Leadership Styles

Leadership style is a leader’s approach to providing direction, implementing plans, and

motivating people. In 1939, psychologist Kurt Lewin and a team of researchers
determined that there were three basic leadership styles: Authoritarian (Autocratic),
Participative (Democratic) and Delegative (Laissez-Faire). They put these three
leadership styles into action with a group of school children charged with the completion
of a craft project to determine responses to the leadership styles.

Authoritarian (Autocratic) Leadership

A leader who adopts the

authoritarian style dictates policy and procedure, and directs the work done by the
group without looking for any meaningful input from them. The group led by an
authoritarian would be expected to complete their tasks under close supervision.

Researchers found there was less creativity under an authoritarian leadership style, but
the children were still productive.

While authoritarian leadership sounds stifling, it has its place: it’s best applied to
situations where there is little time for group decision making, or when the leader has
expertise that the rest of the group does not. When authoritarian leadership strays into
areas where it’s not needed, it can create dysfunctional environments where followers
are the “good guys” and domineering leaders the “bad guys.”

Participative (Democratic) Leadership

Group members feel engaged in the decision making process when they have a
participative leader. Those leaders practicing the participative leadership style offer
guidance to the group, as for their input in decision making but retain final say.
Participative leaders make their group feel like they’re part of a team, which creates
commitment within the group.

Lewin’s researchers found that the participative style of leadership yielded the most
desirable results with the school children and their craft project. They weren’t quite as
productive as the children in the authoritarian group, but their work was a higher quality.

There are drawbacks to the participative style. If roles within the group are unclear,
participative leadership can lead to communication failures. If the group is not skilled in
the area in which they’re making decisions, poor decisions could be the result.

Delegative (Laissez-Faire) Leadership

Leaders practicing the delegative leadership style are very hands-off. They offer little or
no guidance to their group and leave decision making up to the group. A delegative
leader will provide the necessary tools and resources to complete a project and will take
responsibility for the group’s decisions and actions, but power is basically handed over
to the group.

Lewin and his team found that the group of children trying to complete the craft project
under the delegative leader were the least productive. They also made more demands
of their leader, were unable to work independently and showed little cooperation.

The delegative style is particularly appropriate for a group of highly skilled workers, and
creative teams often value this kind of freedom. On the other hand, this style does not
work well for a group that lacks the needed skills, motivation or adherence to deadlines,
and that can lead to poor performance.

Bureaucratic Leadership
Under bureaucratic leadership ,  a leader believes in structured procedures and ensure
that his or her employees follow procedures exactly. This type of leadership leaves no
space to explore new ways to solve issues and in fact work by book.

This type of leadership is normally followed in hospitals, universities, banks (where a

large amount of money is involved), and government organizations to reduce corruption
and increase security. Self-motivated individuals who are highly energetic often feel
frustrated because of the organization’s inability to adapt to changing environments.

Directive Leadership
Directive Leadership provides guidance about what should be done and how to do it,
scheduling work, and maintaining standards of performance.

Thus, it may be inferred that directive leadership  is effective as the subordinators have
an external locus of Control, lacks experience, has a high need for clarity, or a low need
for achievement. Also, when the task is unstructured, or there is a conflict between
workgroups, a more directive style would be useful.

Supportive Leadership
Supportive Leadership show concern for the needs of the employees, the leader is
friendly and approachable. Supportive Leadership would be more suitable for highly
structured tasks, under bureaucratic and formal authority relationship.

In supportive Leadership, leaders support their subordinates officially, and sometimes

personally also. A leader always tries to fulfill their requirements, it boosts employees’
morale also.

Achievement Oriented Leadership

Achievement-oriented Leadership encourages employees to perform at their highest

level by setting challenging goals, emphasizing excellence, and demonstrating
confidence in employees’ abilities. Achievement Oriented Leadership is largely suitable
for unstructured tasks, where the subordinate need for achievement is high.

