The purpose of the Final Project is to apply the concepts and techniques of the module to the analysis of
real-world situations or problems. Students are expected to use diverse sources of information and to
carry out an original analysis rather than summarise or rehash existing work. Students are encouraged to
use situations and data from their own experience where possible.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Please follow the following instructions exactly one by one as each point is very
important. And please don�t deviate from these points.
1) You are required to complete a course project that provides an investigation of outstanding examples
of leadership, providing an analysis of the leaders� styles and effectiveness.
Introduction
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Over time, there have been several leadership models with some proving to be valid and
instructive in meeting the demands of the people. With the world changing so first and
globalization taking drastic turns in shaping the behaviors of people, leadership is becoming a
requirement in every organization. People cannot be lead the same way they were over the past
centuries if an organization wants to obtain optimal performance. Leadership has to be
contextualized to fit into the current situations. In this contemporary world, organizations are in
the search for workers who are highly qualified to make the best out of their capabilities in
environments that afford them the liberty to demonstrate their sense of responsibility and
initiative.
Each and every person’s leadership approach has an important component on how
efficiently an organization has to reach its objectives. This is true when people have significant
roles and responsibilities in playing decision-making roles. This paper seeks to analyze the
different styles and approaches to leadership with respect to the effectiveness of the styles they
formulated.
Outstanding Leadership Styles and Effectiveness
There are a great number of leadership styles that are based on different theories. The
techniques that are based on individual’s beliefs, preferences, and values as well as other
organizational cultures and norms that embrace some particular styles and disseminate others.
The styles of leadership are therefore discussed herein as;
Servant Leadership
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This style of leadership is a very moral style that puts the well being of others before the
goals of an organization. Servant leaders consider others as an equal to them and not above. They
see those they lead as subjects to teach and learn from in any organization. Servant’s leaders are
able to lead others and reach a particular laid down goal and do not believe that as leaders they
are better than others (Bass, BM 2009). Servant leaders are therefore considered consummate
team builders who draw all the strengths from those they lead towards achieving goals and
success. These leaders are incapacitated to lead through dictatorship but instead allow people to
do what they can well.
Servant leaders are known for their ability to use power honestly without misuse. They
exercise their powers legitimately for the benefit of those they serve and see leadership as an
approach to garner good and no the opposite. In understanding servant leaders, we need to
consider icons like Mandela and Mother Teresa, who served with integrity and honesty. Servant
leaders have one objective of serving and not being served (Bass, BM 2009). Being a servant
leader is about the one-on-one deliberations and taking care of a day’s details.
Servant leaders also listen and care for those they serve. They are willing to take time to
listen to the views of others on matters. They also seek the opinions and ideas of others in
making success out of an objective. This attribute of listening makes a servant leader be in
position to create an environment where mutual respect is exercised. They help people acquire
what they need in any setup. When faced with situations, servant leaders look for better
approaches to convince others to see things there way since in their listening, they are open to
improvements. They are also able to stretch their constituents and inspire them to service.
Charismatic Leadership
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This leadership style according to my view is recognizable but may be mistaken as that
with less tangibility compared to other leadership approaches. This Approach of leadership puts
an individual into a form of influence where he possesses exceptional qualities as his followers
perceive. Any charismatic leader incorporates the art of communication as his/hers leadership
style. Emotional appeals are also vital in the making o a charismatic leader, and this combines
the use of emotional and dramatic appeals that adds credibility in communication (Beycioglu, K.,
& Pashiardis, P 64, 2015). As with the art of effective communication, a charismatic leader also
establishes visions that are vital to achieving success. Such leaders have visions that are solution
driven.
Charismatic leaders are also known for their ability to establish trust with those they lead.
Integrity has to play a vital role in such leaders and is cultivated when honesty and consistency
are practiced in a line of duty. It is essential that such leaders embrace the ethics of truth
irrespective of their popularity and should, in other words, enumerate the values that they
espouse on others (Beycioglu, K., & Pashiardis, P 64, 2015).This requires that such a leader
understands the values and needs of his subjects.
