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5.

Leadership Skills

Leadership:
Leadership is one of the most important aspects of studies of human behaviour in organization. It is
the leader who creates working environment. The success of an organization depends upon the
efficiency of the leader. It is the attributes, positive approach and the ability to solve problems that
make a person leader. Leader should be able to turn the hopeless situation in favour. In the
environment of tough competition in the market where it is undergoing financial recession, layoffs is
the order of the day, market is facing poor demand for product because everybody has enough and
poor or no growth situation persists. In this situation leader should not lose his balance but turn the
situation in his favour. He should be able to evolve techniques and lead the organization to win-win
strategy. Leader should be able to motivate employees. All leaders are not managers as they have to
work in non-organized sectors while the managers work in the organized sectors. All managers
should be leaders so that they are able to work efficiently. Warren and Benin

Leader and Leadership:


 A leader is “a person who leads or commands a group, organization, or country”.
 A leader is "a person who influences a group of people towards the achievement of a goal".
 A person that holds a dominant or superior position within its field, and is able to exercise a
high degree of control or influence over others.
 Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he
wants to do it. -Dwight D. Eisenhower
 "Leadership is having a vision, sharing that vision and inspiring others to support your vision
while creating their own." – Mindy Gibbins-Klein
 "Leadership is stepping out of your comfort zone and taking risk to create reward." – Katie
Easley

Levels of leadership:
The 5 Levels of Leadership by John Maxwell
Level 1: Position
This is the lowest level of leadership—the entry level. People who make it only to Level 1 may be
bosses, but they are never leaders. They have subordinates, not team members. They rely on rules,
regulations, policies, and organization charts to control their people. Their people will only follow
them within the stated boundaries of their authority. Position is the only level that does not require
ability and effort to achieve. Anyone can be appointed to a position. This means that position is a
fine starting point, but every leader should aspire to grow beyond Level 1.

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Level 2 – Permission
Making the shift from Position to Permission brings a person’s first real step into leadership.
Leadership is influence, and when a leader learns to function on the Permission level, everything
changes. People do more than merely comply with orders. They actually start to follow. And they do
so because they really want to. Why? Because the leader begins to influence people with
relationship, not just position. When people feel liked, cared for, included, valued, and trusted, they
begin to work together with their leader and each other. And that can change the entire working
environment. The old saying is really true: people go along with leaders they get along with.
Level 3: Production
Production qualifies and separates true leaders from people who merely occupy leadership positions.
Good leaders always make things happen. They get results. They can make a significant impact on
an organization. Not only are they productive individually, but they also are able to help the team
produce. No one can fake Level 3. Either you’re producing for the organization and adding to its
bottom line (whatever that may be), or you’re not. Some people never move up from Level 2
Permission to Level 3 Production. Why? They can’t seem to produce results. When that is the case,
it’s usually because they lack the self-discipline, work ethic, organization, or skills to be productive.
However, if you desire to go to higher levels of leadership, you simply have to produce. There is no
other way around it.
Level 4: People Development
On Level 3, the emphasis is on personal and corporate productivity. The ability to create a high-
productivity team, department, or organization indicates a higher level of leadership ability than most
others display. But to reach the upper levels of leadership that create elite organizations, leaders must
transition from producers to developers. Why? Because people are any organization’s most
appreciable asset. Good leaders on Level 4 invest their time, energy, money, and thinking into
growing others as leaders. How does this emphasis on people and people decisions translate into
action? Leaders on the People Development level of leadership shift their focus from the production
achieved by others to the development of their potential. And they put only 20 percent of their focus
on their personal productivity while putting 80 percent of it on developing and leading others. This
can be a difficult shift for highly productive people who are used to getting their hands dirty, but it’s
a change that can revolutionize an organization and give it a much brighter future.
Level 5: The Pinnacle
Rare is the leader who reaches Level 5—the Pinnacle. Not only is leadership at this level a
culmination of leading well on the other four levels, but it also requires both a high degree of skill
and some amount of natural leadership ability. It takes a lot to be able to develop other leaders so that

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they reach Level 4; that’s what Level 5 leaders do. The individuals who reach Level 5 lead so well
for so long that they create a legacy of leadership in the organization they serve.

