he likes control over his staffs and does not fully trust them. Therefore, he makes decisions by taking input and suggestions for subordinates and great respect for skilled, experienced and educated employees. Therefore, he promotes employee engagement and growth of the employees but keep control of the decision making and operations.

Finally, Joe Johnson has been working as the deputy executive director of Wonder Products in the southern division for more than a year. He has worked as a production manager before for 12 years. He is highly popular among the employees as being fair and help employees in boosting their level of confidence.  Therefore, he also believes in delegation and employee engagement where he takes time to listen to the employee and offer necessary advice. Therefore, he is helping employee growth so that they remain motivated and grow within the organisation. It also implies that he likes to empower the employees with opportunities by offering suitable job roles when they reach next level.  

Leadership skills of each candidate

The leadership skill of Nancy show she is empathic towards her subordinates and believes in team building. She offers opportunity to their employees to take responsibility and help them grow as a person. Team building is the key part her leadership skills where uses positivity and creativity to achieve the organisational goals at rapid pace.

In case of Dane, he likes to control the decision making processes within the organisation but takes help from his workforce. He is encouraging and motivating his employees to be innovative and creative. He has liberal views and wants to focus on autonomy and helps the employees in understanding the vision of the organisation.  He likes to share information with the employees and provide emotional support to the employees. Moreover, taking opinion of every employees is important for moving forward towards a common goal for him.

Finally, Joe believes in fair and makes fair decisions for everyone. He likes to mentor people and help them unlock their true potential. He prepares helps people reach the next level and provide them opportunities to achieve and show their fullest capabilities at work. He is encouraging of their work and provides emotional support to the employees. Engaging with them employees and motivating them towards the goals is one of his key characteristics.

Leadership style of each candidate

The evaluation of the management and leadership skills of each of the leaders have given an understanding of the leadership style followed by each of the leaders. In case of Nancy, she is following Laissez-Faire Style of leadership where she provides opportunities and scope to the teams to work on their own having highest level of autonomy within the organisation (Amanchukwu, Stanley & Ololube, 2015). Moreover, she trusts her employees blindly to use their skills and experiences to achieve results for the organisation. Dane uses Affiliative Style of leadership where the leader develops a personal bond with the workforce. Therefore, the leader pays attention to the needs of the employees and provides emotional support to these employees. It is one of the most effective way of developing a collaborative relationship among team members. On the contrary, Joe uses the coaching style of leadership where he considers people as bunch of talents and can help them realise their true potential (Nging & Yazdanifard, 2015). It focuses on nurturing the talents of the employees by providing them opportunities to develop skills in which they are good at. It helps in developing a diverse team where every team members have diverse skills. Constructive feedback is the key to this leadership style where the leader constantly guides and meets with them.

Recommendation

The evaluation of the leadership styles, skills and management styles of each of the leaders have shown that each leader possess some good qualities along with negative liabilities which can affect the new product and brand development. Therefore, after critical evaluation of all the skills and traits of each leader, it can be said that Joe Johnson is the ideal leader for the job role as he follows the coaching style of leadership and he has the technical expertise to lead. Even though, he does not have knowledge and experience in marketing, he works with diverse workforce having potential in marketing who would help him in achieving the goals of the organisation. All the three managers were innovative in their own way but the Laissez-Faire Style requires an extremely skilled workforce to be successful and it is difficult to achieve at this stage. On the other hand, the affiliative style is also not suitable as the leader is more focused on personal relationship and bonding focused on resolving conflict.

Conclusion

Thus, it can be said that the analysis of the interview transcripts of all the leaders have helped in understanding the most suitable person for the role of Senior Director for the energy Bars Division. Joe Johnson has been chosen as the most suitable candidate as he has the ability to develop skills among employees and focuses on continuous growth and innovation.

References

Amanchukwu, R. N., Stanley, G. J., & Ololube, N. P. (2015). A review of leadership theories, principles and styles and their relevance to educational management. Management, 5(1), 6-14.

Nging, T. K., & Yazdanifard, R. (2015). The general review of how different leadership styles cause the transformational change efforts to be successful. International Journal of Management, Accounting and Economics, 2(9), 1130-1140.