Leadership Plus Employee Satisfaction Equals Business Results

It is no surprise that an organization’s leaders are critical to the company’s success. What is not always connected is the effect that leadership has on employee satisfaction. An employee’s attitude can determine the level of customer service delivered. Therefore, the employee-customer relationship is dependant on the leadership demonstrated within the organization. The connection between leadership, employee satisfaction, and customer satisfaction are direct results on the company’s business financial statement. If there is ever a break in the chain, productivity and profitability may be threatened.
Most often leaders attempt to influence the vitality of the company through overhead control and fiscal measures. Perhaps thinking they can impact the vitality by tinkering with processes and policies rather than educating, empowering and supporting employee resources. This sometimes can be ineffective over the long-term (Hughes & Beatty, 2005). In reality what drives long-term profitability can be a combination of strategic and operational leadership actions that drive employee passion and customer loyalty.
Strategic leadership identifies the imperatives and is critical for setting the tone and direction for everyone in the company. This is the “what” that provides the key relationships and metrics needed to ensure that all units follow the same strategy. Strategic leadership covers long periods and is a constant cycle of assessing where the company is, understanding where it should go, getting there and checking progress (Hughes & Beatty, 2005) Strategies must then identify the criteria that are the keys that determine behavior. Strategic leadership includes the values, vision, culture and strategic essentials of the organization (Fulmer & Goldsmith, 2000). While it is important to determine the strategy, it needs to be supported and delivered by leadership in operations for employees to understand the values and vision. And then buy into the culture and make the

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