Introduction
Leadership determines success in organizations. Each leader has a unique leadership style he or she uses to lead or influence others within an organization. Leaders inspire employees to work towards certain organizational objectives (Daft, 2005). They influence change in employees and help organizations to achieve their desired goals. Leadership is the act of providing guidance or inspiration to others.
Thus, a leader guides or directs employees towards a particular goal. In the workplace, a manager’s leadership strategies and personal traits define his or her leadership style.
Each leadership style is effective for a particular situation and thus, an effective leader should approach each situation with a different style. A leader may adopt two or more of these styles in inspiring others to achieve particular organizational goals. The common leadership styles include democratic (participative), autocratic and laissez-faire (Daft, 2005). Specific personal traits and values define an individual’s leadership style.
Comparison of the Leadership Styles
Each leader has certain traits that are characteristic of a particular leadership style. The writer’s leadership style is the participative leadership style, which is often regarded as an effective leadership approach in an organizational context. One of the distinguishing traits of democratic leaders is that they tend to involve group members in decision-making (Daft, 2005).
Thus, besides providing guidance, participative leaders engage their subordinates and incorporate their input into the final decision. Such leaders seek the views of their staff, but have the ultimate say during decision-making. The involvement of employees inspires and motivates them to become more creative and innovative.
In organizations, democratic leaders share their decision-making role with their staff by engaging them in seeking solutions for work-related problems. They gather information from employees, which they rely on to make a decision. According to McNichol and Hamer (2007), the participative approach, compared to the other styles, enhances the productivity of employees for a prolonged period of time as it encourages cooperation and increases staff morale.
Moreover, in organizations, a democratic leader formulates a performance evaluation plans that allow employees to evaluate their work. Since performance appraisals are crucial to staff development and organizational success, the democratic leadership style helps organizations to achieve their goals and objectives. Besides encouraging staff participation, democratic leaders allow employees to develop their careers by encouraging career growth and development through promotions and rewards.
The democratic leadership style is effective in certain scenarios. It is applicable when organizations want to implement new systems or seek solutions to workplace problems. It is also most effective when the leader wants to involve employees in decision-making or inform them about the issues affecting their performance (Daft, 2005). Leaders should adopt a democratic approach when seeking for ways of enhancing staff job satisfaction and career growth.
A complex problem in an organization can be solved through the involvement of employees as they understand the challenges affecting them. Thus, a democratic leadership approach is required when seeking a solution for complex organizational problems.
A participative style is also applicable when the leader wants to cultivate a culture of teamwork and cooperation among employees. However, the democratic leadership style may be less effective in some situations. For instance, when a decision is urgent, due to time constraints, it would be impractical to seek the input of all employees.
In contrast, in an autocratic leadership, also called authoritarian leadership, the leader and his or her subjects are distinct in terms of their roles and responsibilities. An autocratic leader issues directives on “what needs to be done, when it should be done, and how it should be done” (Daft, 2005, p. 69). Unlike a democratic leader who makes a decision after consulting his or subordinate staff, an autocratic leader does not consult anyone when making a decision.
This tends to stifle creativity and innovation in the organization as employees are required to adhere to specific rules and procedures. Moreover, autocratic leaders tend to be controlling and dictatorial while participative leaders are democratic. Under autocratic leadership, the manager has the power and authority to make unilateral decisions without consulting the staff. In contrast, democratic leaders allow their employees to play an active role in the decision-making process.
According to McNichol and Hamer (2007), autocratic leaders are “punitive, task-oriented, authoritative and controlling individuals” (p. 67). On the other hand, democratic leaders are “participative, consensual and employee-centered” (McNichol & Hamer, 2007, p. 68). Autocratic leaders, unlike democratic leaders, make independent and unilateral decisions that employees are expected to follow.