Pinnacle leaders stand out from everyone else. They are a cut above, and they seem to bring success
with them wherever they go. Leadership at this high level lifts the entire organization and creates an
environment that benefits everyone in it, contributing to their success. Level 5 leaders often possess
an influence that transcends the organization and the industry the leader works in.

Most leaders who reach the Pinnacle do so later in their careers. But this level is not a resting place
for leaders to stop and view their success. It is a reproducing place from which they make the
greatest impact of their lives. That’s why leaders who reach the Pinnacle should make the most of it
while they can. With gratitude and humility, they should lift up as many leaders as they can, tackle as
many great challenges as possible, and extend their influence to make a positive difference beyond
their own organization and industry.

Types of leadership:
The total pattern of leaders’ actions as perceived by their employees is called leadership style. It
represents the leaders’ philosophy, skills and attitudes in practice.
It is necessary to study the different leadership styles from which an appropriate style can be
selected, depending upon the situation in which leadership is to be exercised and the nature of the
followers involved.
1. Democratic Leadership
Commonly Effective
Democratic leadership is exactly what it sounds like -- the leader makes decisions based on the input
of each team member. Although he or she makes the final call, each employee has an equal say on a
project's direction.

Democratic leadership is one of the most effective leadership styles because it allows lower-level
employees to exercise authority they'll need to use wisely in future positions they might hold. It also
resembles how decisions can be made in company board meetings.
For example, in a company board meeting, a democratic leader might give the team a few decision-
related options. They could then open a discussion about each option. After a discussion, this leader
might take the board's thoughts and feedback into consideration, or they might open this decision up
to a vote.

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2. Autocratic Leadership
Rarely Effective
Autocratic leadership is the inverse of democratic leadership. In this leadership style, the leader
makes decisions without taking input from anyone who reports to them. Employees are neither
considered nor consulted prior to a direction, and are expected to adhere to the decision at a time and
pace stipulated by the leader.
An example of this could be when a manager changes the hours of work shifts for multiple
employees without consulting anyone -- especially the effected employees.
Frankly, this leadership style stinks. Most organizations today can't sustain such a hegemonic culture
without losing employees. It's best to keep leadership more open to the intellect and perspective of
the rest of the team.

3. Laissez-Faire Leadership
Sometimes Effective
If you remember your high-school French, you'll accurately assume that laissez-faire leadership is
the least intrusive form of leadership. The French term "laissez faire" literally translates to "let them
do," and leaders who embrace it afford nearly all authority to their employees.
In a young startup, for example, you might see a laissez-faire company founder who makes no major
office policies around work hours or deadlines. They might put full trust into their employees while
they focus on the overall workings of running the company.
Although laissez-faire leadership can empower employees by trusting them to work however they'd
like, it can limit their development and overlook critical company growth opportunities. Therefore,
it's important that this leadership style is kept in check.

4. Strategic Leadership
Commonly Effective
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.

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5. Transformational Leadership
Sometimes Effective
Transformational leadership is always "transforming" and improving upon the company's
conventions. Employees might have a basic set of tasks and goals that they complete every week or
month, but the leader is constantly pushing them outside of their comfort zone.
When starting a job with this type of leader, all employees might get a list of goals to reach, as well
as deadlines for reaching them. While the goals might seem simple at first, this manager might pick
up the pace of deadlines or give you more and more challenging goals as you grow with the
company.
This is a highly encouraged form of leadership among growth-minded companies because it
motivates employees to see what they're capable of. But transformational leaders can risk losing
sight of everyone's individual learning curves if direct reports don't receive the right coaching to
guide them through new responsibilities.

6. Transactional Leadership
Sometimes Effective
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 unscheduled gestures of appreciation.

7. Coach-Style Leadership
Commonly Effective
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.

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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 skillset in something different. In the longrun, this leader
focuses on creating strong teams that can communicate well and embrace each other's unique
skillsets 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.

