Leadership in Complex Environments

Introduction

Demands for leadership development have never been urgent yet necessary for growth. Companies and organizations of all kinds are attracted to the realization of an uncertain, volatile, ambiguous and complex environment, which call for organizational abilities and leadership skills at the same time. In the contemporary society, practice-based leadership is becoming more paramount due to the fact that it attracts both the practical approaches and the theoretical constructs. For any form of leadership to succeed, then the basis should cover both the practical methods and theories that build up the most viable concept, which is relevant to organizations or companies. This applies to Zion Christian Church under the leadership of Bishop Lekganyane who has shown the need of having order until he encountered challenges in his endeavors. My interaction with Bishop Lekganyane left a mark in my life with a lesson full of hope and challenges at the same time. Based on this, the individual reflective report presents a summary of the case scenario, analyze and comment on the recommendations, the strength and areas of improvement on the recommended approach, an implementation plan with risks and benefits of the hindsight.

Case Scenario

Over the recent past, more attention has been given to businesses and companies where profit is regarded necessary in the face of the practice-based leadership. While performance, in these organizations, is determined through productivity, the proportionality never exists in the community-based organizations such as churches. This gap area has attracted the attention of this report, which narrows down on the history of leadership of Zion Christian Church. The church is said to have been born after the Anglo-Boer War with Bishop Lekganyane being aware of the missionaries’ attempt to erode the African value systems as well as the cultural beliefs. He noted the need to contextualize Christianity before integrating it with the African political, lifestyle and cultural setup. As a result, he recognized the African chieftaincy as an important element in the society and constantly observed the permission given by the chiefs before he could preach the gospel. He equally championed for economic independence in the community by establishing and supporting the development of the mill. In the wake of apartheid, Bishop Lekganyane found himself in a dilemma with most of his followers joining the resistance programs that fought discrimination. Bishop Lekganyane encountered more challenges as a result of lack of an organogram and failure to attain a communication cycle that would have improved the functions of the church (SAHO, 2019). There is also an incomplete link in the command line as reports fail to reach the minister in charge. However, a number of recommendations have been floated to solve the menace. A functional organizational culture was recommended to address the missing organogram. A transformative leadership style is also better placed in ensuring growth of new leaders who would take charge of the management of other departments.

History of the church

Zion Christian Church, denoted as ZCC, is one of the largest as well as the fastest growing African independent churches that appeared in the 1990s. The church was founded by the famous Joseph Engenas Matlhakanye Lekganyane in the year 1924. After the split from Lion, Lekganyane is said to have used Thabakgone, his home village, as the headquarters. The early doctrines of the church were essentially influenced by the Christian Catholic Church of John Alexander Dowie (SAHO 2019). Lekganyane began embracing migrant workers which are something that made the church to develop international membership. The church has an estimated membership of 2 million to 6 million across the 4000 parishes that are essentially established in rural communities and urban townships. The headquarters would later be moved to Moria after clashes were witnessed with the chief. The ZCC would later grow rapidly with 926 adherents growing to 2000 before the year 1935 and 8000 before the year 1940. The subsequent 2 years saw the church spreading to Botswana, Northern Cape and Zimbabwe. Joseph would later pass away on June 1948 before he was succeeded by Edward, who was also his son. Edward is remembered for the introduction of all-male Mokhukhu organization (SAHO 2019). Edward would later be succeeded by his own son Barnabas in the year 1967 (Anderson 1999). Zionist beliefs insist on the healing power of faith, which sometimes made ZCC leaders to clash with sangomas and the traditional healers. The most fascinating side is the hierarchy of leadership in the church. From the interview with Lekganyane, around 12 members work in leadership position. At the top of the hierarchy is the Bishop, who oversees the functions of the church and the entire leadership. The bishop can still double as the minister in charge as he works alongside the general secretary, the treasurer, and other additional members in the council. The general secretary is in charge of the policy development and strategies said to give direction for the church. He or she is supported by the Assistant General Secretary (AGS) and the personal assistant. The AGS also has personal assistant(s). The treasurer is in charge of the finances while the minister in charge plays the focal role of providing an oversight of the district ministries.

