Leadership

Leadership

[Name of the Writer]

[Name of the Institution]

Leadership

Sir Alex Ferguson is arguably the most popular football manager in the modern era due to his success, longevity, and leadership. He writes his autobiography in collaboration with his friend and colleague Sir Michael Moritz to demonstrate certain lessons that have the potential to generate long term transformational success. Ferguson traverses ground and rules with the help of Moritz's writing that are not only familiar to any sports fan, but also to any business leader. He transfers his understanding, knowledge, and experience of 38-years' career in this book and emphasize that a leader must observe and listen, must control but need to use power with restraint, must have discipline, drive, and conviction, and must empathize his followers. It is notable to mention that his book illustrates ruthlessly sacrificing the followers for the common good. For instance, Ferguson sells his own son, a midfielder, to another football club for the sake of common good. The book is a delight for anyone who wants to be a leader someday.

The effective leadership style of Ferguson has the ability to influence his team members towards the achievement of a vision. He was admired by others due to his characteristics and personal qualities. It is evident that the book has a heavy emphasis on football. Ferguson inducts great knowledge in this book based on his time leading the team. Sport psychology is the primary factor in this book as it demonstrates the ability of a leader to use psychological knowledge and abilities in order to address the optimum performance of athletes. Ferguson’s leadership style influence the performance, physical activity, and exercises of his team players. One of the significant aspects of sport psychology is mentioned in his book regarding the importance of discipline in a team. His leadership style is represented by Behavioral and Trait Theories. According to Ferguson, following through on deadlines, arriving on time, and managing individual tasks with efficiency is an essential facet to gain success. Ferguson’s illustrates that a leader needs to be punctual in managing time and should not tolerate poor behavior of his team players. According to him, an effective leadership style must contain these things to manage the team. He states, “I always felt that our triumphs were an expression of the consistent application of discipline” (Ferguson & Moritz, 2015). It is noteworthy to mention that discipline is the key factor in a successful team.

Ferguson illustrates that he always enjoyed inspiring people. According to him, "It turns out that the two most powerful words in the English language are, 'Well done'. Much of leadership is about extracting that extra 5 percent of performance that individuals did not know they possessed" (Ferguson & Moritz, 2015). He demonstrates that inspiration and motivation are beneficial paradigms that must be adopted by leaders to motivate their players and team members in order to achieve better results. He argues that motivation and inspiration are the pillars of leadership that help to attain desired outcomes. A leader needs to inspire and motivate people in stressful moments with the help of small gestures like “well done”. According to Ferguson, motivation is the only thing that can make a significant difference in experiencing failure or achieving success. Ferguson showed how he managed to motivate his team players when they got defeated or failed to achieve a specified goal. It is the core responsibility of a leader to uphold his team when they are about to collapse in difficult circumstances. Ferguson highlights that every player needs to be treated in accordance with their emotions, experience, and background. His sayings can be seen in his practices, for instance, his way of handling members of the class of 92 was completely different in comparison to his handling of Eric Cantona.

Ferguson presents an astonishing example of effective leadership style as tried to keep the personal issues of organization within themselves, rather than making them public knowledge. Ferguson believes that criticism and washing dirty linen in public needs to be kept behind doors rather than making it public knowledge. According to him, it is wiser to handle certain situations behind doors. He once said “there is no harm in losing one’s temper" but a leader must make sure that these circumstances are not becoming a source of enjoyment for the public. He demonstrates that losing temper is not harmful to a leader if it is not done quite often. However, if it's become a habit of the leader than it is catastrophic for both the leader and his/her team. Ferguson always tries to uphold his team players in high esteem even after scolding someone based on their mistakes. He tried to control meaning as he is well aware of his players and staff.

Handling stress and facing opposition without fear are major qualities of a successful leader. According to Mortiz, Ferguson did not fear the opposition. It should be in the nature of a leader to face opposition and rivals without any fear. Effective leadership styles constraints the fearless features of a leader to withstand any resistance and conflict. One must not be worried about the things that are outside their control. Facing negative feedback and finding positive aspects from that feedback is a unified ability of the leader that can enhance his ability and performance to understand how to manage various situations (Briars, 2016). It is notable to mention that if one is in control of one’s destiny than it goes a long way than worrying about European Mavericks or Russian Oligarchs. Ferguson successfully integrates sport psychology in his book to illustrate the importance of struggle. According to him, “we are all haunted by failure, and we should only give up when we are dead” (Ferguson & Moritz, 2015). He demonstrates the significance of failure and “give up”. It is important to mention that failure is not an option. Ferguson believes that fear of failure is beneficial to thrive for success. Those who have fear of failure will automatically increase their hunger towards success.

Ferguson illustrates the link of failure and success by presenting a significant example during his period as a team manager of Manchester United. He demonstrates that Manchester United players lost the league in 2012 and they were humiliated by Sunderland fans. Regardless of this harsh experience, a true leader like Ferguson embrace failure with dignity. This failure automatically gives the hunger to succeed as Ferguson told his players that “to learn from the defeat and humiliation and come back stronger” (Ferguson & Moritz, 2015). His book accumulates many incidents where he motivates and encourages his players to thrive for success. By keeping the fear of failure and humiliation in mind, the same players were crowned as champions in the next season. Ferguson illustrates that a leader needs to learn skills about molding the attitude of players in order to achieve expected results (Briars, 2016). A leader understands the behavioral aspects of his players and he can make significant alterations to their behaviors and attitudes with motivational and inspirational skills.

I thoroughly enjoyed the sayings of Ferguson on owning the message. He demonstrates that long speeches are annoying and irritating which can deviate a leader from his basic point. An effective leader tries to keep things to the point instead of wasting time on long speeches. It is also illustrated in the book that sometimes silence is an effective tool as compared to words. Ferguson highlights that effective communication skills are important for a leader to manage everyday affairs. Effective communication involves both listening and watching. According to Ferguson, he often hated to deal with the media. But he believes that showing confidence in body language and playing effective mind games are key elements to handle media. His book presents the idea that only a leader can crave power if he has control over his communication. It is illustrated that a great leader embraces audacity instead of shrinking from controversy and responsibility. It is the core responsibility of a leader to step forward and lead his team by thinking about the unthinkable. The ultimate goal can only be achieved if a leader has the patience to persevere and plan.

Ferguson’s leadership style demonstrates that a good leader is unafraid of the choruses from micro-organisms. A good leader always knows how to make important decisions without presenting a dominating personality over others. According to Ferguson, a leader needs to abstain from entangling him with certain irritations. Sir Alex Ferguson states that personal glory and fame are not important for a leader in comparison to the achievements of the organizations. A great leader always watches and listens more and they have the utmost desire to be respected rather than being universally loved. Ferguson also states that a great leader relinquishes his power with grace when their time comes. Ferguson presented all the above-mentioned qualities in his book to differentiate a great leader from other leaders. His book is a true representation of how a leader manages one great set of players and get them working together as a team.

References

Briars, J. (2016). Book Review- Alex Ferguson with Michael Moritz: Leading - Studying Business at Southampton. Studying Business at Southampton. Retrieved 4 April 2019, from http://blog.soton.ac.uk/bscbusinessmanagement/book-reviews/2016/10/book-review-alex-ferguson-michael-moritz-leading/

Ferguson, A., & Moritz, M. (2015). Leading: Learning from life and my years at Manchester United. Hachette Books.