Workplace Psychological Testing and Measurement

What are the most important requisite skills required of organizational leaders? Why? How do effective and ineffective leadership behaviors affect employees both positively and negatively? The most important skill of an organizational leader is to be able to motivate people, contrary to the assumption leadership is synonymous with telling people what to do in an authoritative fashion. Although in some limited instances, when a matter is urgent and followers are inexperienced, authoritarian leadership may be required, for the most part, people work best when they feel empowered to do so.

According to Hersey-Blanchard leadership theory (2018), the four dominant modes of leadership include telling, selling, supporting and delegating. All too often, leaders assume that more telling is needed than actually is required. Employees need to be empowered and motivated to make positive choices to act autonomously, and even when they are inexperienced, coaching and mentorship is often more effective than dictatorial management. Even someone with the technical title of manager can often benefit from focusing more upon leadership than short-term organizational goals. A Theory Y approach should be embraced.

The concept of Theory X/ Theory Y states that while many organizations take a Theory X approach to leadership, with a focus on transactional rewards and the assumption that employees are inherently lazy, Theory Y approaches are superior because they assume that employees want fulfilling work and to make a contribution to the organization (“Theory X and Theory Y,” 2018). Employees can be motivated by things other than financial transactions, but to do so requires trusting employees and soliciting their input.

Good leadership means making subordinates feel equally involved and invested in the organization as managers. Ineffective leadership, in contrast, breeds employee resentment and causes them to see their own interests as separate from the organization. While transactional rewards may temporarily cause employees to feel motivated enough to complete tasks, it does not enhance retention of high-quality employees in the long run or encourage innovative thinking and wastes organizational resources with micromanagement. References Hersey-Blanchard leadership theory. (2018). Leadership Central.

Retrieved from: http://www.leadership-central.com/situational-leadership-theory.html#axzz5FsZEByUr Theory X and Theory Y. (2018). Mind Tools. Retrieved from: https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newLDR_74.htm Reflect on three of the articles you have chosen for the literature review assignment. How will these articles help you proceed from here? According to Bacharach (1989), not all organizational theories are created alike. Most managers would agree but given the proliferation of available theories, the question arises as to how to make intelligent and discerning choices between all of them.

Bacharach (1989) offers a helpful conceptual model, that of a continuum of falsifiability and utility. In other words, like all scientific theories, a theory is not valid unless it can be proven false or true. Otherwise it is just an interesting idea or commonsense notion based upon anecdotal observation that might be subjectively true in the perceptions of some people, not in others. It also must be useful for managers. Unlike some disciplines, the study of management and business ultimately has a practical objective beyond pure research.

It should be useful for managers to use in conceptualizing behavior and getting employees to perform at their best. Also as noted by Judge and Kammeyer-Meller, (2012), when organizations set goals for themselves, it is essential that these goals are measurable. What cannot be measured cannot be changed or improved. But this raises the question of how to measure performance, particularly individual employee performance and whether employee attributes should be measured in a general or specific way.

A variety of tests are available, including intelligence, five-factor model of personality, and job attitudes, although given.