his transformative mission, missed out on the formal ways of handling challenges and almost never understood the dynamics, which constantly fell out of his control. Based on this, I could easily note from Bishop Lekganyane’s moods that the church must have suffered more from lack of an organogram as well as a non-formalized structure which led to a retarded growth (Watkins 2018). A possible absence of the Bishop paves way for the first born to take over the role, which makes the succession plan as part of the vision of a single family. Perhaps, this hampers the necessity of borrowing ideologies that would help to confront dynamics that might challenge the growth of the church. As a result, Zion Christian Church constantly encountered poor flow of information, low productivity and bad organizational structure among others. Among other recommendations, I felt it necessary for Bishop Lekganyane to adopt a functional organizational structure, an organogram and a transformative type of leadership, which would allow him to nurture young leaders who would take over sensitive positions. After the interview and the interventions, Bishop Lekganyane felt more enlightened and more challenged. He immediately learned of the erroneous areas and learned the essence of an organogram and leadership within an organization. I was more encouraged by this consultation assignment when the Bishop noted that the interviews were educative, convenient, precise and timely at the same time. The commendation from the responded indicates that the approaches applied in the context worked more excellently than what was expected before. While doing a self-assessment, I noticed that key areas of the recommendations must have contributed to the success of the project. Some of these key areas include the significant aspects of the leadership and organizational theories believed to have been drawn from the MA Leadership modules, models, concepts and frameworks (Osburn and Forbes 2018). Among significant models, I was attracted to the sociocultural model, the cultural web and Hofstede cultural dimension. I also took significant note of outstanding concepts such as organogram, functional organizational structure, hierarchy, chain of command and span of control among others. Notable theories aligned to leadership are the transformation leadership theory, which defines the essence of change in organizational context of improving performance. I first chose the sociocultural model because of its explicitness in explaining the contributions the society has made towards individual development. The model points at the interaction between culture and people and largely insists on human learning (Sarala et al. 2016). The latter also engulfs the attitudes and cultural beliefs which impact how learning and instructions are likely to take place. I chose this model for the purposes of understanding the background of Zion Christian Church and that of Bishop Lekganyane. Perhaps, Bishop Lekganyane compromised the African value system before he started preaching the gospel. He later tried to strike a balance between the African value system and Christianity by embracing chieftaincy. The model answered to questions as to why would the African community resist Christianity. Besides, was it necessary to spread Christianity? Sociocultural model describes the sociocultural perspectives and the transitions that are likely to be witnessed in the community, which would end up influencing change (Lantolf et al. 2015). Bishop Lekganyane is seen to have misunderstood such perspectives while embracing Christianity.

Close to the sociocultural model is the cultural web and how it can affect leadership. I chose this model because it is a guiding tool which is necessary in mapping the organizational culture while trying to understand its influence. I understand that the tool can equally map the future cultures as well while establishing the possible impact. I easily connected the cultural web to Zion Christian Church after noting that cultural values defined the kind of a leader and not system. Youths or members would closely listen to Bishop Lekganyane who also informed most of their decisions as far as apartheid, among issues, are put into consideration. Such a culture may have weaknesses especially when the person in charge dies or goes missing. This means that there would be no more church. I used the cultural web as a guiding tool to transformative type of leadership, which is more concerned about others than the leader himself (Swain et al. 2015). On the other hand, the Hofstede cultural dimension was also introduced in the context to establish dimensions which could be analyzed along significant cultural values. For instance, the individualism versus collectivism dimension notes the extent to which people in the community are integrated into significant groups (Alexander et al. 2017). Most of the individualistic societies have loose ties and tend to be inclined to an individual. The system relies on an individual rather than a system, which would a separate entity. This dimension defines the kind of a relationship Bishop Lekganyane has with his church, which has a bad organizational culture (Beugelsdijk and Welzel 2018). The easy connection between Hofstede cultural dimension and the church context gave me a leeway of realizing the kind of weakness and challenges Zion Christian Church is facing.

