Leadership Reflection
Introduction
Amber is a modern French restaurant located in the central district of Hong Kong. It was first launched in 2005, and since then, it had flourished due to its reverence for ingredients. Amber reimagined with close new interiors done by the designer known as Adam Tihany based in Newyork. The bold philosophy addresses the changing tastes as well as the expectations for dinner. Richard Ekkebus, who is a culinary director has decided to have his unique style with intuition as well as passion, attracting the inspiration from the whole world and enjoy exquisite ingredients having designed flavors as well as duteous performance. Amber restaurant has a chain of leadership from the director all through to the staff. This paper will focus on the leadership style of the supervisor in Amber Restaurant.
Position of the supervisor
In Amber restaurant, the supervisory position is ranked among the senior management of the restaurant. Amber’s supervisor plays the role of managing all features of the daily business of the restaurant. The supervisor in Amber is expected to deliver an excellent experience to Amber’s guests and motivate the staff in ensuring high-quality customer services. Additionally, the supervisor in Amber restaurant is responsible for maintaining the quality of the services offered there as well as increasing the profitability.
Leadership style
Amber’s supervisor has numerous leadership style and applies them to different situations. The supervisor at Amber restaurant is Authoritarian. He has the habit of commanding all the employees who are under him in handling and working in the ways that he wants. He uses his authority to influence all staff in producing the best quality services to their daily customers. He ensures that all the control is in his hand. Additionally, he believes that all the staffs require constant guidance, checkups, as well as scheduling of duties to get things done within the restaurant (Zhang & Xie 2017, p.150).
Participative: he upholds and believes in teamwork among the staff and the management of Amber Restaurant. The supervisor ensures that he corroborates with other staff, both senior and junior, to ensure productivity in the restaurant (Kelly & MacDonald 2019, P.438). He likes the involvement of all the top and lower management as well as the employees in decision making. Successful business upholds the collaborative and involvement of all the stakeholders. Before starting the day’s operation at the restaurant, the supervisor ensures that he has to participate in group prayers and discussion on how to conduct the day’s operations. He also participates in all activities around the restaurant so he can understand every field of the service delivery within the Amber restaurant. The main reason why he likes participating in all the fields is to find out if there any requirements form the employees. This leadership style has ensured Amber to help in reducing the time and challenges involved in completing imperative tasks (Miao et al. 2013, p.85).
Transactional: the supervisor at Amber restaurant rewards all the employees with rewards according to the effort each individual has portrayed. He also ensures that he let all the employees understand about monetary incentives, or take the disciplinary action for all the employees for big mistakes. Due to his transactional leadership style, the supervisor ensures that the goals and the motive of Amber are clarified.
Transformational. Amber’s supervisor works to help all the employees to have a bigger picture of the work and life, and he also works to help in planning on career development. He motivates every worker and makes them realize that there is more in life than just the work. He always reminds all the employees that there is always life after Amber restaurant; this has transformed the mind of numerous employees who were once thinking just within the workplace. By transforming the minds and thoughts of the employees, the supervisor wins the employees and engages their attention towards Amber restaurant. He always corrects the behaviors of the employees caught misbehaving at Amber before sacking them. This tactic of always having some consultation and clarification from the misbehaving employees, by engaging more talk and some canceling, has transformed the lives of many employees at Amber.
Laissez-faire. The supervisor does not like being nosy or distracting what other people are doing as long as it is in line with Amber’s mission. Since all the employees are competent with what they are employed to do and they do not require maximum supervision, the supervisor lets them do what they think is right, and that can help in the growth of Amber restaurant (Dussault & Frenette 2015, p.733). All the employees of Amber are competent workers, and they are known for their perfect outcome performances of the restaurant. Despite that more freedom, the employees of Amber are more disciplined and cannot contribute to habits that are not productive.
Reasons
Authoritarian: The main reason why the supervisor is authoritarian in Amber restaurant is to take control of the decision making in the restaurant. If a poor decision is made in the restaurant, the supervisor is to take full responsibility. The supervisor is mandated to have control of every effort executed by the employees in the restaurant and monitor them to make sure they complete the given task mostly, which requires close supervision (Zhang & Xie 2017, p.152). This style is not liked by many since it is mostly associated with the earliest tribes as well as the empires. So, in the current world, people do not appreciate an authoritarian leader, but in some fields like restaurants, this type of leadership is most appropriate.
Amber’s supervisor ensures that through his authoritarian leadership, he has eliminated all little margins of error, and the workflow is all good. When the conditions are not safe in the restaurant, it is the responsibility of the supervisor to make sure that all the employees in the restaurant are safe. Sometimes a new worker can be a nuisance since they do not understand how work is done, and it might take them a long time to understand. Therefore, the supervisor must be very controlling and monitor their flow in order to make sure they have acquired all the skills needed within the shortest time possible.
