Leadership Styles
Connect the four leadership styles of the situational leadership
model examined in the article with the leader behaviors explored
in the text.
How does examining such styles or behaviours lead to a better
understanding of the interaction between leaders and followers?
Note: To prepare for this essay please read the required articles
that is attached
The following conditions must meet in the essay:
1) I want a typical and a quality answer which should have about
830 words.
2) The answer must raise appropriate critical questions.
3) The answer must include examples from experience or the
web with references from relevant examples from real
companies.
4) Do include all your references, as per the Harvard
Referencing System,
5) Please don�t use Wikipedia web site.
6) I need examples from peer reviewed articles or researches.
Introduction
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Success of any organization depends on the type of leadership that top managerial that displays
to their staff. Good leadership results to right results while poor form of leadership results in an
inadequate relationship among workers for this reason leading to the failure of a business.
Directive leadership
The leadership approach involves giving directions that are concrete and task-focused,
commanding, supervising closely and constant follow-up. The method involves the use of
legitimate power or position power to create an influence over the people who are following it.
The followers receive motivation by fear, threats from the authority and peers. Those who
receive motivation from the peers want to be like others while those who get motivated by the
power tend to follow the policy. Motivation that comes from threats and fear are likely to be
reacting to a particular force. Workers in this type of leadership can resist changes because once
they acquire skill; they do not want to learn other skills. Efficiency of the workers is very little
since they depend on their leaders so much, and the level of creativity is tiny. Their
psychological empowerment is short since they do not relate their work roles and personal
beliefs and values that much (Davies and Imbroscio, 2009)
Employees working in an aviation company are likely to receive to receive such kind of
leadership because we take a look at Delta Air Lines, we can notice that the pilots perform
specific tasks. Top leaders tend to do a follow-up on how pilots are carrying out their duties and
supervise them closely. Their motivation for jobs comes from the authorities, and this creates an
influence on how they go on with their activities. The skills they have mastered are not bound to
any change in handling a plane requires the same skills that one acquired since he or she received
training. They are also resistible to any form of changes since they do none particular activity for
a long period.
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Transactional leadership
It focuses on the creation of reward possibilities and an exchange type of relationship leading to
a calculative agreement by the followers. Its ideas reflect on the reinforcement theory and the
expectancy theory (Denmark and Paludi, 2008). Expectancy theory states that people assess the
choice of behaviors basing on variables. The attractiveness of an outcome that associates itself
with a certain behavior and the particular probability that an effort will result in a level of an
action is a consideration. Reinforcement theory suggests implications shape of practices and
determines whether they will happen or not. Basing on these theoretical interpretations, we can
say that transactional leadership tries to create and clarify the link between effort and reward to
reinforce desired behaviors with rewards that are supposed to be attractive (Winkler, 2010)
The leadership style has mixed forms as motivation is from three bases: goal, reward, and
recognition. A motivation from the goal perspective comes from an opportunity where an
employee gets an opportunity and utilizes it to achieve the objective of the organization. The
kind of inspiration that results from a reward is founded on materialism while those employees
who want to get recognized through motivation are likely to elevate their social status.
Personality and efficiency of the leader depend on the atmosphere that he or she has shaped and
the skills that they possess. Dependence and the level of creativity are poor forms of leadership
since employees get motivation from an opportunity and not a need. An example in this case of
leadership is by which employees perform their tasks efficiently so that they get a reward for the
good work that they are doing.
Transformational leadership
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Transformational leadership involves the creation of a communication that is of higher-level
vision in a captivating way that can elicit a response that is emotional and commits the followers.
It has a theoretical foundation that is a sociological concept of charisma, charismatic leadership
theory, and transformational leadership. Archetypal behaviors of transformational leadership
include providing vision, creating a charismatic influence, considering individuals, intellectual
stimulation, and motivating workers (Wren, 2007). Though this leadership perspective has
advanced into distinct streams of research and theory, philosophers have advocated that these
streams are congregating and steadying into a sole unified model. The commitment of workers
depends on the complying with their managers making the level of creativity very little in the
working system. Their development is also weak, the task is unstructured and the urgency is
very high.
There is limited supervision by the managers enabling workers to have an already made decision
while handling a responsibility. Workers are self-motivated of receive motivated from their
teammates that are bases on inspired creativity. Leaders in such a situation have great ideas that
their subordinates are independent minded enabling them to achieve highly. The level of
efficiency is very high since they are creative allowing them to adjust to changes. Such a
leadership style cab be depicted in an aviation company that all workers are liberal minded and
look forward on other employees to move forward.
Empowering leadership
The style stresses a self-influence process to the employees instead of focusing on the usual
hierarchal management process and actively urges followers to display self-leadership policies.
Theorists term this approach as “SuperLeadership” in media and it defines the process as a way
of leading others so that they can lead themselves. The implication of this leadership perspective
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is that the performance of the followers increases by encouraging other individuals to follow the
self-leadership to manage the behaviors. There is limited supervision since the manager inspires
his or her staff to achieve them and be a responsibility when making major decisions affecting
the company. The level of efficiency is high since commitment is independent, and creativity is
great. The psychological empowerment is also high among the personnel. An example of this
leadership approach comes in when an office setting where the manager allows junior officers to
lead themselves and do whatever that is of significant to the firm without any supervision
(Steinberg, 2008)
Interaction between leaders and followers
In a workplace, leadership styles influence the motivation of the workers and applying different
techniques brings different results and level of creativity among workers. When we examine
these approaches of leadership, we get to know what type of employees and leaders in a
management process and the level of results that we obtain. We also analyze the degree of
creativity in carrying out the tasks and whether workers are independent or dependent. The
interaction also enlightens the development and urgency in personnel, whether high or low.
Examining such example is very vital because we get to know what type of leadership we
experience in our workplaces and be able to relate to the kind of results we get. Through this, we
can analyze a leadership strategy and try to adjust to a change that is inevitable.
Conclusion
The type of leadership which managers display to their subordinates is very crucial because it
influences the result that we obtain. I can recommend empowering leadership because it gains
high results with minimum supervision. It’s also subjective to any changes since it is highly
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flexible, unlike the directive leadership that is rigid to any forms of change. Managers should, for
this reason try to apply empowering leadership that result and creativity-oriented.
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References
Davies, J. and Imbroscio, D. (2009). Theories of urban politics. Los Angeles: Sage.
Denmark, F. and Paludi, M. (2008). Psychology of women. Westport, Conn.: Praeger.
Goethals, G., Sorenson, G. and Burns, J. (2004). Encyclopedia of leadership. Thousand Oaks,
Calif.: Sage Publications.
Goldsmith, M., Baldoni, J. and McArthur, S. (2010). The AMA handbook of leadership. New
York: American Management Association.
Segil L., Goldsmith M. and Belasco J. (2003). Partnering. New York: AMACOM.
Steinberg, B. (2008). Women in power. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Winkler, I. (2010). Contemporary leadership theories. Heidelberg: Physica-Verlag.
Wren, J. (2007). Inventing leadership. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar.