I established the leadership concept after taking note of the problems at the church. With the help of the sociocultural model, the cultural web and the Hofstede cultural dimension helped me in establishing the nature and kind of challenges the organization was facing (Beugelsdijk et al. 2017). I noted that Bishop Lekganyane owned the church more than how members would have owned it if given a chance. This is devastating in the face of a church struggling with bad organizational structure and almost a non-inclusive leadership. Based on this argument, and the developments noted from a collection of models, it was easier to integrate the leadership theory (Thompson et al. 2017). The choice of a functional organizational structure and the transformative type of leadership are both recommendable in the context of Zion Christian Church. While in pursuit of an inclusive leadership, the church has to also observe the chain of command while observing the flow of information across departments. The recommendations were highly received and felt relevant by the client’s organization. They stood out as significant solutions to what has been ailing Zion Christian Church. The models, concepts and theories provided both rigor and value to the recommendations. They defined the guiding principles and requirements that should be met while pursuing change. They equally gave room for improvement.

After doing the interview and established the interventions, I sat back for a while and tried to think if the recommended approach was relevant or not. Sometimes, it is hard to establish if things can be perfect or not especially when one tends to be biased in a way. However, it took me a process to establish the needs and aligned them to the most credible solutions as provided through concepts, models, theories and practices. At the same time, I understand that the recommendation of adopting the functional organizational structure or an organogram, and the transformative leadership may not be all that the Zion Christian Church needs to see change. However, I believe that the recommended approach is not misplaced and substantially suits the gap areas noted across the issues fronted in the original brief. First, the recommended approaches are informed through concepts, models and theories (Minkov et al. 2017). This means that they share significant knowledge regarding organizational change, the need for structures and the requirement of having an inclusive leadership. The concepts, models and theories applied in developing the recommended approaches have the capacity of informing dynamics that are likely to impact the performance of Zion Christian Church. Secondly, the recommended approaches took a practical-based dimension while trying to provide solutions. With a background in consultation, I believe that I have experience that would help any other consultant in pursuing and applying both research-based and practical-based skills, which are significant in establishing a link between the problem and the solution. The assertion appeals to the Schein’s consultancy model, which is grounded on the comprehensive concept that covers the expert resource role, the medical or doctor role and process consultation role (Schein 2017). With these constituents of the model, it is possible for one to establish the purpose as well as relationships that one has with doctors. The expert role demands that one should provide a service or information, while the doctor’s role demands a diagnosis of the issue and prescription of the solution. The process role calls for collaboration with the client while focusing on the communication process.

Therefore, the transformative leadership organogram is informed through experience, the Schein consultancy model and practical background that have been tested on different clients before. Besides, the recommended approaches have been considered relevant, precise and applicable by the client and the client organization. Bishop Lekganyane stated that he was challenged and now realized the erroneous areas that have been pulling the church behind when it comes to performance. While this may sound like an achievement, I was more concerned with the kind of an attitude the bishop would show when receiving the recommendations. Apart from sharing areas of strength, the recommended approaches also have areas the need improvement. For instance, the transformative leadership has numerous elements that cannot be implemented as a whole. This implies that the approaches need to be revised before they can be introduced to the church. Perhaps, they need to be customized in a way that would directly address the challenges that the church is facing.

Proposed implementation plan and indicate any potential risks or barrier

The identification of the recommended approaches may not be enough if the implementation plan is missing. The report has already indicated that Zion Christian Church is in need of transformative leadership, an organogram or a functional organizational structure and a formal outline. The implementation plan emanates from the original plan, which provides a preview of the relevant activities and actions that would be considered in the course of realizing change (Beard et al. 2016). However, in this context, it would be easier to establish the kind of actions, the resources required and key performance indicators in case of evaluation or assessment. Below is a table showing the activities among other requirements.

In the course of the implementation process, there are risks and barriers that are likely to hamper the process of realizing change. First, the church is a non-profit making organization, which means that it is likely to face financial challenges. Financial constraints can impede the departmentalization process among other processes. Secondly, the negative attitude towards change among the members can have a detrimental impact on the church. Not all church members can accept change or support it. If such negative forces emerge in the implementation phase, then the church may not realize the change and its benefits. Lastly, leadership struggles can also frustrate the process. While the change comes with new positions and roles, there is likelihood that some of the leaders may be forced to leave office to pave way for the new force. This can attract power struggles with the former ending up reluctant to leave office.

