Change management and leadership are primarily distinguished by their philosophies. Change leadership uses a combination of several synergies while change management is based on a single synergy. While change management is carried out by groups of people or consultants, change leadership is implemented by an individual with a vision of transforming the organization. Change management aims to ensure that the stakeholders do not resist the changes, and that the process is kept under control within the budget. Change leadership, on the other hand, aims at mobilizing the resources required to effect change, and initiates the change process. A change leader inspires the stakeholders to believe in their abilities.
For one to be a change leader, they need to be goal-oriented, trustworthy, and with good communication skills. The leader needs to focus on the goals that he aims to achieve without any external interruption. The level of trust that the stakeholders have on the leaders is crucial in determining the ability to influence them to accept the changes. Finally, the communications skills are essential in making the stakeholders aware of the need to have the changes. The leader must be persuasive to enable the speakers to accept change and mobilize the required resources, including human resources.
There are various critical leadership competencies that leaders need to develop. These include focus, passion, speed, and agility. As a leader, there are some ways through which I can adopt for the purpose of preparing the above leadership competencies. In developing these leadership competencies, I will come up with an organization that supports and requires these as the most fundamental for success. In this case, these skills will end up getting installed through an introduced leadership advancement program.
In the process of developing these competencies, I will get involved in organizational change, which will be led by a leader who is skilled and competent. In this case, I will get in position to learn how he will be applying his leadership skills and try to learn from and collaborate with him. I will further try a new, dynamic management item, and after undertaking this, I will request for feedback from the collaborating members. From the feedback, I will get information on what went wrong and what was successful, thereby seeking information on what could be done with a different approach.
I will contact my supervisor for feedback on the extent to which I implemented a previous change. Also, I will interrogate an individual who has successfully organized organizational change. In this case, I will seek information on what actions they took, reasons and rationale for the selected actions, and the results. Finally, I will request an external consultant to offer his/her service by leading our team through the process of change to equip us with relevant techniques and tools.