8. Bureaucratic Leadership
Rarely Effective
Bureaucratic leaders go by the books. This style of leadership might listen and consider the input of
employees -- unlike autocratic leadership -- but the leader tends to reject an employee's input if it
conflicts with company policy or past practices.
You may run into a bureaucratic leader at a larger, older, or traditional company. At these
companies, when a colleague or employee proposes a strong strategy that seems new or non-
traditional, bureaucratic leaders may reject it. Their resistance might be because the company has
already been successful with current processes and trying something new could waste time or
resources if it doesn't work.
Employees under this leadership style might not feel as controlled as they would under autocratic
leadership, but there is still a lack of freedom in how much people are able to do in their roles. This
can quickly shut down innovation, and is definitely not encouraged for companies who are chasing
ambitious goals and quick growth.

Transactions vs transformational leadership:


Leadership can be described as transactional or transformational. Transactional leaders focuses on
the role of supervision, organization, and group performance. They are concerned about the status
quo and day-to-day progress toward goals. Transformational leaders work to enhance the motivation
and engagement of followers by directing their behavior toward a shared vision. While transactional
leadership operates within existing boundaries of processes, structures, and goals, transformational
leadership challenges the current state and is change-oriented.

Transactional Leadership: Transactional leadership promotes compliance with existing


organizational goals and performance expectations through supervision and the use of rewards and

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punishments. Transactional leaders are task- and outcome-oriented. Especially effective under strict
time and resource constraints and in highly-specified projects, this approach adheres to the status quo
and employs a form of management that pays close attention to how employees perform their tasks.

Transactional leadership styles are more concerned with maintaining the normal flow of operations –
this style is best described as “keeping the ship afloat.” Transactional leaders use disciplinary power
and an array of incentives to motivate employees to perform at their best. The term “transactional”
refers to the fact that this type of leader essentially motivates subordinates by exchanging rewards for
performance. A transactional leader generally does not look ahead in strategically guiding an
organization to a position of market leadership; instead, these managers are often concerned with
making sure everything flows smoothly today.

Transformational Leadership: Transformational leadership focuses on increasing employee


motivation and engagement and attempts to link employees’ sense of self with organizational values.
This leadership style emphasizes leading by example, so followers can identify with the leader’s
vision and values. A transformational approach focuses on individual strengths and weaknesses of
employees and on enhancing their capabilities and their commitment to organizational goals, often
by seeking their buy-in for decisions. A transformational leader goes beyond managing day-to-day
operations and crafts strategies for taking his company, department or work team to the next level of
performance and success. Transformational leadership styles focus on team-building, motivation and
collaboration with employees at different levels of an organization to accomplish change for the
better. These leaders set goals and incentives to push their subordinates to higher performance levels,
while providing opportunities for personal and professional growth for each employee.
Comparing Leadership Types
Transactional and transformational leadership exhibit five key differences:
1. Transactional leadership reacts to problems as they arise, whereas transformational leadership
is more likely to address issues before they become problematic.
2. Transactional leaders work within existing an organizational culture, while transformational
leaders emphasize new ideas and thereby “transform” organizational culture.
3. Transactional leaders reward and punish in traditional ways according to organizational
standards; transformational leaders attempt to achieve positive results from employees by
keeping them invested in projects, leading to an internal, high-order reward system.

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4. Transactional leaders appeal to the self-interest of employees who seek out rewards for
themselves, in contrast to transformational leaders, who appeal to group interests and notions
of organizational success.
5. Transactional leadership is more akin to the common notions of management, whereas
transformational leadership adheres more closely to what is colloquially referred to as
leadership.

