Leadership Essay -- Synergistic Leadership Theory

Introduction According to Northouse (2009), leadership is a concept of multi-dimensional facets inclusive of skill, ability, inherent qualities, behaviors, and relationships. All or some of these dimensions may be observed in an individual that possesses leadership potential in different combinations and can be recognized when intent to make a change in an organization is for the greater good (2009). Even with good intentions and desires for positive changes, pathways to leadership can be locked with long periods of time and laborious experiences. The male gender, White males in particular and majority in the United States, have dominated the field of leadership therefore creating psychological barriers that excellence, potential, and aptitude enviably are tied to the male- gender (Jackson, Engstron, & Emmers-Sommer, 2007). Many explorations and developments allure to leadership theories centered around White male-gender prototypes, establishing ideologies ostensible to that same race and gender, signifying status and power, and mentioning minimal influences aspired by females and minorities. The speculations thereof have caused females and minorities to experienced delayed or non-existent advancements in managerial of leadership roles (2007). Recent literature more readily discusses cues that are suggestive of race and male-oriented ideologies of leadership as data depicts possibilities for setting apart females or minorities that may have potential and creditability for top leadership positions. Two articles, The Synergistic Leadership Theory (SLT), (Irby, Brown, Duffy, and Trautman, 2001) and the White Standard: Racial Bias in Leader Categorization (Rosette, and Phillips, 2008) probe female and minority presence ... ...ng from predispositions about behaviors. Subtle aversive racism derived from negative stereotypes continues to lay biases among female and minorities. Leadership prototypes that refer to being White as being â€Å"the† stereotypical characteristic nevertheless existent and lay constructs that affect minorities and not mentioned in these investigation, female minorities. To many instances occur in leadership where individuals in power set the organization’s culture or create biases that undermine the acceptance of leadership potential and follower 7 support. Research that ignores leadership traits, values, behaviors, abilities, and skills establishes, to the contrary, data based on traditional beliefs about any group not excluding the aged, female minorities, and others, is soaked in attitudes given by the majority and questionable.