International Leadership and Management - Assignment Example

International Leadership and Management

Question 1

The definition of women leadership is highly different between Asia and the United States counterparts. This difference is brought by factors related to achievement orientation, learning orientation, risk-taking and even existing role models. These factors though boil down to individual levels, and interpersonal levels as most of the women stated, the only difference though comes in that in the Asian countries, most of the women are still hindered by barriers at the social level. Though this differences that exist seem to be very visible from Asia and United States, the major difference though exist between the Asian countries themselves, that is, India and China. In the United States women leadership is characterized by high levels of individualism, in China it is characterized by the industrialized economy while in India women leadership is still affected by gender stereotypes which still believe that women’s role are being wither wives and mothers.

Question 2

Studying the gender issues in cross-cultural leadership often lead to different results since it helps in understanding how different cultures react to a different aspect of gender differences like male chauvinism. This therefore will give detailed information based on the different genders and the society accepts them compared to the results that will be offered by cross-cultural studies that disregard gender issues. Another reason is that studying the gender issues offers a depth and detailed information on how both genders face the issues of leadership in respective to their differences in the cultures they exist about definition of self and others. Studying the differences in gender for the basis of understanding management will provide examples of both success and failures in the multicultural projects and on the levels of global management and even the problems that is frequently encountered with both women and women in the cultural differences.

Question 3

The one leadership style that can be appropriate for female leadership and that has not been discussed is the participatory leadership. This is a management style that is very common today and is involved in involving people like subordinates, peers, stakeholders and even the superiors in the process of decision making (Northouse, 2007, 26). The aptitude of how the various parties influence the manager’s decision making may tend to vary with the role of the second in the business. This type of leadership can prove to be effective for women managers as it allows them to be a part of the whole company rather than feel discriminated by the male counterparts. It is vital to understand though that still the manager is the one who will have the final decision to show responsibility to the role. The good thing about participative is that it fosters a good relationship with the entire team as the leader works closely with the co-workers. For women leaders who often seem to be discriminated against, using a participative type of management will help them in building a leadership brand that is essential for running the business (Joynt & Warner, 1997, 54). This can prove to be effective in the Asian countries where women are under-looked.

Question 4

The Western culture differs with the Asian culture of leadership in the sense that the western culture is significantly focused on leadership as individual assertion while the Asian cultures view leadership as a focused group action. The other reason for this is that the United States is a cross-cultural environment while Asia is a single culture environment and thus should be having the same approach but instead they have different approaches. This is not the case though with the difference that exists between the Asian cultures themselves. Most of the leadership styles that are used in the Asian cultures are focused on group management and not individualism, and this thus means that they are forced to apply several types of leadership to work well with their subordinates. Like in China they combine paternalistic leadership with benevolence, while in India their type of leadership is characterized by combination of nurturing and transformational leadership and Singapore the case is different as the country do not have one outstanding type of leadership but instead borrows its tactics from various countries like Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand and even Malaysia. Therefore, this type of differences in the Asian culture is because the management is task-oriented.

Question 5

Individual success factors are often determined by resources such as achievement orientation and career aspirations. The two countries, China and United States define these differently in that in the United States they are characterized by individualism whereas in China they are characterized by collectivism. This is because, in the United States, the women have always considered taking risks as one of the crucial determinants of the success factors This is what defines the high level of individualism in the United States, this is illustrated by the fact that most of the women in the United States fall in the paradigm of being self-employed and thus they focus on finding their way up the management. This though is opposite to the Chinese counterparts whose individual success factors are described regarding collectivism. This is because the Chinese women are oriented by sacrificing things like family time to get something in return, for example, respect from the others. This therefore would mean that they would have to give up a lot of things in life for them to successfully pursue their careers. This is not the case with the American women who are not required to make sacrifices for their careers as they can combine both their caregiver roles with their leadership position and still be successful (Peus et al., 2015, 62). Another reason why the success factors in the United States are explained in the terms of individualism is that the women in the United States calculate their success at an individual level and interpersonal level and thus are not in any way gauged by how the society is affected by the roles they play as the managers in different companies. This though is a different case when it comes to China where success factors are explained regarding collectivism. China is somewhat still affected by the social system level that fosters gender stereotypes who still believe that women are only supposed to be subordinates and not in the management position and for the women who manage to be at the management position then there success factors are influenced by role models and the necessity to comply with the organizational or societal values. Therefore, the leadership in China is aimed at facilitating the followers and not from the individual level of achieving their dreams. This type of individual success factor in China is the main drive force behind their types of leadership too.