VUCA leaders:
What used to seem stable has become increasingly volatile. While we have more data than ever we
are more uncertain about the future than ever. In a planetary context, the world has become
overwhelmingly complex. Overall, we are less clear about things than ever.
So how do you lead in times of Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity?
The military coined a term for this back in the last century: VUCA. Back then, this designated
special situations…
Today, VUCA has become the norm.
It seems that nearly every day a new startup is coming up, new research surfaces, new technology
breakthroughs are achieved, and new customer trends are developing.
How can you keep up with the rate of change when you are at the helm of a large organization and
you are tasked with bringing innovation to your company?
Startups are perfectly positioned to deal with volatility, with velocity, and with uncertainty: For them
it is about growing, and growing fast, continuously diminishing uncertainty and pivoting until a
value proposition has been found with product market fit.
Once an organization becomes successful and scales, a different dynamic sets in: In a mature
organization it becomes about managing complexity and reducing ambiguity. The rate of change
slows down. The organization becomes larger and has more components, stakeholders, dependencies
and potential points of failure. Risks are greater, which is why there is a strong focus on reducing
ambiguity through policies, procedures and metrics.
Both startups and large organizations have advantages for some of the elements of VUCA. Startups
deal well with volatility, as they are volatile themselves. Large organizations deal well with
complexity, as that is their status quo.
The organization of the future will have to deal with all four dynamics: volatility, uncertainty,
complexity and ambiguity.

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Today’s and even more so tomorrow’s leadership needs core pillars to address these dynamics. We
found that a foundational purpose, an inspiring vision, a stratified portfolio and clear progress
indicators support innovation leaders in the context of VUCA:
Volatility — Everything is moving fast.
Things around us are changing faster than ever. We have unleashed exponential developments in
technology, environment and consciousness that are now only beginning to unfold. The amount of
human knowledge is now doubling every few months. Rapid change is now more norm than
exception.
Especially in times like these we need to orient ourselves on something that is fundamental,
something that exists beyond time…
That is where Purpose comes in.
Purpose serves as a root.
It is something we are committed to exploring in ever new ways, no matter what our environment
looks like. It is the difference between personal mobility and making cars. Making cars is not a
purpose, it’s a means of addressing the purpose of providing personal mobility.
Purpose is timeless.
Because of that, it stands up to the test of time, gives us direction even if everything is changing.
Purpose allows every member of the organization to make decisions.
It is short and clear. It is akin to the mantra concept Guy Kawasaki suggested.
Purpose creates urgency.
Urgency is needed to act quickly in times of rapid change. Urgency can come from dread, from fear
of failure, or it can be inspired by purpose, by always clearly seeing the next step toward an ultimate
goal.
A clear purpose will also allow you to be okay when you get to completely change your business
model.
Purpose allows for stability in a volatile world.
Today’s reality: In recent research fewer than 20% of leaders in the US had a clear sense of purpose.
In organizations that lack purpose, focus shifts from commitment to quality products and services to
the bottom line, from focus on long-term sustainable growth to short term financial results.
Without purpose leaders drift from one shiny thing to another, they lack the basis for courage to act,
to step out their comfort zone, and without purpose leaders lack the passion to persevere in the face
of volatility.
Purpose also provides an anchor in a world of uncertainty.

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Uncertainty — Nobody really knows what the future will look like.
With the increase in exponential trends and the increase in points of origin for change, more
uncertainty has been added to the system. Not just are things changing fast, but they are getting more
and more difficult to anticipate. We cannot rely on the past as an indicator of the future. There is less
and less certainty in our projections. This uncertainty is terrifying.
While purpose gives us a foundation, we also need to build a container that we feel safe in.
This container is created through Vision.
We want to hear about a possible positive future. We want to learn about what could be.
As a leader, it is your job to inspire vision.
As a leader, you get to create a vision for yourself, and for where you could collectively take your
organization. By living and constantly enforcing the vision, you uphold a container of safety for your
people, and thus inspire them to create and innovate.
Vision is best expressed and delivered in inclusive narratives.
You get to inspire and spread narratives that allow for enough room for the listener to find
themselves in - to identify with an archetypal role in the narrative you are creating as a leader.
Especially when collectively created, visionary narratives allow individuals to see an aspirational
version of themselves: who they could become.
By sharing your narratives in a way that inspires trust, your vision becomes the safety that your
employees can move within and deal with the uncertainty they are facing in their daily lives.
And together with you team, you get to create a vision for your future customer, which in turn will
allow you to create trust in your organization from the outside.
Complexity — We have introduced more points of origin of change.
Change can come from anywhere. An individual today has more power than any individual in the
past. We have more information available to us, and a single individual could destroy this whole
planet. In their Global Trends 2030 report the National Intelligence Council had already highlighted
the shift in power toward the individual. In no other time in history has one individual had as much
ability to effect change on this planet as today.
This introduces a whole new order of complexity. We now see more clearly the inter-relatedness of
all things. Of our supply chain. Of our purpose, internal culture and brand. Everything is more
affected by everything else.
That is where having a simple Portfolio supports us in managing complexity.
There are many initiatives inside of an organization, but they should all fall into a simple portfolio.
Your portfolio of strategic tracks is designed to move you toward your vision and fulfill your
purpose.

