ROSKAB Leadership Model

Content

1. Brief overview

2. Abstract of the research base

3. Definition

4. Social psychological prerequisites
4.1 Knowledge
4.2 Experience
4.3 Attitude

5. Leadership attribute clusters
5.1 Roles
5.2 Skills
5.3 Abilities

6. Structure of the model
6.1 Direct method
6.2 Indirect method

7. Conclusion

About the author

List of Figures

List of Abbreviations

1. Brief overview

People are different. ¹ People are either (more) rational, or (more) emotional. But what does rational and emotional mean. Before looking at the topic of optimizing leadership, these terms should be briefly defined.

Rationality and emotionality arise in the human brain. The human brain can be differentiated into the four areas of brain stem, cerebellum, limbic system and cerebrum.

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Figure 1: RATIO-vs.-EMOTIO Overview²

The brain stem is like the "autopilot". The main tasks include controlling breathing, heart rate and blood pressure. The movement sequences, for example, are controlled in the cerebellum while the emotions are processed in the limbic system. Learning, the ability to think and speak, and awareness are ascribed to the cerebrum.

Looking at the topics of rationality and emotionality, the focus is on the limbic system and the cerebrum (see Figure 1). The cerebrum for example has the medial prefrontal cortex (intellect) and the orbitofrontal cortex (reason or rationality). While the intellect is used to solve tasks and problems in the here and now, rationality weighs one’s own actions - with a view to what effects one's own actions can have. In the limbic system, there are for example the nucleus accumbens (positive emotions) and the amygdala (negative emotions).

Depending on the cultural socialization and conditioning, the areas RATIO or EMOTIO are more dominant (see Figure 1 below: scale³ ). This fact should be taken into account when dealing with culturally different people. Especially in leading international teams.

Leadership of people in a mono cultural environment is already a challenge for managers in day-to-day business. With increasing internationalization of teams and a subsequent enrichment of cultural diversity, the complexity of leadership also increases accordingly.

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Figure 2: Individual reality⁴

The leader is very often confronted with many "hurdles" and "stumbling blocks" in dealing with people. Mostly unconsciously, mistakes are made.

Or, to put it positively: Managers have the power to improve and enhance the productivity of their team by, for example, improving their own perception and customizing their leadership style.

Leadership is learnable and can be constantly improved!

However, the manager has to want it. How can the manager improve his or her leadership? An important point is to be clear about your “own reality”.

How does the manager perceive his or her environment? What seems right or what seems wrong to him or her?

Every second, our personal sensors record about 11 million bits⁵ (e.g. sounds and noises, colors, smells, changes in air pressure). This is too much information to fully process in real time. Our brain offers a so-called perception filter⁶, which can be differentiated into the three areas of biological, psychological and socio-cultural⁷. After this perception filter, 40 bits per second are available for further and conscious processing. This information then shapes your personal reality, which in turn means there are different individual realities (see figure 2).

Is the manager's reality the correct reality?

People can change their perception. The prerequisite is to reflect and evaluate one's own knowledge, experience and attitude, to draw conclusions and initiate effective changes. Psychologists believe that it takes seven weeks⁸ to learn new patterns of behavior and processes. After that, they are internalized.

Against this backdrop, leadership is learnable and can be constantly improved. The manager just has to want it!

The ROSKAB Leadership Model is a tool that depicts effective motivation and leadership of national as well as international mixed teams. The awareness and execution of the critical leadership enablers will maximize the motivation, the engagement as well as the employee´s productivity.

2. Abstract of the research base

The aim of Kohler´s initial research project (2011-2014) was to derive a leadership model as well as a sketch for a development program focusing on managers and employees involved in multicultural (finance) teams of organizations. Therefore, the first step was executing a literature analysis of a recent and important topic-related discussion. The result showed that against the background of optimizing leadership in a multicultural framework, the scientific discussion has not yet reached the adequate level for the target organizations (big international companies). This analysis of cultural examinations and multicultural leadership leads to the conclusion that there are dimensional cultural-related discrepancies between the countries to be examined that inter alia may lead to reduced productivity if this is not taken into account by the teams working together. In addition, there neither exist further signs regarding correlation of cultural and functional diversities in general nor in particular for multicultural framework in Germany, Spain and France so far. The next section will go over the following roles, skills and abilities (ROSKAB) in a brief manner: personnel development, mentoring and coaching, sensitivity for mental stress within a multicultural context, creation of a trustful culture and empowerment of employees, cultural intelligence, sustainable motivation, change management within a multicultural framework, multicultural team building and development, time management for time to lead, multicultural communication as well as emotional intelligence. The empirical examination is based on a questionnaire for finance managers and finance employees working in multicultural (German, Spanish and French) teams (n = 214) where questions are set up correlated and the results of which can be found in the ROSKAB leadership model and the leadership development program.⁹

