IT Leadership Foundations (D370)

Correct Answer

C. By assessing individual strengths and adjusting their leadership style to empower team members.

Explanation

A leader should assess the unique strengths of each team member and adjust their leadership approach accordingly. This ensures that the leader can provide the right level of support, guidance, or autonomy to each team member based on their level of expertise. Empowering team members by aligning tasks with their strengths promotes a collaborative and effective work environment.

Why other options are wrong

A. By using a one-size-fits-all leadership style regardless of team dynamics.

Using a one-size-fits-all leadership style disregards the individual differences in expertise, which can limit the effectiveness of the team. A leader must tailor their approach to the specific needs of the team members to foster collaboration and achieve the desired outcomes.

B. By employing a directive approach to control the project tightly.

While a directive approach can be useful in some situations, it may hinder collaboration when team members possess varying levels of expertise. Excessive control may stifle creativity and initiative, which are essential for leveraging the diverse skills of the team.

D. By avoiding conflict and letting the team self-manage without guidance.

Avoiding conflict entirely or allowing the team to self-manage without guidance can lead to confusion or missed opportunities. A leader must provide direction and facilitate communication to ensure that the team works cohesively and effectively toward shared goals.

Correct Answer

B. Through the use of personal influence and adaptability

Explanation

Effective leadership positively impacts both task performance and citizenship behaviors by using personal influence, emotional intelligence, and adaptability. Such leaders inspire, motivate, and support their team members, leading to higher engagement and productivity. They also create a positive work environment where employees are more likely to go above and beyond their formal roles, exhibiting helpfulness and cooperation, which are key citizenship behaviors.

Why other options are wrong

A. By enforcing strict rules and regulations

While rules provide structure, overreliance on strict enforcement can create a rigid and uninspiring work culture. It may suppress creativity and initiative, reducing overall performance and discouraging voluntary citizenship behaviors.

C. By focusing solely on organizational power

Using only formal authority ignores the value of interpersonal relationships and influence. Leadership is most effective when it combines both formal and informal power, including the ability to connect with and adapt to team members' needs.

D. By avoiding conflict and negotiation

Avoiding conflict may temporarily reduce tension, but it often leads to unresolved issues and resentment. Effective leaders engage in constructive conflict resolution and negotiation to maintain team harmony and ensure continued collaboration and trust.

Correct Answer

C. Ingratiation

Explanation

Ingratiation is considered moderately effective for achieving compliance because it involves using flattery, praise, or doing favors to make others feel good, which increases the likelihood of gaining their cooperation. This tactic builds rapport and positive feelings, which can influence people to comply without the need for coercion or manipulation. It's more positive than using forceful or deceptive tactics, although it may not always lead to the strongest or most sustainable compliance.

Why other options are wrong

A. Coercion

Coercion involves forcing someone to comply through threats or pressure, which often leads to resentment, resistance, and a lack of trust. This tactic is less likely to foster long-term cooperation or loyalty.

B. Threats

Threats, like coercion, can create compliance in the short term but often result in negative feelings, decreased morale, and reluctance to cooperate. It can damage relationships and is not a sustainable way to gain compliance.

D. Manipulation

Manipulation involves deceptive or underhanded tactics to influence others, often at the expense of their best interests. While it can achieve compliance, it is unethical and can cause long-term damage to relationships and trust.

Correct Answer

C. Leaders who balance high assertiveness with high cooperativeness are likely to use a collaborative conflict resolution style.

Explanation

When leaders balance high assertiveness with high cooperativeness, they are most likely to adopt a collaborative conflict resolution style. This approach focuses on both asserting their own needs and being considerate of others' needs, seeking mutually beneficial solutions. Collaborative leaders prioritize resolving the conflict in a way that addresses the concerns of all parties involved, ensuring that all perspectives are considered and valued.

Why other options are wrong

A. Leaders who are highly assertive and low in cooperativeness tend to avoid conflicts altogether.

Leaders who are highly assertive but low in cooperativeness are not likely to avoid conflicts. Instead, they are more likely to engage in a competitive conflict resolution style, focusing on winning the conflict and prioritizing their own goals over cooperation. Avoiding conflict would be more associated with leaders who score low in both assertiveness and cooperativeness.

B. Leaders who are low in assertiveness and high in cooperativeness often adopt a competitive approach.

Leaders who are low in assertiveness but high in cooperativeness are unlikely to adopt a competitive approach. Instead, they are more likely to adopt an accommodating or collaborative style, focusing on maintaining harmony and meeting the needs of others. Competitive approaches are typically linked with high assertiveness and low cooperativeness.

D. Leaders with low assertiveness and low cooperativeness typically engage in compromising strategies.

Leaders with low assertiveness and low cooperativeness are more likely to avoid conflict or yield to the demands of others, rather than engaging in compromise. Compromising involves balancing assertiveness with cooperativeness, making it a more balanced style that is not characteristic of leaders with low levels of both factors.

