Fundamentals of Leadership - BMW Case study Coursework

Fundamentals of Leadership - BMW Case study - Coursework Example The focus in this paper is on BMW as the most important competitor in the global automotive industry; the organization’s employees, for 2010, have been estimated to 95,453. The organization operates in about 34 countries. The success of the organization in the global market has been related to the leadership style of its leader, Joachim Milberg, who was appointed as the firm’s CEO in 1999. Milberg initiated the restructuring of organization’s operations promoting the alteration of organizational values and mission. The leadership style of Joachim Milberg is presented and evaluated in this paper; the trait leadership theory is used for explaining the success of Milberg as the leader of BMW. Other leadership theories, such as the Blake and Mouton’s Leadership Grid, the team leadership theory of Hill and the Skills approach of Katz have been employed for evaluating the characteristics and the effectiveness of leadership in BMW, as reflected in the continuous development of the organization in the global market. It is made clear that in BMW leadership has been used not just for developing effective organizational strategies but also for improving communication and cooperation across the organization; in other words, in BMW leadership has been a framework for supporting the transformation of the organization to a highly competitive one but also for enhancing the team working and the participation of employees in key organizational plans. 2.0 Leadership in BMW – Presentation and analysis 2.1 Evaluation of Joachim Milberg as a leader – leadership theory Joachim Milberg can be characterized as an exceptional leader. Since his appointment as the leader of Milberg, in 1999, Milberg managed to significantly improve the company’s performance, a target which was mainly achieved by emphasizing on the openness of the organization and the respect to the perceptions