Final answer:
Leaders engage in strategic planning to ensure organizational alignment, efficiency, clarity of roles, and guidance, among other goals. However, increasing incentives for individuals to follow them faithfully is achieved through motivation and influence, not typically directly by strategic planning. Successful leadership involves a mix of instrumental and expressive qualities, flexibility, accountability, and strategic complexity handling.
Step-by-step explanation:
Leaders should exercise strategic intent and engage in strategic planning to ensure alignment across the organization, improve organizational efficiency, create employee interest and buy-in, identify required resources, and provide inspiration, direction, and guidance to their people. These actions help to effectively communicate roles, intent, and needs of the organization. However, one aspect not typically a direct result of strategic intent and planning is to increase the incentives for individuals to faithfully follow them. Increasing such incentives can involve raising the costs of defection and the rewards for fidelity, and by highlighting expressive values like solidarity, loyalty, and patriotism. This is often more the result of the leader's ability to motivate and influence rather than the strategic planning process itself.
Successful leaders must factor in the anticipation of their followers' needs and the strategic actions of other stakeholders when devising their plans. This involves a balance of both instrumental and expressive leadership qualities, and consideration of strategic complexities such as multiple goals, imperfect information, and the interdependence of actions in an organizational context.
Ultimately, effective leadership involves cultivating a supportive environment, demonstrating flexibility, conveying a clear interest in the mission, responding professionally to feedback, offering solutions to problems, and being both accountable and resourceful. Leaders should not only focus on meeting their own goals but also consider the needs and priorities of their organization and its members, seeking to contribute to areas that are a priority for their managers and team members.