Transactional Leadership

Transactional leadership is a set of activities that involve an exchange between

followers and leader and deal with daily tasks (Bass, 1990). Transactional leadership
deals with those day-to-day tasks that get the job done. The majority of models we
talked about in the last section—Fiedler’s Contingency Theory, Path-Goal among them
—are based on the concept of this exchange between leaders and followers. The leader
provides followers with direction, resources and rewards in exchange for productivity
and task accomplishment.

Charismatic Leadership
 Charismatic leaders don’t
doubt their own decisions, they move forward unwaveringly and believe that the
decisions they make are the correct ones. They move through a crowd of their followers
shaking hands and lending an encouraging word. They are undeniably clear on their
expectations and where they see the company going. They have mastered the art of
developing images for themselves that others want to emulate. Charismatic leaders
have four common personality traits (Conger, Kanungo, 1998):

 High degree of confidence and lack of internal conflict

 High energy and enthusiasm
 Good communication skills
 Good image and role mode

The relationship between charismatic leader and followers is an emotional one (this can
sometimes go awry—just think about the relationship between the leaders and followers
in a cult). In order for a charismatic leader to be effective, the situation has to be right.
There are four situations required for a charismatic leader to have success:

 Organization is in a time of crisis or stress.

 Organization is in need of change.
 There is opportunity for the organization to have new goals or direction.
 Availability of dramatic symbols (like the CEO taking a pay cut or donating his
salary to charity)

Culturally speaking, those cultures with a tradition of prophetic salvation (e.g.,

Christianity, Islam) are more welcoming of the charismatic leader, while cultures without
prophetic tradition are less likely to embrace them.

In spite of a limited amount of scientific study where charismatic leaders are concerned,
researchers agree there are applications and lessons to be learned out of this type of
leadership. Leaders should have belief in their own actions. They should seek to
develop bonds with their followers. And they must be able to communicate their
messages clearly.

Strategic Leadership

Strategic leaders sit at the intersection between a company's main operations and its
growth opportunities. He or she accepts the burden of executive interests while
ensuring that current working conditions remain stable for everyone else.

This is a desirable leadership style in many companies because strategic thinking

supports multiple types of employees at once. However, leaders who operate this way
can set a dangerous precedent with respect to how many people they can support at
once, and what the best direction for the company really is if everyone is getting their
way at all times.

Transactional Leadership

Transactional leaders are fairly common today. These managers reward their
employees for precisely the work they do. A marketing team that receives a scheduled
bonus for helping generate a certain number of leads by the end of the quarter is a
common example of transactional leadership.

When starting a job with a transactional boss, you might receive an incentive plan that
motivates you to quickly master your regular job duties. For example, if you work in
marketing, you might receive a bonus for sending 10 marketing emails. On the other
hand, a transformational leader might only offer you a bonus if your work results in a
large amount of newsletter subscriptions.

Transactional leadership helps establish roles and responsibilities for each employee,
but it can also encourage bare-minimum work if employees know how much their effort
is worth all the time. This leadership style can use incentive programs to motivate
employees, but they should be consistent with the company's goals and used in addition
to gestures of appreciation.
Transformational Leadership

Transformational leadership takes a chapter out of the book of charismatic leadership.

(Bass, 1990) Followers admire and are inspired to act. But the transformational
leadership concept takes that one step further and expects intellectual stimulation from
a leader, as well as individual consideration, in which a leader singles out followers and
provides them with additional motivation.

Transformational leaders motivate and teach with a shared vision of the future. They
communicate well. They inspire their group because they expect the best from everyone
and hold themselves accountable as well. Transformational leaders usually exhibit the
following traits:

 Integrity
 Self-awareness
 Authenticity
 Empathy

Measuring a leader’s ability to inspire and enable is a challenge, so researchers rely on

anecdotes to supply data. This makes scientific study difficult. And even though this
theory emphasize leadership behavior, it’s difficult to determine how a leader can learn
to be charismatic and transformational.