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These overarching umbrella programs will then be executed in a myriad of different activities,
possibly too complex to have control over, but they can be guided by clear boundaries of the
portfolio. If an initiative doesn’t fall into the context of the portfolio, it probably is not supporting
your vision or purpose.
Ambiguity — How do we even know if we succeeded?
In a world where everything changes faster than ever, is more uncertain than ever, and more
complex, how do we know we are on track?
If the only variable in my equation is shareholder value, I will make decisions that are not beneficial
to other stakeholders, the environment, and even my own organization. Tools like triple and
quadruple bottom line are beginning to address this issue.
In order to measure strategic alignment, new kinds of Progress indicators are required.
Goals are hit or miss.
Progress indicators give us the confidence that we are moving toward our vision and are executing
toward our purpose, our timeless legacy.
While traditional KPIs measure one aspect of success, that of financial profit, it is a limited view of
the world we want to create.
We get to determine additional indicators of success that support us in resolving ambiguity, that will
provide us with the feedback we need to have confidence in our actions.
Today’s success is tomorrow’s failure
What works today might not work tomorrow. Things are volatile, uncertain, complex and
ambiguous. Nothing can save you from that. Frameworks are not about certainty. They are about
supporting you in managing and leading in uncertainty. They are about giving you a foundation for
confidence.
Ultimately, confidence is a choice, but in a world of VUCA to know that you are on purpose in your
actions, that you are inspired in community by a powerful vision and narratives that evoke that
vision, that a clear portfolio is guiding the trajectory of your actions, and that you are seeking and
receiving meaningful feedback about your progress — is priceless.
Additional Notes:
Volatility
We live in a world that’s constantly changing, becoming more unstable each day, where changes big
and small are becoming more unpredictable – and they’re getting more and more dramatic and
happening faster and faster. As events unfold in completely unexpected ways, it’s becoming
impossible to determine cause and effect.

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Uncertainty
It’s becoming more difficult to anticipate events or predict how they’ll unfold; historical forecasts
and past experiences are losing their relevance and are rarely applicable as a basis for predicting the
shape of things to come. It’s becoming nearly impossible to plan for investment, development, and
growth as it becomes increasingly uncertain where the route is heading.
Complexity
Our modern world is more complex than ever. What are the reasons? What are the effects? –
Problems and their repercussions are more multi-layered, harder to understand. The different layers
intermingle, making it impossible to get an overview of how things are related. Decisions are
reduced to a tangled mesh of reaction and counter-reaction – and choosing the single correct path is
almost impossible
Ambiguity
“One size fits all” and “best practice” have been relegated to yesterday – in today’s world it’s rare for
things to be completely clear or precisely determinable. Not everything is black and white – grey is
also an option. The demands on modern organisations and management are more contradictory and
paradoxical than ever, challenging our personal value systems to the core. In a world where the
“what” takes a back seat to the “why?” and the “how?”, making decisions requires courage,
awareness, and a willingness to make mistakes.
Best practice was yesterday & Best thinking is in demand today and tomorrow.
Where does the term VUCA come from? VUCA is an acronym used by the American Military. It
stands for Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous. It was the response of the US Army War
College to the collapse of the USSR in the early 1990s. Suddenly, there was no longer the only
enemy, resulting in new ways of seeing and reacting.
The world of today Neither an organization’s leadership nor its strategies are spared in today’s
VUCA world. Experiences, dogmas and paradigms must all come under scrutiny; it is no longer a
case of finding the one way or the management tool: standards give way to individuality.
You as a leader As a manager, you are responsible for the lion’s share of the decisions about the
parameters that define how your organisation can operate.
The increase in volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity means that you and your business
must seek new orientations and take a fresh approach to management. Only then can you guarantee
positive results in changed circumstances. The VUCA world challenges you to find your own way.
You will need to understand the psycho-logic and develop empathic behaviour – in short, to be more
concerned with humans and their needs. Meaning and purpose take a central role in business
activities.

