Leadership development for general management

Abstract

Leadership effectiveness, and how it affects organisational performance, is a much researched area of interest. This study focuses on those leadership skills and behaviours that possibly could increase leadership effectiveness at the senior level of leadership. This is a qualitative research project and the data has been collected using a combination of a qualitative questionnaire and in-depth interviews, conducted with highly qualified individuals with extensive leadership development experience. The research showed a significant relationship between leadership skills and leadership effectiveness and revealed that certain behaviours impact leadership effectiveness at the senior level. In addition it confirmed that leadership skills and behaviours that increase leadership effectiveness could be both continuous and discontinuous in nature when transitioning from the middle management to the senior level. Within the context of sub-Saharan Africa, adaptability and learning agility are especially important behaviours for leadership effectiveness at the senior level. The research also showed that interpersonal skills is the most important skill group to be developed when transitioning to the senior level and, of these, political and cultural sensitivity emerged as the most important interpersonal skill for leadership effectiveness at the senior level.