Table of Contents
Introduction
I have been hired to lead a culturally diverse team as a consultant, to a leader in the U.S Corporation, in developing a global organization. The main intention is to plant business operations in Germany, Greece, Iran and Singapore, and thus wish to hire employees from these culturally diverse nations. They will be required to work together with the staff from U.S. According to Michael (2016), organizational culture entails the behaviours and values contributing to the unique psychological and social environment of a given organization, thus reflecting the society to which they are embedded. It is thus probable to assume that practices and values in society have close alignment within an organization. This approach can thus be modified by a leader who is well vast with the knowledge of cultural values and practices that an organization presents.
To develop and sustain an organization representing the diverse global team, it is important to have leadership that is capable of building and strengthening internal relationships. Inclusive leadership thus comes in at this point to strengthen the diverse organizational cultures for employees in the global groups. The aim of this paper is to provide the traits of inclusive leadership, key skills required in leadership for creating an organizational culture that is inclusive, characteristics in leadership that mostly influences culture creation in this organization, and an application of inclusive leadership to this organization in overcoming challenges and meeting inherent opportunities in a global environment.
Traits of Inclusive Leadership
The model of inclusive leadership has its focus on humans relate within organizations. The leadership standards of an inclusive leader include service elevation beyond self-interest, having respect for cultural beliefs and preferences which are diverse, non-application of destruction power, and being concerned about sustainable relationships and organizations (CIO, 2016). Leaders who are inclusive seek to deeply understand their members about their cultural dimensions and socio-economic statutes in an organization. They thus apply the transformative approach as opposed to a transactional one. While the former build, models and leads through values and morals which finally creates an inspiration for their members to follow them, the latter makes an assumption that punishment and rewards can be used to motivate followers, and is thus set by destructive power through a hierarchically established structure.
Key Leadership Skills in Creating an Inclusive Organization Structure
The leaders of the organization will help in the definition of specific skills for culture and diversity and their organizational strategies. The key leadership skills required in the establishment of an inclusive organizational culture are as follows: First, the leader should be able to motivate others through definition and establishment of organizational forms, assimilation of members’ diversity, identification and respect to differences, engaging with employees, listening, observing, believing in and promoting the ideas and talents of employees. Secondly, the leader should possess organizational culture skills such as being able to come up with values which reflect the community, and the ability to understand the significance of respect and acknowledgement to diversity. Thirdly, the leader should possess the ability to build a paradigm where dimensions in national preferences and diversity can be incorporated, and the intersection of patterns and identifiers in social interactions is considered a mandatory requirement. Finally, inclusive leadership should consider respect and acceptance to behaviours and different ways of thinking by culture (Chin, 2015).
Influential Leadership Characteristics in the Creation of Organizational Culture
The power of influential leaders is derived from a human relationship. The characteristics of an influential leader include being person centred and social, focused, motivational, and ready to support the gratification of employee and having personal integrity (Chin, 2015). These qualities outdo the actual authority, yet have the power to propel others in achieving their personal best by recognizing and acknowledging the differences in cultural and social norms. The cultural dimensions which are influential in the creation of an organizational culture which is diverse and productive fit for a group that has members in Singapore, Iran, Greece and Germany as defined by Chin (2015) include the leader’s ability to encourage and promote assertions of beliefs and feelings which governs personal practices and set up ground rules that will provide respectful exchanges and openness when vying for positions and giving opinions. Finally, power distance will be considered the most influential characteristic of leadership for such a culturally diverse group, since the members come from a culture that has stronger persuasion for power concentration at the higher organizational levels.
Addressing Challenges and Opportunities through Inclusive Leadership
In this project, the organizations will show a reflection of diverse cultures of Germany, Greece, Iran and Singapore and the western culture, that is, the American culture in particular. Singh (2017) defines dimensions which conceptualize culture through values and practices at the level of the organization. The analysed dimensions are assertiveness, future orientation, gender egalitarianism, humane orientation, individualism and collectivism, performance orientation, power distance and uncertainty avoidance. The ratings of these countries under study at depicted by GLOBE study on a scale of 1.0 to 6.0, are as shown in the table below:
| Germany | Greece | Iran | Singapore | |
| Assertiveness | 4.55 | 4.58 | 4.04 | 4.17 |
| Future Orientation | 4.27 | 3.40 | 3.70 | 5.07 |
| Gender Egalitarianism | 3.10 | 3.48 | 2.99 | 3.70 |
| Humane Orientation | 3.18 | 3.34 | 4.23 | 3.49 |
| Individualism & Collectivism | 3.79 | 3.25 | 3.88 | 4.90 |
| Uncertainty Avoidance | 5.22 | 3.39 | 3.67 | 5.31 |
| Performance Orientation | 4.25 | 3.20 | 4.58 | 4.90 |
| Power Distance | 5.25 | 5.40 | 5.43 | 4.99 |
The approach to inclusive leadership can be used to address opportunities and challenges inherent in environments of the global organization through the promotion of respect for the cultural preferences which are diverse. Great assertiveness was seen in Greeks, having an increase in confrontation, personal assertiveness, and aggressiveness (Chin, 2015). Iranians were ranked the lowest in assertiveness, while the natives from Singapore seem determined to delaying collective gratification. Greater persuasion to gender egalitarianism or the ability to promote gender equality while minimizing gender roles was depicted in Singapore, while Iran ranked the least in this. Iran ranked the highest in humane orientation, which is the degree to which individuals are rewarded and encouraged for being kind, fair and generous to others (Chin, 2015). In this area, Germans ranked the least. Singaporeans had the strongest influence in individualism and collectivism, which is the persuasion of the group towards social rules. Greeks measured the least in this respect. High-performance orientations were depicted in Singapore and Iran, which helps in inspiring and rewarding personal and group excellence. Greeks ranked the lowest in this respect. Iran depicted high power distance, thereby supporting power concentration at the top, while Singapore ranked the least. Finally, uncertainty avoidance, which is the persuasion of culture to keep uncertain circumstances at bay, is highly practised in Singapore and poorly done in Greece. These cultural differences can be bridged through inclusive leadership to promote success in the global organization.
- Chin, R. (2015). Examining teamwork and leadership in the fields of public administration, leadership, and management. Team Performance Management, 21 (3/4).
- CIO. (2016). 6 Characteristics of Inclusive Leaders. CIO Journal , 1.
- Michael, S. (2016, August 24). Lessons from the Deutsche Bank whistleblower Eric Ben-Artzi: A corporate culture must allow employees to dissent, before they take it outside the company. Financial Times.
- Singh, R. (2017). Human Behaviour. Notion press.