Participative Leadership
This style of leaderships one that makes an achievement through people. Participative
leaders get success in their initiatives through teamwork and by collectively involving other
people in achieving a goal. Such leaders are known for their ability to show ownership on those
they lead in a manner that makes them feel responsible for the commitments taken in achieving a
particular goal.
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They make people valued as a vital part of a team by making a group become focused on
the journey of cooperative teamwork (Brain, C 2002). In an airport, for example, leaders need to
cooperatively involve every personnel in the processes in order for the whole team to make
conclusions collaboratively through dialog and reason. Such leaders have the option of drawing
from other approaches in order to achieve their goals.
Situational Leadership
This style of leadership entails the fact that there is no one size that fits all in its approach
to leadership. In order to achieve goals, such leaders have to first of all identify their most
significant priorities and consider the readiness of those they lead by analyzing their ability and
willingness to follow in the steps of the leader. Leaders in this approach should have the capacity
to apply the essential styles of leadership that fit a given situation (Lang, R, & Rybnikova, 2012).
This style of leadership incorporates four elements that are essential to achieving success. These
elements are directing, coaching, supporting and delegating.
Transactional Leadership
This form of leadership involves the motivation and direction of a leader’s subjects
through appealing to their self-interests. The power of such leaders is vested in their formal
responsibility and authority in an organization. It is upon the subjects of those leaders to obey
instructions and follow in the foot of such leaders (Malcolm, G 2002). Such leaders motivate
through an approach that reward and punish, for instance, when a worker does what is a requisite
of them, he is rewarded.
However, when he fails to achieve that which is required of him, a punishment follows.
This style of leadership is known for its nature to overemphasize detailed short termed goals and
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rules that are standardized (Malcolm, G 2002). This approach is known to work well where an
organization’s problems are well-defined since transactional leaders are quite efficient in guiding
decisions aimed at cutting costs and improving the productivity levels of an organization.
Transformational Leadership
This kind of leadership is one that incorporates change with such leaders considered
people of change and action. Transformational leaders are always considered effective since the
changes they bring are always positive. It is important to point out that transformational leaders
have the ability to master their emotions and are also required to understand how they respond to
motivational and persuasive situations (Marx, T 2013). These leaders are believed not to assume
the rationales and logic of responding to change and are considered emotionally intelligent.
Quiet Leadership
Quite leaders are known for their abilities to work behind scenes carefully and patiently
instead of making forceful and direct actions. Their aims are to address serious problems while
still leaving by their values without hampering the running of an organization (Marx, T 2013).
Quite leaders always employ forceful and direct actions that aim at handling situations.
Ryan air Leadership in the era of costly Air Travel
The CEO of Ryan air in the wake of the global economic recession restructured a form of
leadership that managed the organization into a competitive state. The Irish millionaire Thomas
Antony Ryan cofounded Ryan air with another partner in 1985. Before opening this airline, Ryan
was an employee of Aer Lingus a leading air carrier in Ireland. Most of Ryan’s wealth came
from this airline since he made this airline company the largest in Europe (Pasmore, W 2014).
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Ryan employed the use of the situational style of leadership which expounds that there is
no perfect way to lead an organization since situations determine the ways and approaches of
making decisions. Ryan was able to venture into the airline industry with his friends and
customers viewing him as a difficult man to handle in work related issues.
He never gave room for criticisms and always strived to be different and better in
anything. Ryan also had a strong sense of responsibility and was so crucial to the completion of
tasks (Pasmore, W 2014). This was depicted when he launched the airline company with the aim
of driving growth that was geared towards minimizing and engineering low-cost maintenance in
the airline sector.