Generally, this type of leadership has ensured the supervisory work to be effective and produce professional workers who are independent-minded. The major work of the supervisor is to see the goals of the restaurant are met. Therefore he has to make sure that whatever he does, it will bring a positive outcome to the objectives of the restaurant. At times, softness in leadership is not tolerated since the workers get used to it, and the start misusing the freedom given to them, and as a result, the performance of the work in the restaurant will not be successful. However, it is not easy to balance authority with the team’s morale. It is believed that too much supervision can make the employees or the subordinate miserable, and it might affect all group input. Amber’s supervisor ensures that he uses his authoritarian leadership effectively by being intentional regarding when and how he makes his own demands.
Participative. The main reason why the supervisor is always participative at Amber restaurant is that he wants to increase the morale of the employees. The morale of all the employees remains high since there is an appreciation for the chance to work with their supervisor in making decisions that affect the operations of the restaurant (Miao et al. 2013, p.86). The supervisor knows that the employees will be active in improving the conditions of the work the moment they understand that they have direct effects on the policies governing the restaurant.
Additionally, the supervisor knows very well that through participative leadership, he will improve the lives of the employees through the increment of the income due to good performances. The supervisor understands that by being participative, he will give the employees the opportunity to become active when shaping the future success of the restaurant. By allowing the employees to be part and parcel of the restaurant in making influential decisions regarding the growth of the restaurant will encourage the employees to become active and stay within Amber restaurant to witness the plans in which they participated in turns into success. By being participative, the supervisor knows that it will improve the retention of the employees and cut down on the costs of the turnover.
Another the supervisor opts to apply participative leadership at Amber restaurant is to decrease the competition and instead increase the rate of collaboration in the restaurant. In most workplaces, there are competitions, especially for the top performers. The positive side of competition is that it can increase the productivity of the work, but when in excess, it has the ability to cause cutthroat strategies as well as other disruptive characters. However, when all the employees are included in decision making, the work environment changes and becomes collaborative. The collaboration will make the employees feel equal other than seeing their co-workers as competitors, and in turn, they will see each other as associates how are working with one common goal, which will have benefits to all of them.
Transactional. The reason why Amber’s supervisor is transaction is that he needs to manage the transactions of the restaurant in a timely manner. Delaying the transactions within the restaurant can cause delays in other services, which are essentials at the restaurant (Claxton & Sarti 2014). Additionally, Amber’s supervisor must ensure that focus on maintenance of the restaurant structure. He is mandated to let the employees understand what exactly is needed from them by the management of the restaurant. Another reason why he practices transactional leadership is to make sure both the leaders and the employees are working to their full potential.
Transformational. This style of leadership helps the supervisor to identify the weakness of his employees and come up with ways of transforming the weakness into an opportunity (Dussault & Frenette 2015, p.728). By being transformational, the supervisor makes sure he transforms the employees into people who transcend beyond self-actualization as well as their own self-interests for the sake of the restaurant. This leadership style also gives the supervisor some moral development. He is able to commit himself to selfless ideals as well as aligning his own principles and values of the Amber restaurant. Additionally, he is able to nature the moral development of the employees in order to internalize the values and principles of the restaurant.
Through his transformational leadership, the supervisor is able to develop and nurture employees who are able to perform beyond their expectations. It is evident that his transformational leadership style has transformed the employees of Amber since the employees have outperformed beyond the management’s expectation.
The supervisor at Amber restaurant reaches every level of the restaurant. And through his leadership, he is able to stimulate, inspires, and motivate all the staff of Amber restaurant, including the top management as well as the staff of lower status at Amber. The supervisor is able to use this style of leadership in directing the flow and visions of the restaurant and influence every worker to work smartly (Dussault & Frenette 2015, p.728). His transformational leadership has enabled Amber restaurant to meet new challenges, such as strategy redirection, reorganization as well as downsizing.
Conclusion
Leadership style has a great impact on changing the flow of work in an organization. In Amber, the supervisor’s styles of leadership have enabled the restaurant to emerge as one of the top restaurants in Hong Kong. The supervisor has played his roles in a wiser manner and has transformed numerous people and the ways of doing things within Amber restaurant. This paper has outlines major leadership styles that are effective in influencing the success of the restaurant as well as other related organizations. An intelligent leader is able to portray all these leadership styles and skills. The employees of Amber have benefited a lot from working under this supervisor since he has changed their lives from common to a better life. The supervisor, through the leadership skills, was able to contribute to the moral development of the employees as well as his own self. All employees are able to appreciate the leadership of their supervisor since it had changed them to be responsible people in the organization by chasing the goals of where they are working.
Reference lists
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