With the benefit of hindsight, what might you do differently next time?

I believe I did much in the interest of the church to impact change that has been waited for long. I also entrust the process I undertook to realize change at Zion Christian Church. However, I have to realize the need to customize some of the models before imposing them to the client organizations. As mentioned before, transformative leadership styles or even the formal outlines recommended for Zion Christian Church may carry additional elements which cannot be applied to community-based organizations. This means that a revisit of such models and leadership styles is needed to readjust the elements before applying them to the client organization. However, precautions shall equally be considered while making the adjustments. This is due to the fact that the model should carry at least two thirds of the original components for it to maintain its meaningful structures. Secondly, contextual understanding is always important (Alexander et al. 2017). This means relating disciplines to the kind of an organization in need of the consultation services. For the case of Zion Christian Church, the organization is community based but still engages in economic activities, which equally call for the attention of the church leadership. This means that a flexible approach was required to also address the economic activities, which were rarely mentioned in the consultation process.

Personal leadership development and learning

I started this project knowing that it would share significant insights towards skill development and knowledgeable gains, which I never encountered before. While trying to connect the MA Leadership study materials to Zion Christian Church, I learned a range of skills from the research process, the program members and even the consultation assignment itself. From the program members, I learned that teamwork is always important in the course of sharing knowledge. Perhaps, I could not be perfect enough to handle the consultation assignment to the end without asking my friends significant questions, which seem to challenge my capabilities. From the assignment, I noticed the advantages of my own learning style, which gave me an advantage of learning and appreciating the environment even before interacting with the respondents. I equally noticed that cultural contexts call for robust leadership skills (Amanchukwu et al. 2015). Notably, every organization is likely to have its own problems, which are likely to be different from another organization. However, before one learns and establishes the kind of leadership solutions to be provided, discipline is always a priority before achieving situational awareness. My encounter with Bishop Lekganyane forced me to be disciplined to learn the kind of history he had and what he has been going through for years. I also learned that a good leader should constantly keep learning without necessarily showing areas of weakness. For instance, one may not be perfect to carry out consultation on all disciplines but through learning, it is possible to understand a range of them. Perhaps, I borrowed most of the ideologies from Honey and Mumford learning styles, which are believed to have been developed by Alan Mumford and Peter Honey (Arslan 2018). Honey and Mumford suggested that in the due course of learning, one can be a theorist, an activist, a pragmatist or a reflector. Based on my experience with my colleagues and my encounter with Bishop Lekganyane, I believe I can suit the properties or qualities of a reflector. This is due to the fact that I did much of the paired discussions, engaged in observation of activities, engaged a self-analysis questionnaire and also delved in interviews (Stander et al. 2019). The model allowed me to share experiences with the Bishop as he dug into his past and the history of the church. This gave me an opportunity of pondering the experiences and digested them from different perspectives. Learning is a special skill for leaders which is rarely found in most contexts. Most of the leaders are tied to the narrative of perfection, which largely ruins most of their decisions. Reflection stands out as the best avenue for making informed decisions.

The reflective report touches on significant areas of my practice-based leadership experience, which gave me an opportunity to interact with Bishop Lekganyane at Zion Christian Church. Through an interview, I noticed that the church has been suffering from a bad organizational structure and lack of an organogram, which leads to low productivity. Further establishment of the family-based succession plan seemingly impedes the process of borrowing ideologies which would help in containing some of the dynamics. With the help of models, concepts and theories, I derived the most recommendable solutions which included a functional organizational culture and a transformative leadership. The functional organizational culture means that the church stands an opportunity of having robust values, open and dynamic practices that would embrace change. The culture is informed by the cultural web, sociocultural model and the concepts attached to Hofstede cultural dimension. The transformative leadership requires the Bishop to engage young leaders as they take part in some of the critical tasks attached to the growth of the church. This move dilutes or dismisses the notion of a family-based succession plan, which hampers growth through retention of conventional practices and dogmatic beliefs. An introduction of the implementation plan implies the practical side of my interventions, which also helped me to learn more about leadership skills.

References

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