Tony Fernandez Leadership Style
Born in Kuala Lumpur, Tony Fernandez was originally from Chennai. He was educated
and graduated in London as an economist. Fernandez worked briefly with Virgin Atlantic as a
financial controller and was considered one of the youngest CEOs in the organization. He then
decided to venture into the airline industry and in one of his meetings with the Prime Minister of
that time Mohamed; he managed to convince to become a new operator in the Malaysian
aviation industry (Siegmund, F 1990). At this time of the meeting, Fernandez had already
registered a company called Tune Air. Mahathir agreed to the demands of Fernandez and
deemed it suitable and worth giving a try.
Fernandez vision turned Air Asia to become one of the leading airline brands in the
world. Many attribute the success of this airline firm to the strong leadership style of Tony. He in
his capacity created a good organizational culture that embraced the importance of working as a
unit in achieving goals. As a leader he was readily and easily approachable to hi employees and
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laid a central role in establishing a culture that inspired the conduct and behaviors, values and
rules that are vital to the achievement of the missions and strategies of the organization
(Siegmund, F 1990). Employees were allowed to access his office with important things that
needed to be addressed.
In the contemporary world where business has become more competitive, exercising such
approaches to leadership may be considered expensive to an organization. Tony Fernandez
approach to leadership made a big impact on the airline industry since it inspired growth. Many
of the employees were so happy to be part of the team that inspired the achievement of goals in
the company. They were always treated as a family unit, and any of their contributions and ideas
were welcomed in deriving better approaches to achieving success. Tony’s leadership style
emphasized on the value of building interactions among the staff members in maintaining the
state of an organization (Siegmund, F 1990).
The two leaders greatly differed in their styles of leadership. Ryan embraced the use of
situational leadership that emphasized that In order to achieve goals, leaders have to first of all
identify their most significant priorities and consider the readiness of those they lead by
analyzing their ability and willingness to follow in the steps of the leader.
This style of leadership finds solutions to problems when such issues arise. On the other
hand, Tony Fernandez applied the participatory form and style of leadership (Thomas, J. C., &
Segal, DL 2006). This style of leaderships one that makes an achievement through people.
Participative leaders get success in their initiatives through teamwork and by collectively
involving other people in achieving a goal. This was Ryan’s style of leadership that spurred the
growth of the airline industry.
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Conclusion
In my journal, I also noted some other leaders who also had a different style of
leadership. In essence, leadership is all about influence. Leaders should, therefore, have better
approaches of rallying people behind their visions and dreams. It is important that leaders portray
the leadership styles they have in the lives they leave too since people watch and follow in their
footsteps.
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References
Bass, BM 2009, From Transactional To Transformational Leadership. Albany, NY, Free Press.
Beycioglu, K., & Pashiardis, P 2015. Multidimensional Perspectives on Principal Leadership
Effectiveness. Available from:
Brain, C 2002. Advanced Psychology: Applications, Issues And Perspectives. Cheltenham,
Nelson Thornes.
Lang, R, & Rybnikova, I 2012 Leadership is Going Global, in The Encyclopedia of Human
Resource Management: Thematic Essays (eds W. J. Rothwell and G. M. (Bud).
Benscoter), Pfeiffer, A Wiley Imprint, San Francisco, CA.
Malcolm, G 2002. The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make A Big Difference. Boston,
Back Bay Books.
Marx, T 2013, ‘Teaching Leadership And Strategy’, Business Education Innovation Journal,
Vol. 5 No. 2, Pp. 12-19.
Pasmore, W 2014. Developing A Leadership Strategy: A Critical Ingredient For Organizational
Success. White Paper, Centre For Creative Leadership
Siegmund, F 1990, ‘Competition and Performance in the Airline Industry’, Policy Studies
Review, 9, 4, pp. 649-663, Academic Search Premier.
Thomas, J. C., & Segal, DL 2006. Comprehensive Handbook Of Personality And
Psychopathology Volume 1. Hoboken, John Wiley & Sons.