Coach-Style Leadership

Similarly to a sports team's coach, this leader focuses on identifying and nurturing the
individual strengths of each member on his or her team. They also focus on strategies
that will enable their team work better together. This style offers strong similarities to
strategic and democratic leadership, but puts more emphasis on the growth and
success of individual employees.

Rather than forcing all employees to focus on similar skills and goals, this leader might
build a team where each employee has an expertise or skill set in something different.
In the long run, this leader focuses on creating strong teams that can communicate well
and embrace each other's unique skill sets in order to get work done.

A manager with this leadership style might help employees improve on their strengths
by giving them new tasks to try, offering them guidance, or meeting to discuss
constructive feedback. They might also encourage one or more team members to
expand on their strengths by learning new skills from other teammates.

TYPES OF LEADERS

Type 1: Managerial Leader 

A managerial leader is the least effective of the five types of leaders. They have the
least influence. People only follow them because they have to. They are not in the
position to serve others. Their desire is to be served by others because they are in the
position. They see others as tools to use to complete the objective for the day. They
prefer to make decisions. Their weakness is character development.

Here’s a brief review of characteristics:

 Character is weak.  

 Desire is “to be served” rather than “to serve.” 

 They have a scarcity mindset. 

 Competency can range from undeveloped to highly developed. 

 Focus is on managing (directing/controlling) people and processes. 

 Values the position more than the people. 

 Strength comes from power, control, formal authority, and personal results. 

Type 2: Relational Leader 

A relational leader builds relationships in order to influence others. People want to
follow them because of who they are, not what they know. They develop mutual
respect with others and work well with them. Although people want to follow them,
they have not developed specialized knowledge. Their weakness is not making the
necessary sacrifices to develop their competency.

Here’s a brief review of characteristics:

 Character is strong. 

 Desire is to serve.  

 They have an abundance mindset. 

 Competency is undeveloped and generalized. 

 Focus is on leading (influencing/releasing) people. 

 Values people more than the position. 

 Strength comes from relationships and moral authority. 

Type 3: Motivational Leader 

A motivational leader seeks mutual benefit for themselves, others, and the
organization. People want to follow them because of who they are and what they
know. They influence others from the outside. They are process focused. They are
trusted and deliver results for themselves, their families, their team, their organization,
their customers, their suppliers, and their community. Their weakness is not making
the necessary sacrifices to reproduce other motivational leaders.

Here’s a brief review of characteristics:

 Character is strong. 

 Desire is to serve.  

 They have an abundance mindset. 

 Competency is developed and specialized. 

 Focus is on leading (influencing/releasing) people, managing the processes, and

getting results. 

 Values people more than the position. 

 Strength comes from relationships, moral authority, and team results. 

Type 4: Inspirational Leader 

An inspirational leader inspires managerial and relational leaders to become
motivational leaders. Their focus is on growing themselves in order to inspire others
to grow. They influence others on the inside. They are people-focused not process-
focused. They focus heavily on character development. True inspirational leaders are
followed because of how much they care and who they are on the inside. They are
inspired by the growth of those following them.

Here’s a brief review of characteristics:

 Character is stronger. 

 Desire is to serve and develop others. 

 They have an abundance mindset. 

 Competency is highly developed and specialized. 

 Focus is on leading (influencing/releasing) people and developing motivational

leaders. 

 Values people more than the position. 

 Strength comes from relationships, moral authority, and the growth of others. 

Type 5: Transformational Leader 

A transformational leader’s passion and purpose is to transform others. They are the
most influential of the five types of leaders and are highly respected. Their reputation
precedes them. They are well known for developing leaders. Their influence touches
people in all industries and across multiple generations. They have influenced many
leaders for many years. Their influence is continuously being transferred through
many other leaders at many different times in multiple locations.

Here’s a brief review of characteristics:

 Character is strongest. 

 Desire is to serve and to develop others. 

 They have an abundance mindset. 

 Competency is highly developed and specialized. 

 Focus is on leading (influencing/releasing) people and developing motivational

and inspirational leaders. 

 Values people more than the position. 

 Strength comes from relationships, moral authority, growth of others, and the
respect they have earned.