Leadership of Modern Financial Institutions and the Changing Paradigm of Banking in Nigeria

It is an established fact that there exist leadership crisis at levels of organizational management. And organizational leadership crisis have occupied the front pages of various tabloids all over the world. Leadership crisis has engulfed various SMEs, conglomerates, governments, and financial institutions all over the world. The resultant effects of these have given rise to the present crisis, chaos and rots that are being witnessed in all nooks and crannies of the globe. This paper addressed issues relating leadership and the changing paradigm in the Nigerian financial landscape. The aim among others was to analyze the leadership theories especially the most appropriate circumstances for their application to current banking systems. The characteristics of and expectations from a good leaders; due mainly to the changing paradigm in banking e.g., optimizing the use of funds and building up management information system for decision making and better management of assets and liabilities and how leaders can rise to the challenges of global crisis. The theoretical findings showed that leaders should be abreast of risk inherent in currency market and keep an eye on the ball of underlying credit risk. It concludes that leadership needs to address issues of technical mismanagement, cosmetic management, desperate mismanagement and fraud which pose threat to the health of a bank. For effective leadership, there is need for good combination of teamwork, right organization, power and appropriate style of leadership.