Essay plan: leadership
- Leader
- Leadership styles
- Pros and cons of each style
- Successful leader
- Styles followed by successful leader
- Recommendations – manager , leadership
Essay:
Leader is a person who has been playing a prominent role in the society for a long time by influencing and motivating people towards the achievement of the goal. Leadership is the act of influencing, leading or commanding people. Every leader exerts certain traits and has their own leadership style. A leader has vision and he motivates his followers to achieve that goal. People who get influenced by the leader are his followers, often they draw inspiration from him towards achieving his goal. A leader generally presents the following personality traits. Such as decisiveness, accountability, empathy, optimism, awareness, confidence, honesty, inspiration, confidence and focus. The personal and relational competencies of a leader determines his leadership style. The following are some of the most common leadership styles, Coercive, Authoritative, Democratic, pacesetting, coaching, bureaucratic leadership, charismatic leadership, servant leadership and transactional leadership.
Coercive leadership: The coercive leadership style was first introduced in 2002. In this leadership style the leader exerts command on followers and asks them to comply. This bullying type of leadership is best for certain situations, like a last minute report in a company. This might increase the pace of work. This leadership style gives the leader a great control over the organization Although it looks like this style of leadership is useful in last minute resorts the research done by Goldman’s says otherwise. There is a negative impact on the work climate due to the coercive leadership style. If used this style in a right way this leadership style is extremely helpful during a crisis. Long term usage of this style leads to serious issues in the management and it does more harm than good.
Authoritative leadership: in authoritative leadership the leader has goals and he decides the best way to pursue them. The followers are given less importance in the decision making process. The leader must motivate the followers and make them understand his vision and strive hard to reach it. The coercive leader and authoritative leader are almost similar as they both make the followers do thing their way. The only difference is that the coercive leader doesn’t appreciate or reward followers whereas in authoritative leadership the followers are rewarded or punished. Bill gates was one of the examples of authoritative leader. He took control of the company and used authoritative leadership methods to pursue his vision. This methodology is best during emergency situations and during the situation where there is no time for group discussion and it calls for a decision making person.
Democratic leadership: Unlike coercive and authoritative leadership, the followers has a say in this leadership style. Though the leader’s decision is final, the followers are encouraged to participate in the process of decision making. This leadership style is most effective and the productivity is also high. Since the followers are encouraged to participate in the process of decision making, the members or followers feel more engaged and a great level of creative thoughts are exchanged. This as we know increases the productivity. This leadership style fails during emergency situations or when there is less time. This also fails if the followers are not skilled enough to participate in the decision making process.
Pacesetting leadership: The is the most common leadership style observed. The leader sets goals and if the followers doesn’t reach or underperform he replaces them. Thought this may seem like a best way to do, it isn’t. Study says that the pacesetting leadership often doesn’t trust his followers and their morale drops. This causes a damage to the work culture. But if the team is highly talented and self-motivated the pacesetting leadership bring the best results.
Coaching leadership: This leadership style is similar to democratic leadership style. The leader clearly sets tasks and goals for the followers but their view is also considered. The communication is purely both ways in this leadership style. This style works if the team is agreeable and responsible. The leader can actually train the followers better and help them understand what they are supposed to do. This way the leader can coach the followers and contribute to the company’s strategy.
Bureaucratic leadership: This leadership is different from those we have discussed above. Bureaucratic leadership has a set of duties for both managers( Leaders in this context) and followers. These set of duties are performed under a hierarchy of authority. In bureaucratic leadership the leader is generally the technical expert in that field with management background as well. This styles of leadership is completely flawed as the leader is concerned more with procedure at the expense of efficiency or common sense. This leadership style hinders the freedom of individual with rules.
Charismatic leadership: charismatic leadership or transformational leadership depends on the harm of the leader. The charismatic leader’s goals drives his followers. The followers are inspired by his conviction and commitment towards the cause. Charismatic leadership is similar to democratic leadership with few differences. In democratic leadership the skill level required for the workers is high and the leaders have a rational behaviour. Charismatic leader have a more persuasive tendency and they often target the audience emotions. Charismatic leader often strive for a greater good. One of the major problem with charismatic leadership in an organisation is when he/she retires or leaves the organisation, the organisation is dependent on the charismatic leader and struggles with their retirement.
Servant leadership: Servant leadership was first coined by Robert k. in 1970. It says that to lead is to serve first. This leadership practise puts the servant or employees first. They give priority to the professional development of other and often encourages organisations to do the same. Over a long period of time there will definite improvement in the organisation as well as society. Servant leaders have high reputation and trust from employees and this encourages high performance from them.
...(download the rest of the essay above)