Different Situations and roles of leaders and managers

In all around the world, ways of doing business has changed. It has become essential for the companies to make sure that they manages there operations in a better way. Operations management refers to as the management of the inputs, resources and tools that a company utilizes for ensuring the higher growth of the company. Leader and managers have different kinds of roles in an organization (Annarelli and Nonino, 2016). The way in which they manage somehow depends on the characteristics they have. There are many kinds of operations that are performed in various units of any organization. There are different kinds of theories and concept that has been given by various researchers that helps in understanding the roles of leadership and management. Operation management is necessary for achieving the objectives of the firm. Apart from this there are various factors that affect the operational management as well as the decision making y leaders of an organization. ALDI is one of the largest retail stores in UK. It has been performing well in the UK business environment. This report highlights the roles of the leaders and managers in different organizational context as well as the theories that depict their roles. It also underlines the factors that are present in the business environment that tends to influence the decision making of the leaders and managers of the organization.

1.Role of a leader and manager in different situational context

There are several departments within an organization. In every unit managers and leaders have different kinds of roles and responsibilities. Some of the situation and the role of the leaders and manager in this regards is as follows:

Situation 1: Assigning the new task and getting it done in the required time frame.

In this situation managers or leaders can take use of the classical theory of leadership. This helps to increase the productivity of the workers so as to achieve better results. This theory assists in enhances the efficiency and the output. Managers apply this theory for enhancing the job skills of the employees. Managers must make a work structure and provide incentives for motivating the subordinate to get the required results. Managers must understand the challenges that employees are facing while doing this task and then work for providing solution for it.

Situation 2: Ensuring employee retention as well as enhancing thier loyalty of employees towards firm. 

In this situation leaders and managers can take use of motivational theories so as to motive their sub-ordinates. Managers must talk to their employees from time to time and leaders should fulfill the demands of the employees.

Theories that co-relate with leader and manager roles in the organization

Situation 3: Training and development of employees for increasing productivity of the employees.

Leaders must take initiatives for arranging such kind of training and development sessions for the employees so that their efficiency can be increased. It is a function of a manger to underline the requirements of the employees so that trainings to them can be given accordingly.

Situation 4: Bringing smoothness in the work

Leaders have the responsibility to make sure that avail all the resources so that there is no interruption in the work due to lack of resources. It is the function of a manager to organize all the resources in a better way so that they are available at the right time. Staffing needs to be done by the managers in a way that required amount of staffs are always available at the workplace. 

Situation 5: To enhance productivity

Leaders must ensure that all the advanced technology is implemented within an organization. This helps in increasing the speed of operations. Managers have the function of applying all the tools of management so that highest of productivity can be achieved in operations.

2.Theories and models of approach that can be applied at ALDI

There are several theories and models can be given by different researchers for understanding the role of management and leadership at ALDI.

Situational leadership: Situational leadership is one of the most widely used theories of leadership (Krajewski, Malhotra and Ritzman, 2015). This theory suggests that a leader must adopt flexibility in his approach and there must not be any rigid leadership style that he or she might follows. This theory suggests of four leadership stages

S1: This is a stage called directing. In these stage leaders defines the roles of the individuals and provide them what they want.

S2: This stage is called coaching stage. In these stage leaders provides assistance to the employees so that they can do their task.

S3: This is called supporting stage where the leaders provide support to the employees especially in decision making so that their task can be accomplished.

S4: It is delegating stage where leaders are involved in decision making but the process or the responsibility for completing the task is provided to the individuals or groups.

System leadership: This theory suggests that organization is like a system where input is fed and various operations are done on it so as to retrieve the desired results. Every organization is having a set of behavior, culture and there are different ranges of operations. The organization like an open system gets influenced by the environment that is made by different factors.

Contingency approach: This approach suggests that there is no perfect model for leadership which best suits any firm. This theory supports the fact that a leadership style must be adopted as per the situation that company is facing. The leadership style must be task and relationship motivated. In order to obtain best of results a proper analysis must be made so as to apply any kind of leadership. 

