Leadership and team development in a multinational corporation

The trend of a global marketplace has given rise to needs for multinational companies. Literature on global business, HR development and management, social problems, etc. has, of late, greatly focused on the key subject of global leadership efficacy (Caligiuri & Tarique, 2012). Leadership represents a central element of every firm. However, leadership ability and function is increasing in complexity with enhanced engagement in technological development and globalization (Ulrich & Smallwood, 2012). People hailing from diverse cultures may have different ideas regarding, and expectations from, corporate leaders. Hence, this paper aims at determining an inclusive leadership approach's contribution to reinforcing corporate culture within a diverse international workforce, having individuals hailing from the US, Germany, Greece, Iran and Singapore.

Commitment: Developing an inclusive, assorted workforce requires commitment of corporate leaders' energy and time, which are the two elements most important for them. Besides having faith in the proposed undertaking, an inclusive manager will be guided by his/her ideals, which include a profound sense of justice that, in case of certain individuals, is imbedded in individual experience.

Courage: An inclusive leader may exhibit courage in the following ways. Firstly, he/she will not shy away from challenging the established corporate practices and mindsets which give rise to homogeneity, despite the possibility that their suggestion is culturally or politically disliked. They also do not shy away from demonstrating humility and openly accept their individual flaws, soliciting others' contributions to surmount them.

Bias awareness: An inclusive manager realizes that individual and company prejudices limit their visual field, preventing them from unprejudiced decision-making. They strive significantly towards identifying personal prejudices and learning ways to stop shaping talent decisions.

Cultural intelligence: Corporate leaders, such as chief information officers, must be familiar with cultures other than their own. Beyond theoretical knowledge, the concept of cultural intelligence implies leadership capacity of altering their approaches to make them consistent with diverse cultural standards.

Curiosity: A zest for acquiring knowledge, broadmindedness, and the desire to get to know diverse ideas have quickly become crucial qualities of a successful leader, particularly under challenging circumstances.

Collaborative: An inclusive leader realizes that to achieve effective collaboration, the team should, firstly, not hesitate to voice their views. For achieving this, inclusive managers cultivate a corporate climate wherein every worker is permitted to freely voice his/her view with coworkers, superiors, and subordinates.

Foster Self-Awareness

Ascertain personal fortes and shortcomings. A global leader must perform self-awareness evaluations or examinations for determining their personal fortes and shortcomings.

Respect individual differences. A global leader is faced with a highly complex and diverse universe that necessitates respect for, and understanding of, individuality (Holt & Seki, 2012).

Bridge the cultural divide by seeking commonalities. Concentrating only on how one differs from others does not form the absolute way to resolve interpersonal issues.

Recognize Cultural Stereotypes

Refrain from engaging in stereotyping and prejudices. A global leader must grasp the local culture of their company setting, look at things from their subordinates' viewpoint, and display tolerance towards different cultures (Holt & Seki, 2012). A grasp of cultural stereotyping will aid leaders in surmounting personal prejudice and respecting other people within diverse workplaces. Personal prejudice against those belonging to other nationalities or against those who differ from oneself in any other aspect may lead to failures in company discovery of competent personnel, and in developing workforce trust, productivity, dedication and loyalty to the company.

Improve Self-Assurance

Always remain at the fore by thinking one step further, and enthusiastically face and tackle challenging scenarios. A successful global leader must be progressive in his/her thinking, results-oriented, and success driven (Gutierrez, Spencer, & Zhu, 2012).

Understand the competition. Real leaders hone their self-assurance and capacity for facilitating personnel development of interest and confidence (Holt & Seki, 2012). For improving a leader's self-confidence, the first step may be attempting to understand one's rivals.

See the Bigger Picture

Exceptional cross-cultural leaders act locally, but think globally (Gutierrez et al., 2012). They must take care not to microprint the global market by striving to fulfill needs that have already been met. It is essential that they take a step back to see the bigger picture, study what's transpiring at present, and what challenges and needs may surface in the future.

Acquire a Global Outlook

Global leaders must necessarily improve on their cultural intelligence, which will assist them in transforming their global experience into an international outlook (Lovvorn & Chen, 2011). This constitutes a distinctive characteristic of global leaders, linked to trust, corporate commitment and leader-subordinate relationships.

Communication Skills: Leaders who wish to develop an appropriate organizational culture within a multicultural company need to have superior communication skills, including superior speaking and listening skills. They must effectively communicate with every organizational level (Lisak & Erez, 2015). Their words must ensure employees remain dedicated and motivated to give their best.

Interpersonal Skills: Multicultural companies' leaders must possess sound interpersonal skills, earning their followers' loyalty, support and trust. They should lend an attentive ear to subordinates' complaints and provide constructive feedback whenever necessary. A balanced team dynamic must exist, with all team members striving towards the same goal.

Value Diversity: Further, leaders in global firms need to understand the advantages of diversity in business. With greater diversity, opportunities to improve and innovate will increase. A leader needs to dynamically seek a blend of diversity for improving the company's innovation and success capability.

Flexible: Leaders in multinationals need to take care not to ever rest on their laurels. They are duty-bound to continuously challenge the existing state of affairs and push their boundaries. They must exhibit flexibility and adapt to their environment, altering their course and strategies in line with current needs and demands (Lisak & Erez, 2015).

For improving their "inclusiveness", a leader must seek input and opinions from individuals they typically don't engage in. An inclusive leader must foster environments for reducing social seclusion and enabling free expression of diverse perspectives, where respect-based relationships are dominant, where diversity as a value and its effect on corporate bottom lines is strategically entrenched, and where everyone strives to openly accomplish shared objectives (Sparrowe, 2014). Leaders must, in practice, make sure they select people having unique or complementary expertise and skills for ensuring followers confront unknown prejudices. They should consider altering seating arrangements in meetings so that they can effectively interact with different individuals and change 'power dynamics'. They shouldn't immediately judge people who simply look or behave different, but must rather ask themselves whether there are others who may also share that perspective. Even if any individual voices a thought that grates at one, one needs to expand that conversation, soliciting further explanations from that individual, without being offended.