With every personality and each individual’s experiences, a tendency towards one leadership style or another is developed. Each leadership style has its own set of good and fair characteristics, hence an awareness of each style’s characteristics will assist the manager in determining what the right approach is and when to use one approach instead of another at a given situation.
Kurt Lewin (1939) identified three styles of leadership in organizational management: authoritarian leadership, participative leadership, and delegative leadership.
Authoritarian Leadership: The Autocratic Leader
The characteristics attributed to the autocratic leader include dominant, dictatorial and controlling. This type of leadership enforces rules and procedures and there is a clear separation between the leader and the subordinates. The autocratic style of leadership usually results in passive resistance from team members, which in turn translates in lower performance from the team.
Nevertheless, there are some instances where an authoritarian leadership style may be required such as when certain situations arise that call for urgent action and there is no time for group decision-making.
Participative Leadership: The Democratic Leader
The democratic leader makes decisions by consulting with the team members, while still managing to maintain control of the group and of the decision-making process. A good democratic leader aims to encourage participation and the delegation of tasks to team members; however the crucial responsibility of leading the team is retained by the democratic leader.
In such participative leadership decision-making is discussed with team members thus allowing participation and input from team members. The democratic leader thus motivates team members by empowering them and creating a sense of belonging in the team.
Delegative Leadership: The Laissez-Faire Leader
The laissez-faire leader allows team members to define their own roles and make their own decisions. The laissez-faire approach often fails to provide direction to team members resulting in a lack of motivation.
The laissez-faire style of leadership is not usually a very effective type of leadership style unless team members are highly motivated and experts in their fields. In such a situation a laissez-faire leader can empower team members to achieve their goals by sharing authority.
According to Kurt Lewin the most effective style of leadership is participative or democratic leadership since it provides a balance between the excessive dominant style of the autocratic leader and the free reign style of the laissez-faire leader.
List of Works Cited
Lewin, K., LIippit, R. and White, R. K. (1939). Patterns of aggressive behavior in experimentally created social climates. Journal of Social Psychology, 10, 271-301
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