Book Review

The selected book for the report is “Effective Leadership” written by John Adair.  The selected book consists of several parts. The author unintentionally devided it in several segments, which can help to navigate through the main principles and aspects of management. It is possible to see the author’s intention to start from mentioning about self-management, which becomes the primary step in the development of appropriate leadership skills. The author dedicated the book to the following aspects: understanding of leadership, development of leadership skills, and growth of an individual as a leader. The author defines leadership as an appropriate skill, which a manager should obtain in order to support the steps of the company’s development and lead people to the top of success. It is the essence of any plan as long as it helps to include appropriate elements in plans starting from long-term plans up to mid-term and short-term plans. The essentials of the planning start from planning the manager’s day, and this is the point, which the author starts considering as a transition point to further establishment of theory on leadership. He points at the necessity to put tasks according to the urgency of their completion. It is possible to see the diversity of tips on daily planning, which help the author to adhere to the pace of the company’s development and implement appropriate methods and techniques according to the level of its evolution. In fact, any manager should be aware of the fact that his day should have enough use in order to bring benefits to the company and move it towards success. The author puts much attention to planning, which is appropriate for effective leadership.

The author also mentions the delegation process as one of the major points in building effective leadership. It is the part of explanation of how to grow into a respectable leader able to put the company into appropriate pace of the development. It encourages enhancing leadership skills through letting other employees involve in the top management’s activity. Delegation can become an essential step in the regulation of all processes in the company’s performance with the help of involvement of employees from different departments. It not only enhances trust and loyalty of employees, but also helps to penetrate the company’s performance with appropriate relationships between the manager and his subordinates. In addition to the improvement of human relations through the lens of delegation, the author encourages the reader to manage his time effectively in order to become an outstanding leader able to bring the company to the top of success. The author means that it is necessary to pay attention to stress-related factors and health issues faced in the process of the performance. It means that a leader cannot act effectively enough if he faces stress on a continuous basis and does not get enough rest in order to refresh his batteries.

Another segment of the book focuses on the goals-setting techniques, which can effectively boost the process of the company’s development and move it towards prosperous future in the rapid pace. It is important to mention that the author defines goals into two sections, which can help the manager handle them on the regular basis regardless of the urgency of their completion. For example, the author mentions personal and professional goals. This distinguishing feature helps to understand which goal is appropriate for the development t of personal skills and which goal can lead the company to the new level of the evolution. In fact, both types of goals aim to improve the manager’s performance and enhance his working skills necessary for setting appropriate leadership tone. However, business goals orient on the development of all departments at the same time while personal and professional goals help to develop an outstanding leader or manager bringing the company to the appropriate direction of the performance.

The next step the author uses to help readers become effective leaders hides in the evaluation of the decision-making skills. It is known that management is a science, which involves various steps in the establishment of the system allowing the companies reach their goals. Moreover, it is a fact that the company depends on the decision-making process performed by every manager in the prospect of the company’s direction of the performance. It means that an effective leader should obtain enough skills, experience, and knowledge in order to make decisions and choose the set of resources required for the achievement of the goal. The author mentions that the manager is the decision-maker, who regulates the steps taken in the process of the company’s evolution (Adair, 2009). He is the one regulating partnership and cooperation of the company with suppliers and other companies working in the same field. In addition, it is the manager’s responsibility to take appropriate action towards regulation of human relations and the whole system of human resources management within the company’s boundaries. Analysis and synthesis of the key aspects of the effective decision-making process help the reader to obtain the most useful information regarding leadership within any company. Moreover, the author goes beyond the useful set of theoretical aspects and mentions that it is important to consider intuition, imagination, conceptual thinking, and innovation as the leading approaches towards regulation of the leadership processes. The author does his best to explain the concept of value in the decision-making process. He puts a special attention to the importance of weighing all options and alternatives in the process of taking appropriate action towards improvement of the company’s performance.