They also encourage adherence to rules and procedures. In contrast, democratic leaders give staff autonomy, which is essential for personal growth. Both approaches motivate employees through rewards. The situations where the autocratic leadership style is effective include when the staff is new and unfamiliar with their tasks or work procedures, when supervision requires specific instructions or when there is no time to seek staff input.
A charismatic leader inspires his or her followers to support his or her vision for the organization. They are very enthusiastic in what they believe. Charismatic leaders are also transformational, which makes them good project managers (Daft, 2005). However, charismatic leaders tend to have less trust in their team members and thus, organizational performance may be affected when the leader is incapacitated or leaves his employment. Such leaders initiate change in organizations or teams through charisma and influence.
The charismatic leadership style is similar to the participative style in many respects. First, both styles are worker-oriented. However, a participative leader involves his or her subordinate staff in decision-making while a charismatic leader encourages employees to make personal decisions.
Also, unlike a participative leader, a charismatic leader does not make the final decision; rather, he or she delegates the decision-making role to his or staff. Both styles are useful when seeking employee support and goodwill for a particular course of action.
Effective Leadership
Effective leadership is essential for organizational success. A successful leader must understand his or her leadership style as well as those of others. Daft describes good leaders as “those who are deeply interested in others and can bring out the best in them” (2005, p. 118).
Thus, it is by understanding the leadership styles of the others that a leader can learn to use an appropriate leadership approach to motivate others. It also helps leaders to hire or assign the right candidate an appropriate leadership role in an organization. As a democratic leader, the writer uses each of the leadership styles to manage his subordinates in the workplace. In particular, the writer uses the charismatic, transformative, bureaucratic and autocratic leadership styles to address different situations in the workplace.
The writer uses the charismatic style to influence his subordinates to support his ideas. Daft (2005) writes that effective managers motivate their staff to work towards achieving certain goals and objectives.
Thus, a participative leader who understands how each leadership style affects workplace behavior and attitudes would use a style that suits a particular situation to achieve the desired outcomes. For instance, a charismatic style would allow a participative leader to develop a vision for the future and influence his staff to follow him.
On the other hand, an autocratic leadership style works well during crises. A task-oriented approach enforces measures that must be followed by everyone to help the organization maneuver through crises. A participative leader can use an autocratic leadership style to turnaround a company or help employees to handle work-related challenges. Strict deadlines, independent decisions and quick responses to certain situations, which are characteristics of an autocratic leadership style, are effective when a firm is going through a crisis.
When anticipating a transformation, the participative leadership style can be useful. It allows a leader to engage staff in strategic discussions, address their concerns and respond to the challenges associated with the change. Changes such as mergers and layoffs require a participative style to prevent possible chaos, turnover or industrial action. In this situation, an autocratic style would increase employee resistance to the change, affect morale and output, and increase turnover.
A participative approach is also useful during decision-making. Since informed decisions require facts or data, engaging the staff would help a leader evaluate different alternatives before choosing the best option. A participative approach can also help a leader in evaluating the employees’ skills, in risk-assessment and in role delegation.
On the other hand, a bureaucratic leadership style can help a participative leader in handling company operations. This style emphasizes on following set out procedures and guidelines on workplace operations. A participative leader can use this style when overseeing industrial operations that involve the use of heavy machinery.
Differences in Leadership Styles and Related Problems
Problems
In the workplace, each worker may have a different leadership style. This means that there may be a clash of goals, priorities or interests from time to time. This may lead to conflicts between employees in a team or between a leader and his or her subordinates. Basic leadership styles such as democratic leadership and authoritarian leadership style have conflicting values, which breed workplace problems.
One such workplace problem relates to decision-making. A democratic leader usually involves his or her subordinates in seeking solutions to organizational problems. He or she seeks the input of the group members, assesses their input and makes an informed decision. In contrast, an autocratic leader enforces his independent decision to all the employees. This may breed a conflict as it will discourage employees with a democratic style.