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What does VUCA mean for your LEADERSHIP and your strategies?
Vision
Paint a picture of the future you want. Together; as a compass and for orientation; in order to confer
meaning and spark motivation – and to forge internal and external identity and effectiveness.
Understanding
Understand interconnections; make them transparent. Reflect on the context. Think and plan meta-
strategically. Start from the result and work backwards. Harmonies skills. Embrace and exploit
behaviors and reactions. Convert anxiety and resistance into productive energy.
Clarity
Simplicity. Focus on what counts and what it's really about. Trust, transparent connections and
processes. Apply energy and force exactly where they will be most effective.
Adaptability / Agility
Flexibility. Agility. Scrutinize hierarchical management techniques. Promote a consistent culture for
making decisions and accounting for mistakes. Interact transparently with objections. Facilitate
innovation and build up resilience.

Leadership grid & leadership formulation:


Developed by R. R. Blake and J. S. Mouton, the Managerial Grid Model helps Managers to analyze
their leadership styles through a technique known as grid training.
Also, Managers can identify how they concerning their concern for production and people with the
Managerial Grid Model.
The two dimensions of leadership, viz. concern for people on ‘vertical’ axis and concern for
production on the ‘horizontal’ axis have been demonstrated by R. R. Blake and J. S. Mouton in the
form of Managerial Grid Model.
They identified 5 basic leadership styles of practicing managers representing various combinations of
the aforesaid two dimensions as shown in the following figure;
Managerial Grid Model is based on two behavioral dimensions:
1. Concern for people: This is the degree to which a leader considers the needs of team members,
their interests, and areas of personal development when deciding how best to accomplish a task.
2. Concern for production: This is the degree to which a leader emphasizes concrete objectives,
organizational efficiency, and high productivity when deciding how best to accomplish a task.
As shown in the figure, the model is represented as a grid with concern for production as the X-axis
and concern for people as the Y-axis; each axis ranges from 1 (Low) to 9 (high).

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The five resulting leadership styles are as follows:

(1,9) Country Club Style Leadership High People and Low Production
(1,9) Country Club Style Leadership style of leader is most concerned about the needs and the
feelings of members of his or her team. In this environment, the relationship-oriented manager has a
high concern for people but a low concern for production. He pays much attention to the security and
comfort of the employees. He hopes that this will increase performance. He is almost incapable of
employing the more punitive, coercive and legitimate powers. The organization will end up to be a
friendly atmosphere but not necessarily very productive. The (1,9) boss mainly uses reward power to
preserve discipline and to support his subordinates in accomplishing their goals. Conversely, this
manager is virtually incapable of employing more disciplinary coercive and legitimate powers. This
inability results from his fear that using such powers could jeopardize his relationships. This inability
results from his fear that using such powers could jeopardize his relationships. Thus, the supervisor
seldom attempts to impose his will on other people, preferring to accept the ideas of others instead of
forcing his own. Employees in this type of work environment go about their day working at their
own pace on projects that they enjoy and with coworkers that they are attracted to.
(9,1) Produce or Perish Leadership- High Production and Low People
(9,l) Produce or Perish Leadership management style is characterized by a concern for production as
the only goal. Employees are viewed as obstacles to performance results unless obedience to the
manager’s wishes is explicitly granted. In this style, the manager is authoritarian or compliance. A
task-oriented manager, he has a high concern for production and a low concern for people. He finds
employee needs unimportant and simply a means to an end. He provides his employees with money
and expects performance back. There is little or no allowance for cooperation or collaboration. He