3. Definition

The ROSKAB Leadership Model is a simplified leadership tool for Managers and Researchers with common view on mono as well as multi-cultural and cross-generational needs for an optimized and successful team lead. As mentioned in chapter 2, the acronym ROSKAB is based on the two first letters of the words Roles, Skills and Abilities.

A mapping of selected and critical people leadership enablers towards the dedicated clusters Roles, Skills and Abilities will be performed.

Prerequisite and anchor for the leadership model is the so called "effective leadership attitude", the Manager´s wish to lead people.

Figure 3, the ROSKAB Leadership Modell (Version 2), shows the re-design of the first ROSKAB Leadership Model (Version 1) please see figure 4. The “stairs presentation” in ROSKAB Leadership Model (Version 1) wrongly suggested a step-to-step approach.

Nevertheless, the different attributes of the ROSKAB Leadership Model should be considered on their own.

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Figure 3: The ROSKAB Leadership Model (Version 2)¹⁰

The “circular presentation” of the ROSKAB Leadership Model (Version 2) tries to make this clearer.Figure 4 shows the ROSKAB Leadership Model (Version 1). You can see also traffic lights (direct method: left hand side; indirect method: right hand side) with the colors red, yellow and green. These colors indicate the need for action with a view to the development of managers. Green means that the managers are sufficiently qualified. Yellow indicates that it could occasionally be critical. The red light induces a need for action with a view to executive training (knowledge, experience and attitude; see also chapter 4).¹¹

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Figure 4: The ROSKAB Leadership Model (Version 1)¹²

4. Social psychological prerequisites

In this context, the social psychological prerequisites are differentiated into the three areas of knowledge, experience and attitude.

4.1 Knowledge

Facts, information and skills acquired through either experience, education or the theoretical or practical understanding of an issue.

Explicit knowledge:

Information, skills and expertise that has been, or can be, verbalized, codified, written and stored in different media, such as models. Explicit knowledge is found in resources like journals, books and the internet and can be readily transmitted or communicated to others.

Implicit knowledge:

Information, skills, and expertise that has not been recorded but is intuitive and valuable. This know-how can best be transferred face-to-face by experienced leaders showing new topics how effective leadership will work. Also known as tacit knowledge.

4.2 Experience

Familiarity with specific leadership skills or area of knowledge in the frame of leadership gained over a period (months to years) of actual practice and which, presumably, has resulted in superior understanding.

4.3 Attitude

The individual position how to approach a situation in terms of what the outcome should look like, leading, motivating or influencing subordinates or employees.

5. Leadership attribute clusters

In the following chapter, the leadership attributes Roles, Skills and Abilities will be defined. It is a literarily challenge to deduct an absolute and selective classification of the terms.

5.1 Roles

In the context of psychological and sociological descriptions, the term "role" is defined as the sum of one‘s expected behaviors with view on the individual dedicated social position.

5.2 Skills

The term "skills" can be divided into the two scopes, hard and soft skills.

- Hard skills are more technical oriented skills and mainly cognitive driven.
- Soft Skills are an aggregation of competences that contribute to a person´s attribute to lead himself or herself and relate to other human beings.

5.3 Abilities

From the psychological perspective, abilities describe individual attitudes, which are operationally or methodically transferred to a person and are therefore relatively stable and consistent.

6. Structure of the model

The result of the ROSKAB Leadership Model should be a high probability for engaged and productive employees. The main critical enabler as well as the baseline for this target is the above mentioned "effective leadership attitude", the Manager´s attitude and wish to lead people. Two methods exist to reach this overall target = the direct and the indirect method.

