Leadership Style

 

Why leadership style is important ?

The selecting a appropriate leadership style is crucial for any leader. It has a significant impact on the performance of organization. Mainly, it keeps the cohesiveness of organization and build up a confidence with in team members about leader.

(Duggan , 2020), Leadership style impacts the organization by affecting employee morale, productivity, decision-making speed, and metrics. Successful leaders carefully analyze problems, assess the skill level of subordinates, consider alternatives, and make an informed choice.

(Quain, 2019), The leadership style you choose to implement can have a profound impact on the success or failure of your small business.

Basically, 7 Type of leadership styles can be identified based on the way  How they communicate and maintain relationships with the Subordinate of company.  leadership styles  can be arranged according to how fur leader cooperates with team members for decision making and planning functions of organisation. One end of this leadership style spectrum is placed by Autocratic leadership style and other end is stand by laissez-faire.

It is important to understand that, There are no any superior leadership style out of afore mention leadership styles, instead situation and composition of the team demands  the most appropriate leadership style. The wise leader should be able to move from one styles to another.

Major factors, that should be considered when selecting best fit leadership style.  

Level of readiness of team members

If the team members are highly skilled and knowledgeable over the activities the team perform, and they are perfectly acclimated to the circumstances  the team repeatedly  exposed, the leader should given a some sort of Autonomy for the team members, and  the leader should incline to democratic Type leadership. Whereas,  if team members are not fully accustomed to the team environment and they are not perfectly fit to relevant skills and knowledge, the leader should espouse to Autocratic Leadership style, because in this situation, team members are not ready to take decisions  and responsibility for their work activity, So the leadership must have a higher level of intervention to influence the team. Hence, the level of readiness of workers  have to be recognized to select appropriate  leadership style.

The Nature of activities, and production process

If the team have to perform technically and operationally difficult and complex tasks, The leader should not adopt a Autocratic leadership style. Because, the worker’s needs some form of freedom and autonomy to execute technically subtle activities.

For example, lets take a Design firm, The design firm is consisted by professional such as Architects, Structural engineers, Quantity Surveyor etc, and it  demand higher level of creativity skills and knowledge, and  freedom and autonomy to apply those abilities. On the other hand, until the design is finalized, there is a some form of uncertainty over the design, such a scenario, Authentic leadership style is not apt, because the direction is not clearly identified, hence chain of command is not clear and level of activities demands higher level of higher level of professionalism

Whereas in a construction phase of a project,  the directions are now identified, chain of command is clear, the construction activities should have been specified and programmed Now it all have to execute, thus Autocratic Type of leadership is rather appropriate for this situation, like wise, the technical and operational nature of activities have to be appraised when selecting a leadership styles.

 Physiology of leadership

The leader should be conscious about his or her psychological and mental status. There may be some limitations of some leaders, because of  inborn or environmental causes. So, It may be difficult to change some of mental characteristics with in a short time, in such a situation, if leader adopt a leadership style which may be unfitting  for him, it may not be effective and successful when practicing his leadership. Some times, Subordinate can identify the weakness of leadership and thence it can affect to his or her control over the team .

For example, There are some leaders who can’t adopt Autocratic leadership styles, even if this leadership style is needed for particular circumstances, because the leader is initially unfamiliar with the technical and operational nature of activities, in such a situation, the leader should adopt kind of democratic leadership style in the beginning rather than Autocratic, and thence have  to improve his cognizant about the function of team and it’s members, there after having acclimated to team environment, he can exercise the Authentic leadership style effectively. Hence,  the leader should take his or her inner temperament and then should develop a his own unique leadership style.

Organizational  culture

The organisation culture of a particular company is largely associated when inducting a related leadership style. Because the organisation culture means set of ethics, values, and the framework that how relationship between members maintains, ergo the leaders must recognize organization culture of company  before selecting a leadership style.

For example, military forces carry out construction activities by its civil engineering units, Then they can excessively use its labour forces for construction activities without their consent by adopting a autocratic leadership style, and leaders can influence it’s subordinates without hearing their opinion and  suggestions .

How ever, the private civilian construction organisation,  cannot overpower and exploit  it’s labour force excessively as same as military forces do. Because civilian private organisations have to adhere labour regulations, they must dedicate to maintain some form  of flexible working environment than in military environment, the organization have to give space for workers to express their grivinesss and workplace issues.  Also, if leader exercise a autocratic leadership style on Subordinate, the frustrated employees has right to leave from organisation. that is something can’t do it in military forces, therefor in civilian organisation, the leader ship should adopt a democratic disposition in order to keep the cohesiveness of organisation, whereas, in military forces, the leader can adopt Autocratic leadership styles, as they have a appropriate culture to do that.

Environment and risk exposure of organisation

If the organisation or team have to function in a volatile environment, the leader must adopt appropriate leadership style to cope with external and internal impaction on its business activities which can be caused by political, economical, Natural sources, because, if the environment is volatile, it frequently necessitate changes or reforms with in organisation in order to deal with volatile environment. However, Generally workers or employees shows a reluctant or unwillingness to change their Working patterns,  routine activities or procedures that what they have been used. Hence, such a situation demand a Autocratic leadership style to push workers according to leader’s direction.

For example, Let’s take a Manufacturing company. Then  assume that, Government suddenly impose a tax on their products. Then the business organisation have to produce their production rather low price in order to assure stable sales. Now the organisation have to implement  some form of changes in their production process, and strict austerity measures on their work forces. Some times, they need to work more hours than previous, sometimes the salaries may needs to be reduce etc . Those are the things that worker’s are usually reluctant to accept. So, this situation demands a autocratic Type of leader to push workers forcefully regardless of their willingness and consent. Hence, volatility of external and internal environment shapes the leadership style accordingly 

Conclusion

In Nutshell, Selecting the best fit leadership style Have a significant impact on team or organisation’ s performance. So, The leader must have a cognizant about factors that have to be weighted when adopting suitable leadership style. However, Normally it may be difficult for some leaders to move from one style to another because of their physiological and mental characteristics. Hence, leader must have a conscience about his or her limitations and capabilities and thereby should develop a his or her own leadership style.

References

Kate boogaard, 2020, The muse(Online), What kind of leaders are you ( 8common leadership styles, and their pros and cons ), Available at- https://www-themuse-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.themuse.com/amp/advice/common-leadership-styles-with-pros-and-cons?amp_js_v=a6&amp_gsa=1&usqp=mq331AQKKAFQArABIIACAw%3D%3D#aoh=16374932811894&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.themuse.com%2Fadvice%2Fcommon-leadership-styles-with-pros-and-cons, [Accessed on 28^th November 2021]

Sky schooley, 2019, Business News Daily(Online), What kind of leader are you? 9 leadership styles and their strengths, Available at- https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/9789-leadership-types.html, [ Accessed on 19^th November 2021]

Sorin Dumitrascu, 2020, An Idea(Online),  choosing an appropriate leadership style, Available at -https://medium.com/an-idea/choosing-an-appropriate-leadership-style-6e7ceb55e8ce, [Accessed on 18^th November 2020]

Tara Duggan, 2020, Azcentral(Online), The effect of leadership styles on the organisation, Available at- https://yourbusiness.azcentral.com/effects-leadership-styles-organization-5247.html, Accessed on 20^th November 2020]

Sampson Quain, 2019, Chron(Online), The effects of leadership styles on the organisation, Available at- https://smallbusiness.chron.com/effects-leadership-styles-organization-10387.html, [Accessed on 17^th November 2020]