Summary

Leadership Styles

In this session, the learner will go through the different leadership styles along with suitable examples for
each style.

Bureaucratic Leadership

The first style of leadership that you learnt about was the bureaucratic leadership style.

In this segment, you learnt the following salient points about the bureaucratic style of leadership:

• In this form of leadership, the bureaucratic organisation or hierarchy gives responsibility and
authority to a leader.

• The hierarchy lays a clear set of responsibilities.

• It works well in government organisations, NGOs and educational institutions.

• This style of leadership may not work well when a rapid decision-making process is required, since
several levels of authority would come into picture.

• Bureaucratic leaders are very often involved in upward delegation.

• In this style, leaders can choose to seek clarity from their subordinates as well as their seniors.

Transactional Leadership

The second style of leadership is the transactional style. Transactional leadership is based on a simple theory -
when employees are successful, they are rewarded; when they fail, they are punished.

In this segment, you learnt that transactional leadership involves the leader setting up rewards or goals for
individuals, who, in turn, work to achieve them.

Basically, there are three levers of transactional leadership that leaders use to drive individuals to attain the
set goals. These three layers are:

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Additionally, you learnt that transactional leadership has the following characteristics:

• Since give and take is a basis for performance evaluation, there is no ambiguity in the decision-making
process.

• Transactional leaders are very clear and define smart goals for their employees to achieve.

• Transactional leadership is a very popular form of leadership. It is instrumental in achieving short-term

goals.

• Transactional leadership also works very well when long-term goals need to be achieved in a phased
manner.

• Transactional leaders are very popular in any organisation because they believe in self-motivated
people.

Servant Leadership

The third style of leadership is the servant leadership style.

In this segment, you learnt that servant leaders believe in giving, nurturing and caring for others. They focus
on contributing to the interests of their followers and serve their organisations.

You also learnt about the ten principles of servant leadership, which are as follows:

• Listening
• Empathy
• Healing
• Awareness
• Persuasion
• Conceptualisation
• Foresight
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 • Stewardship
• Growth
• Community Building

Transformational Leadership

The fourth style of leadership is the transformational leadership style.

In this segment, you learnt that transformational leaders:

• Inspire and empower managers with a vision

• Are character-focussed
• Focus on the bigger picture
• Are visionary leaders
• Help turn managers or employees into role models

You also learnt a few advantages of transformational leadership for organisations. This type of leadership:

On the flip side, transformational leadership has a few disadvantages as listed below:

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