Another part of the book is dedicated to the importance of including innovation and creativity in the useful performance of any leader. It is an important step in the development of the company as long as it creates conditions towards transformation according to the terms of the surrounding business environment. For example, it may become a key to the evolution of the company according to the technical innovations penetrating the world’s performance on the annual basis. It is not a secret that innovations are the core of the development of any company. They push it towards implementation of new approaches related to the technical sphere. These approaches help the company to meet customers’ requirements with an outstanding effort. In addition to the innovations, it is the leader’s responsibility to encourage employees change themselves according to the pace of the company’s development. The author mentions that it is the leader’s responsibility to encourage employees to improve themselves and to innovate their professional skills according to the requirements of the business segment. Creativity should become another element helping the company handle routine problems and obstacles on the way to putting innovation as a mandatory element of its performance. Generation of ideas is a sub-element of creativity, which should always be a part of the working process not only of a leader, but also of his subordinates. It is the leader’s responsibility to motivate employees and help them handle their everyday working problems preventing from the evolution of their professional skills. In fact, the reader points at the importance of clarifying the connection between the company’s performance and the diversity of approaches used to fulfill duties by its employees.

The second part of the book goes deep in the roots of leadership and its essence. The author gives the definition of leadership and points at the importance of considering the qualities and functions of leadership. Defining the task, planning, briefing, controlling, evaluating, organizing and setting examples are the main aspects of the performance of the successful leader. It is also the leader’s mandatory obligation to develop appropriate leadership skills. The author puts a special attention to teambuilding and training of employees aimed to enhance the company’s development and help it gain its tactic and strategic goals.

The next point of the book is dedicated to motivation and human resources management. The author discusses human needs and the way to motivate them through the lens of their needs. The author presents three circles of needs, which include the following: task needs, group needs and individual needs. It helps to understand what needs the leader should fulfill according to their urgency. The part of the book helps to understand what an effective leader needs to do in order to obtain the targets and goals of the performance process. The author encourages an effective leader to follow the rule of praising every employee as an individual with his personal characteristic traits. He suggests selecting highly motivated people and assigning appropriate tasks for them. In addition, setting realistic and challenging targets is appropriate for the development of employees’ skills and experiences. In addition, the author mentions that the progress itself is a powerful motivational tool. As soon as employees see their achievements, they can easily adhere to any task they receive and apply appropriate techniques in order to achieve their goals. It means that experience helps employees not only to stay motivated, but also helps them to become outstanding professional able to work at any task. Fair rewards and motivating environment can help any employee generate enough energy to handle any problem and achieve any task. It is the leader’s obligation to put employees in appropriate environment in order to encourage them work for the benefits of the company. Finally, recognition helps to reduce the level of employee turnover as long as the company shows that it values every employee contributing to its development.

Further, the author goes on to discuss the importance of communication in the aspect of setting effective leadership. It is important how to listen not only to the employees, but also to the leader. It means that communication should have a mutual nature in both aspects. If there is something unclear, it is important to teach employees to ask questions without any hesitation or fear of being misunderstood. Another special point in the establishment of leadership skills is speaking. Speaking and presentation skills should have enough attention from the leader as long as it is his responsibility to motivate, persuade, encourage and regulate human relations. Nurturing the working environment with appropriate communication will help to avoid distrust and misunderstanding between all elements of the company.

By the end of the book, the author summarizes the most important aspects in the employees’ performance and leadership approach applied towards its regulation. The author remember all elements he discussed in the book including skills and characteristics necessary for effective leadership, planning, communication, and motivation, and practice as the leading measure of achieving leadership. The author did his best to support the main aspects of leadership and explain all essentials of every tool used to bring the company to the new level of the development. In addition, it is possible to see the connection between leadership and employees’ performance, which may lead to the improvement or degradation of the company. In general, the book is a perfect guide towards regulation of human relations and effective leadership bringing the company to the new level of evolution.