Becoming a leader is never easy. A leader has a lot of responsibilities to hold and when it comes to her team, she must ensure that everyone is carrying their own weight. As there are many kinds of people in the world, there are also many kinds of leaders the world has seen.
Some of the famous world leaders in history come from different backgrounds. Julius Caesar was a Roman leader and he played a critical role as military commander to make the Roman Empire grow. Martin Luther King Jr. brought change to America during the civil rights movement and he’s famous for the phrase “I have a dream” and being diplomatic as a public figure. These two had different causes they fought for and different leadership styles. For people who don’t know what leadership styles they have, here are some popular examples.
Leadership Style #1: The Participative Leader
If you are a leader that guides your group members, yet you take part in the group work, you are this type. From researcher Kurt Lewin’s leadership styles framework, this is commonly referred to as the democratic style. The leader is comfortable with letting the group members give their opinions and considers them as work progresses. With leaders like this, they will encourage team members to participate and be more creative. They are also most likely to gain genuinely committed
followers due to their leadership style.
Leadership Style #2: The Delegative Leader
This leadership style is part of the framework from Lewin and is also known as laissez-faire. This type of leader delegates tasks to team members and gives them complete freedom to make decisions. While this leadership style can be risky, the group can be productive if the team members are experts in their
respective fields.
Leadership Style #3: The Authoritarian Leader
These leaders are the type that will tell people exactly what and how things need to be done. They make the decisions alone and also give their team members little to no chance to give their opinion. This leadership style may not be popular, but in certain circumstances, it is effective. For example, in cases like managers arranging a work-shift schedule for her part-timers after some last minute changes. The authoritarian leadership style is also part of the framework by researcher Kurt Lewin.
Leadership Style #4: The Coaching Leader
When people watch sports-related movies or TV series, they’ll find that the team coach often looks out for individual talents and nurtures them all. This is what coaching leader does. Instead of aiming for a common goal, the leader moulds the goal for the team based on the members’ respective skills. This kind of leader may give out a lot of instructions, but she will also offer a lot of support as well. If this leadership style goes on for a long time, the team members are able to communicate
with each other and harness each other’s strengths.
Leadership Style #5: The Transformational Leader
When people see leaders who can constantly improve their organizations’ conventions, it’s most likely they are this type of leader. The transformational leader has the ability to motivate and inspire the subordinates and is always stimulating them intellectually. While this leadership style is ideal for growth-minded companies, any organization will find these leaders handy since they are committed to achieving goals within the company.
Leadership Style #6: The Transactional Leader
An easy way to describe this leadership style is when the leader clearly defines the leader-follower boundaries. The leader does her job and the subordinates do theirs - end of story. This type of leader may be the type people can see everywhere for specific lines of work, like sales or finances, where the employer-employee label is explicit. However, the only downside to this leadership style is the leader leaves no space for creativity and innovation.
So, my dear strong lady, which leadership style is yours?
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