Steve Jobs and Fr. Jose Arizmendiarrieta were the founders and leaders of two different but highly successful and profitable organisations, Apple and Mondragon. The two companies are from different parts of the world, in different industries, and can only be compared by their organisational and financial success. Fr. Jose and Steve were the architects of this success, leading and inspiring confidence and support among the people who were needed to achieve their vision and organisations goals (DuBrin, 2013). This essay will compare and contrast the leadership of Steve Jobs with that of Fr. Jose Maria Arizmendiarrieta based on Andrew J. DuBrin’s leadership theory. Brief Background Fr Jose Maria Arizmendiarrieta, a Catholic Priest, founded the Mondragon Corporation, a cooperative in the Basque region of Spain in 1956. The region suffered greatly during the Spanish Civil War (Thomson, 2010) and Fr Jose felt it his calling to help his regions people recover, allowing them to continue to support themselves. Fr Jose’s motive was to promote individuals’ moral character as well as social justice through the creation of a new kind of work place, one that encouraged hard work, cooperation, shared rewards, and individual responsibility. At the same time, he sought to generate employment and income in a region that had been impoverished by war, dictatorship and neglect (Lafuente, 2012). The initial cooperative was successful and from that much other cooperative business emerged in industries including banking, manufacturing, distribution and education. The Mondragon Corporation multiplied until it became the biggest employer in the region (Witzel, 2003). The Mondragon Corporation now consists of over 82,000 people in an integrated group of so... ... middle of paper ... ...ties and differences of the leadership of Steve Jobs and Fr. Jose Arizmendiarrieta that the leadership required for organisations to succeed is unique to the goals and definition of success portrayed by the leader. Their leadership styles were reflected in the organisations development and it can be seen why leadership in organisations is of such importance. What is also clear is that there is no right or wrong way to lead – Fr Jose achieved a sustainable profitable cooperative, Jobs archived a highly profitable company. The leadership practice used needs to fit the organisations vision, the needs of the stakeholders, and be ingrained into followers. The followers need to buy in to the leader’s vision and goals and play their part in implementing the steps required for success. The leader is ultimately responsible for guiding the followers along the path to success.
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Show MoreThe most valuable commodity of any great organization is the quality of good people. Almost everyone has good intentions but leaders acknowledge what needs to be done and has the ability to inspire others to respond. Nonetheless the author conveys the differences between leadership of past generation versus this generation. As society loses confidence in leadership techniques of the past, it begins to look for management wit...
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...F. and Whyte, K.K., Making Mondragon: The Growth and Dynamics of the Worker Cooperative Complex (Ithica: ILR Press, 1988).
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Background of Mondragon cooperatives began the reason to restore and develop local people and company activities on the Basque region in Spain found by catholic priest José María Arizmendiarrieta after Spain civil war. His students and he thought that cooperative solve stagnate in the local economy to step up social revolution in Basque region. Mondragon cooperatives was established by his students and him that he was activity to found training and learning school for jobless and young people in local economy. They have developed cooperative corporations to merge bankruptcy of neighboring companies and to found suited needs of social problems in local economy in the head of Basque area in Spain. When the market in Spain could join from company in other countries, Mondragon cooperative decided to adapt a flow of the time between locally and globally. Mondragon corporations come to develop over the world that extends various enterprises of distribution, industry, finance, and training or education in each country.
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What catch my attention out the most about the leadership style of Steve Jobs, is that he is very charismatic. People often say there is some sort of "aura" about Steve Jobs which makes well respected and followed. Employees do enjoy working with Steve Jobs, as they feel really inspired, true, happy, focus and important. Steve Jobs does an excellent job keeping everyone on track with the companies (Apple) vision. He can do this by being an excellent charismatic leader, visionary, and focused on the longer term rather than short term.