This would lead to low work satisfaction and high turnover. It may affect output and productivity in an organization. On the other hand, autocratic employees can devalue a democratic leader’s decision-making role leading to a slower and lengthy process of making decisions. Also, self-directed employees with a laissez-faire leadership style may devalue a leader’s decision-making role as they are often critical of a leader’s decisions.
Another problem encountered with the leadership styles is reduced standards/ productivity. An autocratic style (controlling approach) can hinder creativity and hinder accountability by preventing the development of feedback systems. This affects staff performance and productivity.
Unclear expectations, lack of trust and autocratic rules can stifle creativity leading to low standards in the workplace. Moreover, autocratic and laissez-faire styles enhance compliance to regulations, but may affect creativity and innovation. Also, autocratic rules can increase absenteeism and turnover, which affect staff productivity.
Solutions
To overcome the aforementioned problems, the writer suggests two solutions. First, a division of the decision-making role among different units or departments in an organization can enhance staff participation and speed up the process of decision-making.
Departments such as finance, marketing, human resource and production can be allowed to make decisions in a horizontal version, which can then be passed to administrators for action taking. This will ensure that everyone in the organization participates in decision-making. Thus, a horizontal and hierarchical system can accommodate the diverse views, priorities and values of the different leadership styles.
The solution to the problem of reduced standards and productivity is an implementation of constructive feedback systems. A feedback system focuses on the roles and performance of a department or an individual (Ruggieri, 2009). Employees at each level can utilize feedback systems to obtain information about their performance and make appropriate decisions at the personal level. Thus, adequate feedback systems in an organization can enhance accountability, which will improve productivity.
Advantages Created Between Leadership Styles
Leadership styles in an organization have many benefits. One such benefit is enhanced communication. Participative, charismatic and transformation leaders enhance communication as they encourage participation and exchange of views and opinions (Ruggieri, 2009).
They create an atmosphere of cooperation, which promotes creativity and innovation leading to improved productivity. On the other hand, bureaucratic and autocratic leaders emphasize on adherence to strict procedures and communication channels in the company. Although this may affect communication, it ensures a clear flow of information and instructions that employees need to do their work.
The second potential benefit leadership styles bring to an organization is enhanced employee cooperation. Organizations planning to improve work procedures, efficiency and productivity must seek staff input (Ruggieri, 2009). Some individual’s in leadership positions value staff input and consult employees when implementing new changes. A democratic leader seeks and uses staff input to enhance work processes.
This helps reduce resistance to a new change. Furthermore, workplace problems can be resolved through employee involvement in decision-making. Democratic and charismatic leaders involve employees in seeking solutions to their problems. This increases staff morale and performance.
The third benefit relates to goal setting. Leadership styles affect goal-setting at individual level as well as at organizational level. Transformational and charismatic leaders rely on inspiration to influence staff to work towards particular goals.
They set goals for each worker and provide them with the resources necessary to achieve those goals. Leadership that focuses on staff empowerment also involve goal-setting. Autocratic leaders emphasize on a strict adherence to organizational procedures to achieve certain goals while servant leaders seek employee consensus when developing company goals.
As a participative leader, the writer can use the advantages created by leadership styles to increase company productivity in many ways. Elaborate communication channels in a company will motivate staff and promote creativity. Moreover, communication creates a positive work environment, which leads to improved productivity.
On the other hand, employee involvement increases staff morale leading to improved performance. Moreover, their input would ensure informed decisions on the part of the leader and increase staff confidence in the organization’s goals. At an individual level, goal-setting can encourage employees to work towards achieving specific goals. Thus, performance appraisal based on these goals can enhance productivity in a company.
References
Daft, R. (2005). The Leadership Experience. Toronto: Southwestern.
McNichol, E., & Hamer, S. (2007). Leadership and Management: A 3-Dimensional Approach. Cheltenbam: Nelson Thornes.
Ruggieri, S. (2009). Leadership in Virtual Teams: A Comparison of Transformational and Transactional Leaders. Social Behavior & Personality Journal, 37(8), 117-121.