6.1 Direct method

The direct method is focused on a short term to medium term period to achieve the desired leadership target. The critical enablers are a mixture of leadership roles, skills and abilities. The direct way is a more common and simplified leadership method cluster:

- Optimized time management to gain temporal resources to lead people (Skill)
- Emotional Intelligence (EQ) as well as Empathy of the Manager (Skill)
- Sensitivity to mental stress and psychological strains (Role)
- Creation of a trustful culture and empowerment of employees (Role)
- The ability of a manager to act like a mentor and coach for the employees (Ability)
- Personnel development of the team members with view on the individual and organizational frame (Ability)

6.2 Indirect method

The indirect method focuses on a medium- to long-term period to achieve the favored leadership goal. Main drivers are selected leadership skills. The indirect way is more ambitious and complex approach:

- Openness and tolerance in regards to other cultures (Cultural Intelligence CQ)
- Team building and Team Development
- Multi-cultural Communication
- Successful handling of Change-Management

7. Conclusion

The awareness and execution of the mentioned critical leadership enablers (Roles, Skills and Abilities - direct and/or indirect method) will maximize the motivation, the engagement as well as the employee´s productivity.

About the author

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Figure 5: Picture of the author¹³

Prof. Dr. Reinhold Kohler (1974)

PhD. in Business Management, Electrical Engineer and Industrial Engineer Professor for International Management and Business Administration Head of International Industrial Engineering program

Faculty Electrical Engineering and Industrial Engineering University of Applied Sciences Landshut, Germany www.orcid.org/0000-0002-2668-4928 www.reinholdkohler.com

List of Figures

Figure 1: RATIO-vs.-EMOTIO Overview

Figure 2: Individual reality

Figure 3: The ROSKAB Leadership Model (Version 2)

Figure 4: The ROSKAB Leadership Model (Version 1)

Figure 5: Picture of the author

List of Abbreviations

CQ Cultural Intelligence

EMOTIO Emotionality

EQ Emotional Intelligence

HAW Hochschule für angewandte Wissenschaften University of Applied Sciences

ORCID Oilosophiae Doctor

RATIO Rpen Researcher Contributor Identification Initiative

PhD. Phationality

ROSKAB Roles, Skills, Abilities

Literature

Doğan, Aynur / Schroevers, Sander / Venter, Isabella / Ярос, Ольга (2016): the Global Leadership-Lab: A comparative analysis of leadership styles across 15 nations. 1. Edition. English language. CCBS press, Amsterdam, Netherlands. Pages 37-44. eBook ISBN: 978-90-79646-33-3

Kohler, Reinhold (2015): Optimization of Leadership Style. New Approaches to Effective Multicultural Leadership in International Teams. 1. Edition. English language. Springer Gabler Verlag, Wiesbaden. Germany. Book ISBN: 978-3-658-11425-1. eBook ISBN: 978-3-658-11426-8. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-658-11426-8

Kohler, Reinhold (2016): Fuehrung internationaler Teams. Das ROSKAB Leadership Modell. German language. 1. Edition. Grin-Verlag, Munich. Germany. Book ISBN: 978-3-668-35706-8. eBook ISBN: 978-3-668-35705-1

Myers, David G. (2013): Psychologie. German language. 3. Edition. Wiesbaden. Germany. Book ISBN: 9783642407819

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¹ Note on gender-neutral formulation: Throughout this document, all gender-specific terms are to be considered to refer to both the feminine and the masculine form.

² Source: „RATIO-vs.-EMOTIO Overview“ compiled by Reinhold Kohler

³ Trivia: The color/colour blue is often used for rationality. The color/colour orange is often used for emotions. Both colors/colours are given in the color wheel (color circle) and are therefore so-called complementary colors/colours.

⁴ Source: „Individual reality“ compiled by Reinhold Kohler

⁵ In this context, bits can also be understood as information.

⁶ Cf. Myers, D. G. (2013): Psychologie. Page 283

⁷ See also the RATIO-vs.-EMOTIO description within the beginning of chapter 1

⁸ Cf. Myers, D. G. (2013): Psychologie. Pages 290-364

⁹ Abstract of the PhD. Business Management dissertation of Reinhold Kohler. Kohler, R. (2015): Optimization of Leadership Style. New Approaches to Effective Multicultural Leadership in International Teams

¹⁰ Source “The ROSKAB Leadership Model” (Version 2) compiled by Reinhold Kohler

¹¹ The ROSKAB Leadership research results were discussed in the following book: Doğan, A. et al. (2016): the Global Leadership-Lab: A comparative analysis of leadership styles across 15 nations. Pages 37-44

¹² Kohler, R. (2015): Optimization of Leadership Style. New Approaches to Effective Multicultural Leadership in International Teams. Page 112

¹³ Source: Author