Page 35 - Develop your leadership skills- John Adair. -- 2nd ed

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26 ■ Develop your leadership skills

■ team leadership: you are leading a team of about five to 20
people;

■ operational leadership: you are leading a significant unit in
the business or organisation, composed of a number of
teams whose leaders report to you;

■ strategic leadership: you are leading a whole business or
organisation, with overall accountability for the two levels
of leadership below you.

Not only the three circles but the eight functions also apply at
all these levels, although in different ways. In the brief discus-
sions of each function below I shall sometimes indicate these
differences, but my focus here is upon the first level – the team
leadership role.

The functional approach to leadership set out here is also
sometimes called action-centred leadership. A function is one
of a group of related actions contributing to development or
maintenance, just as each part of the body has its function in
relation to the whole. ‘Function’ comes from a Latin word
meaning performance. Sometimes it is used more widely to
mean what I have called role – the special kind of activity
proper to a professional position. Are you functional as a
leader? In other words, are you capable of performing the
regular functions expected of a leader?

Defining the task

‘Task’ is a very general word. It simply means ‘something that