Correct Answer

C. Active listening, problem-solving, and team building

Explanation

The five social and emotional power skills include active listening, empathy, problem-solving, self-awareness, and team building. These skills are crucial for fostering strong workplace relationships and effective collaboration. They help individuals understand others, navigate social complexities, and work together efficiently, which is vital for both personal development and organizational success.

Why other options are wrong

A. Interpersonal communication, executive function, and social awareness

While these are important soft skills, this grouping does not reflect the five core social and emotional power skills discussed in the lesson. Executive function, in particular, is more related to cognitive processes like planning and impulse control rather than emotional and social skills.

B. Time management, decision making, and conflict resolution

These skills are valuable but are more aligned with task management and leadership strategies. They do not encompass the emotional intelligence aspects such as empathy or team building, which are central to social and emotional power skills.

D. Empathy, delegation, and strategic planning

Empathy is a social and emotional skill, but delegation and strategic planning are managerial and cognitive in nature. This mix does not accurately represent the five emotional power skills discussed, as it combines leadership and tactical thinking with emotional intelligence.

Correct Answer

A. Offering personal assistance and sharing positive experiences with the tool

Explanation

Offering personal assistance and sharing positive experiences is a moderately effective influence tactic because it appeals to the team's willingness to engage with the tool in a supportive, non-threatening way. By providing help and demonstrating the benefits from a personal perspective, the leader encourages buy-in without resorting to heavy-handed tactics, fostering a cooperative atmosphere.

Why other options are wrong

B. Threatening team members with consequences for non-compliance

This is incorrect because threatening consequences can create resistance and resentment. While it may yield short-term compliance, it doesn't encourage long-term commitment or enthusiasm for the tool, and may damage the leader's relationship with the team.

C. Mandating the use of the tool without discussion

This is incorrect because mandating without discussion is an authoritative approach that can lead to disengagement and resistance. It does not foster collaboration or address potential concerns from team members about the tool.

D. Ignoring team feedback and implementing the tool unilaterally

This is incorrect because ignoring team feedback can result in alienating team members. The lack of input from the team can lead to dissatisfaction and lower the likelihood of the tool being adopted successfully. Effective leadership involves considering team perspectives and encouraging collaboration.

Correct Answer

C. Desire to influence people and events

Explanation

The need for power stems from the desire to influence others and shape outcomes in a way that aligns with one's objectives. Leaders with a high need for power are driven to affect change, control situations, and impact the direction of events. This need is an essential aspect of leadership, as it motivates individuals to take action and make decisions that influence their teams and organizations.

Why other options are wrong

A. Perform well against a standard of excellence

This is not the need for power; it refers to an individual's personal drive for achievement and performance, not necessarily the desire to influence others. Power is more focused on control and influence, not performance metrics.

B. Be liked and on good terms with people

While being liked may be a factor in some leadership styles, it is not the primary need for power. The need for power is about influence, not simply being liked or maintaining good relationships.

D. Satisfying everyone's wants and needs

This is more about the need for affiliation or concern for others' well-being, not power. The need for power is more about exerting influence rather than satisfying everyone’s needs.

Correct Answer

A. Power requires asymmetric dependence in a relationship.

Explanation

Power in a leadership context arises when there is asymmetric dependence — meaning one party is more dependent on the other. This imbalance creates a dynamic where the more independent party has the ability to influence or control decisions and outcomes. This dependence is often based on access to resources, information, or authority, and it plays a fundamental role in defining power relations.

Why other options are wrong

B. Power exists only when one person has something of value for a second person, but the second person has nothing of value for the first person

This is incorrect because power relationships are often mutual, even if unbalanced. Both parties usually have something of value, though one may be more dependent. The absolute lack of reciprocal value undermines sustainable power dynamics and is not a requirement for power to exist.

C. Power is the actual practice of influencing others

While this statement seems accurate, it confuses power with the exercise of influence. Power is the potential or capacity to influence, not necessarily its practice. Influence is the use of power, but power can exist without being exercised.

D. Power exists only when the power holder is able to change someone's behavior

This option is incorrect because power is the potential to influence, whether or not it is exercised. A person may hold power even if they choose not to use it to change behavior. The existence of power does not require action; it only requires the ability to act.

Correct Answer

B. To sway others' decisions or actions

Explanation

Influence tactics in leadership are employed to persuade others to align with a leader’s goals, vision, or desired outcomes. The primary purpose is not to dominate or control others, but to effectively guide decision-making and direct behavior in a way that supports organizational objectives. Leaders use influence tactics to inspire action and align others with their goals.

Why other options are wrong

A. To establish authority over others

Establishing authority may be a consequence of effective leadership, but the primary purpose of influence tactics is to persuade, not to assert authority. The goal is to guide and influence others, not to impose power or dominance.

C. To create conflict among team members

Influence tactics aim to encourage cooperation and alignment, not to foster conflict. While conflict can sometimes arise during influence efforts, the intention is not to create discord but to persuade others in a constructive way.

D. To maintain control in negotiations

While influence tactics can be used in negotiations, their primary purpose is broader than just maintaining control. They focus on influencing the decisions and behaviors of others, which can lead to more effective and collaborative negotiations rather than solely maintaining control.