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pressures his employees through rules and punishments to achieve the company goals. This type of
leader is very autocratic, has strict work rules, policies and procedures, and views punishment as the
most effective means to motivate employees.
(1,1) Impoverished Leadership-Low Production and Low People:
(1,1) Impoverished Leadership is a delegate-and-disappear management style and a lazy approach.
The manager shows a low concern for both people and production. He or she avoids getting into
trouble. His main concern is not to be held responsible for any mistakes. Managers use this style to
preserve job and job seniority, protecting themselves by avoiding getting into trouble. This leader is
mostly ineffective. He or she has neither a high regard for creating systems for getting the job done
nor for creating a work environment that is satisfying and motivating. A result is a place of
disorganization, dissatisfaction, and disharmony.
(5,5) Middle-Of-The-Road Leadership-Medium Production and Medium People
(5,5) Middle-Of-The-Road Leadership is a kind of realistic medium without ambition. It is a
balanced and compromised style. The manager tries to balance the competing goals of the company
and the needs of the workers. The manager gives some concern to both people and production,
hoping to achieve acceptable performance. He believes this is the most anyone can do.
Consequently, compromises occur where neither the production nor the people’s needs are fully met.
The supervisor views it as the most practical management technique. It is also an outcome when
production and people issues are seen as in conflict. The defining characteristic of this style “is not to
seek the best position for both production and people… but to find the position that is in between
both, about halfway.” When dealing with subordinates, the (5,5) manager prefers relaxed and shared
conversations – these allow’ him to slay popularly. Group membership is also enjoyed as committees
allow’ the supervisor to spread the responsibility for decision-making.
(9,9) Team Leadership-High Production and High People
At (9,9) Team Leadership, the manager pays high concern to both people and production. Motivation
is high. This soft style is based on the propositions of Theory Y of Douglas McGregor. The manager
encourages teamwork and commitment among employees.
This style emphasizes making employees feel part of the company-family and involving them in
understanding the organizational purpose and determining production needs. This method relies
heavily on making employees feel they are constructive parts of the company. And this will result in
a team environment organization based on trust and respect, which leads to high satisfaction and
motivation and, as a result, high production. In a (9,9) system the manager strives for sound and
imaginative opinions, letting others partake in the decision making the process. He is not afraid to
use ideas that are divergent from his own, but rather focuses on the value of the ideas. Emotions and

SH286U Life Skills


5. Leadership Skills

thoughts are used to solve .problems through teamwork because this supervisor is concerned with
arriving only at the best possible solutions. A (9,9)-oriented manager is capable of acting sensibly to
bring about effective results, maintaining consistency but finding innovative solutions to fit unique
problems, and unusual circumstances”. Another of the manager’s primary goals in this system is to
identify barriers that his subordinates may be encountering and then finding a way to remove them.
This creates a team environment based on trust and respect which leads to high satisfaction and high
satisfaction and motivation and, as a result, high production.

Advantages of the Managerial Grid Model


• Managers help to analyze their leadership styles through a technique known as grid training.
• Managers identify how they for their concern for production and people.
Limitations of the Managerial Grid Model
• The model ignores the importance of internal and external limits, matter and scenario.
• There is some more aspect of leadership that can be covered but are not.
Blake and Mouton’s Managerial Grid Model was one of the most influential management models to
appear in the 1960s, it also provided a foundation for even more complex contingency approaches to
leadership.
Notable amongst these studies are Fiedler’s Contingency model (which considers the match between
the manager’s personality and the situation), and Tannenbaum and Schmidt’s Continuum of Leader
Behavior (which stresses that the leader not only understands himself but also the other persons in
the organization along with the social environment as well.
The Managerial Grid Model was the next logical step in the evaluation of management thinking.
Blake and Jane Mouton based the framework of Grid on the sound logic of noted theorists Abraham
Maslow and Douglas McGregor.
The Grid expanded upon McGregor’s and other’s theories at the time to provide a richer and more
complete design between the manager’s concerns for production versus their concern for
interpersonal relationships.
Although later criticized and subjected to further revision by its creators, the original Managerial
Grid Model remains an important model of managerial behavior that continues to be studied and
utilized.
Blake and Mouton strongly argue that style (9,9) is the most effective management style because it
improved productivity, and caused high employee satisfaction, low turnover and absenteeism.
It is widely used as a technique of managerial training and for identifying various combinations of
leadership styles.

SH286U Life Skills

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