Question 6

Just like the achievements in the various countries that the studies were carried, barriers too can be categorized into the societal level, interpersonal, organizational and individual levels. Therefore, one of the glass ceilings that bar women from achieving the leadership positions in the various countries is their levels of self-confidence. In various countries even apart from the studied and mentioned countries is how they respond to their self-image. Most women still believe that they are not in any way supposed to be beyond men or even be their superiors, they see themselves as the weaker gender that are not supposed to compete against men, and therefore they assume the role that is supposed to be lead (Rhode, 2003, 43). This leads to the misconception of identity and loss of confidence in women to advance and assume roles in the managerial positions. This then like stated in the journal article ends up lowering their propensity to assert self-interest at individual levels (Peus et al., 2015, 56). Lack of access to powerful networks is the second reason that is considered as a glass ceiling hindering women from achieving their leadership positions. Many women once they have developed into the leading positions they do not seek to develop other women or even empower other women to be like them, and this leads to a broken contact between the senior women who are already at the top and the junior women looking to get there. Women, unlike men, are not very efficient at networking with other women. This cripples networking amongst women to help and empower each other in their growth to be coming to the next business leaders in this competitive world. This is happening at interpersonal levels. Lastly are the gender stereotype organizations that still practice the discrimination of women in their selection practices (Karsten, 2006, 41). This is considered as biased recruiting where a company would rather have a man manage their company rather than a woman and therefore most of well learned and experienced women in managerial are left out as nothing but juniors in companies. This does not only happen during recruitment but also during employees’ appraisal. This is because most of the owners of the business and even managers still believe that men are more and well psychologically trained to be leaders and not women, and they also believe that women cannot make vital decisions as men.

Question 7

Though this journal has time and time drawn a line between the various success factors at different levels, that is, individual, interpersonal, organizational and social systems like they do not relate to each other, these levels are actually interdependent with one another; meaning one cannot exist without the other. This is because every decision made at one level in one way or another affects the other. For example, if a woman lacks self-confidence which is considered to be at the individual level, its echo will affect how she relates to other women at interpersonal level and extend to feeling comfortable at being ruled out as the weaker gender during recruitment at the organizational level. Meaning she will not try and prove her worth, and this will convince the male counterparts who are the seniors and employers that women cannot compete with women at the same level and therefore affect the social systems and how they view women in general. Therefore, these four levels that are discussed as not dependent on one another may be interdependent after all when looked at in minor details. If this point of view were the approach made in the research of this journal article, it would have offered a broader picture of how the society in the general can fight the details that are left out in this journal article. When looked at independently not much information is offered on how any woman at any level or any decision made at any levels does not only end there but extends to affect the other individuals at other different levels. This therefore would have given us a clear picture in the conclusion and even better our understanding of how various factors affect women and their relation to leadership.

Question 8

The title of the article is inappropriate in the sense that it is not giving an idea of what the paper discusses. This journal article discusses how management in different countries, that is the United States and Asia, have different perspectives when it comes to women and the different approaches that Asian countries and United Sates have towards the role of women in the managerial positions. The title of the journal article states, “On becoming a leader in Asia and America: Empirical evidence from women managers” this, therefore, gives the impression that the article will discuss the various approach that the two countries Asia and America have towards becoming a female manager in the two environments. Nevertheless, all it does is to discuss the difference that exists in the approaches of women and the managerial roles. Therefore because of this, it can be suggested that the appropriate title for the journal article would be “Women in Management: The existing difference and approaches towards women and management in the United States and Asia” as this at least gives an insight that the main idea is the findings from the research of how the environments handle women leadership.