Chaos leadership: This is the theory which advocates the fact that many a time changes in the industry are uncertain. Due to these changes many kinds of disturbances arises in the operations of the firm (Brown, Bessant and Lamming, 2013). For such type of situations leaders must be ready with different set of plans so as to reduce the amount of loses they can bring. A leader or manager must manage their firm in such a manner that their company is able to adapt any situation coming in the future. A leader must identify the nature of the chaos and implement tools in order to eliminate it.

3.P6. Factors that impact the operational management and decision making

There are several internal and external factors that are present in the industry that tends to influence the operational management and decision making of an organization.

Factors that impact the operational management within the organization are as follows:

• Political: There are lots of changes that are going on in the political tie ups between the countries of Europe. The decisions such as Brexit will have long term impact on the operational management of ALDI.
• Economic: There has been decline in the economic stability of Europe. This has resulted in loss for ALDI hence its impact can also be seen on the operational management of the company.
• Social: Society needs are changing. Cited company has to transform its operational management strategies so as to make sure that maximum customer satisfaction can be achieved. People are demanding for many types of product at the same store for which ALDI will have to be ready for.
• Technological: Technology that is used in the logistics and retail are changing at faster speed (Jay, and Barry, 2016). This compels ALDI to make operational management in a way that best of technologies can be adopted as per their requirements.
• Legal: Legalities related to retail business have changed in Europe and hence ALDI also need to make sure that they have adopted such operational management strategies that help in complying with these rules and regulations.
• Sustainability: It has become essential for the company to manage its resources in such a manner that they have enough of resources for their future operations. Sustainability effects the operational management as they need to make sure that there is effective utilization of resources so that it can be used in the future.
• Competition: The competition present in the industry always tends to influence the operational management of the company. Any operational management strategy is made checking the strategies that rivals have adopted. More the competition in the market more is the requirement to have effective operational strategy. 

Factors that affects the decision making of an organization

• CSR: ALDI has lot of corporate social responsibility. Any decision made by the company is highly affected by the corporate responsibility they have in the society. Leaders need to make sure that the decisions they are made must be as per the guidelines that company has made for managing the welfare of the society (Sanders, 2018).
• Interest of stakeholders: ALDI’s decision making depends on the fact that whether it is in the interest of the stakeholders or not. Every decision is made citing the influence it has on the stakeholders of the company. A decision that has positive impact on the stakeholders is preferred over the other.
• Culture: ALDI has a predefined culture and these cultural aspects always affect the decision making of the ALDI. More the complexity in the culture of ALDI more is the chances that there will be effect of it in the operational management of the organization.
• Ethics: ALDI makes its decisions as per the ethical standards present in the industry as well as the guidelines they have made for themselves. Any decision is made according to the vision and mission of the company. ALDI leaders have to think about the ethical consequences of any decisions.

Conclusion

From the above based report it can be concluded that there are operational management refers to as the management of operations within a firm that is done by utilizing the resources of the firm. There are many kinds of situations that occur in an organization and it is the role of the leader and function of a manager to make sure that smoothness in the work process is ensured. Managers take use of various approaches and theories for understanding the role of leadership. Apart from this there are many factors that directly affect the operational management and decision making of the firm. 

References

Annarelli, A. and Nonino, F., (2016) Strategic and operational management of organizational resilience: Current state of research and future directions. Omega, 62, pp.1-18.

Brown, S., Bessant, J.R. and Lamming, R., (2013) Strategic operations management. Routledge.

Jay, H. and Barry, R., (2016) Operations Management. Pearson India.

Krajewski, L.J., Malhotra, M.K. and Ritzman, L.P., (2015) Operations management: processes and supply chains. Pearson.

Sanders, N. (2018) Operation management defined. [Online]. Available at: https://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=2167438. [Accessed on: 12^th March 2018].