Wednesday, September 12, 2018

When a leader is a leader in name only


Bill is the Chief Executive Office of a multinational corporation as such he has enormous responsibilities on his shoulders. So, what he would often do to lighten his responsibilities is to delegate to his underlings many of his functions without him carefully assessing the function/s that he delegated. 

After a year of operation, the board of directors noted that the company was not financially healthy. There was low morale among the workers because they were not receiving their salaries on time and working conditions was very poor. Soon after, there was rebellion within his subordinates and they called for the CEO’s firing. To save the organization the CEO was immediately fired of the BOD. 

To get to the bottom of the CEO’s dismal performance the board of directors hired independent auditors to audit the performance of the CEO. They found out that the CEO was fond of delegating his functions without having a first-hand knowledge about the function to be delegated.

For example, in the marketing department he simply told his middle managers to market their products without providing them the needed leadership on how to undertake it. He did the same thing in the production department.

The CEO being the leader must always lead the way for his organization and the people working for it. What does lead the way means? It means that he should not just delegate with reckless abandon. When he delegates he must know the work and function to be delegated.

This doesn’t mean that he would micromanage his organization because this is counterproductive. What this means is he has a clear grasp of the delegated functions and every function under his organization for that matter.   

A leader becomes a true leader when he knows what he is doing and when he leads by example. Otherwise, he becomes a leader in name only, a leader which is incompetent, averse to responsibility and can easily be deposed by his subordinates. – Marino J. Dasmarinas

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