Modern Leadership Styles

Strategic Leadership

• Strategic leadership is the ability to anticipate, envision and maintain flexibility, think strategically, and work with others in the organization to initiate changes that will create a valuable future for the organization. 

The eight key dimensions of strategic leadership are: 

1. Determining the organization’s purpose or vision, 
2. Exploiting and maintaining the organization’s core competencies,
3.  Developing the organization’s human capital, 
4. Creating and sustaining a strong organizational culture, 
5. Creating and maintaining organizational relationships, 
6. Reframing prevailing views by asking penetrating questions and questioning assumptions, 
7. Emphasizing ethical organizational decisions and practices, and 
8. Establishing appropriately balanced organizational controls. 

Charismatic Leadership

• This leadership approach assumes that charisma is an individual characteristic of the leader. Charisma is a form of interpersonal attraction that inspires support and acceptance. Someone with charisma is more likely to be able to influence others than is someone without charisma. Such leader will be more successful in influencing subordinate behavior than a supervisor who lacks charisma.
• Robert House first proposed a theory of charismatic leadership, based on research findings from a variety of social science disciplines. His theory suggests that charismatic leaders are likely to have a lot of self-confidence, a firm conviction in their beliefs and ideals, and a strong need to influence people. They also tend to communicate high expectations about follower performance and express confidence in followers.

The three most important elements of charismatic leadership are : 

• The leader needs to be able to envision the future, set high expectations, and model behaviors consistent with meeting those expectations.
• The charismatic leader must be able to energize others through a demonstration of personal excitement, personal confidence, and patterns of success. 
• The charismatic leader enables others by supporting them, empathizing with them, and expressing confidence in them.

 A charismatic leader is an enthusiastic, self-confident leader whose personality and actions influence people to behave in certain ways. Some of the characteristics of charismatic leaders are: 

• They have a vision, the ability to articulate that vision, a willingness to take risks to achieve that vision, a sensitivity to both environmental constraints and follower needs, and behaviors that are out of the ordinary. 
• Impressive correlations between charismatic leadership and high performance and satisfaction among followers. 
• Although a small number of experts still think that charisma can’t be learned, most believe that individuals can be trained to exhibit charismatic behaviors.  

 Team Leadership  

• The role of team leader is different from the traditional leadership role. Many leaders are not equipped to handle the change to employee teams. As one consultant noted, “Even the most capable managers have trouble making the transition because all the command-and-control type things they were encouraged to do before are no longer appropriate. There’s no reason to have any skill or sense of this.” This same consultant estimated that “probably 15 percent of managers are natural team leaders; another 15 percent could never lead a team because it runs counter to their personality—that is, they’re unable to sublimate their dominating style for the good of the team. Then there’s that huge group in the middle: Team leadership doesn’t come naturally to them, but they can learn it.”
• The challenge for many managers is learning how to become an effective team leader. They have to learn skills such as patiently sharing information, being able to trust others and to give up authority, and understanding when to intervene. And effective team leaders have mastered the difficult balancing act of knowing when to leave their teams alone and when to get involved. New team leaders may try to retain too much control at a time when team members need more autonomy, or they may abandon their teams at times when the teams need support and help.
• One study looking at organizations that reorganized themselves around employee teams found certain common responsibilities of all leaders. These leader responsibilities included coaching, facilitating, handling disciplinary problems, reviewing team and individual performance, training, and communication. However, a more meaningful way to describe the team leader’s job is to focus on two priorities: 

1.     managing the team’s external boundary and 
2.      facilitating the team process.

• Team leaders place considerable emphasis on team building and then evaluates their own performance on the basis of how well they‟ve developed the team

• A team leader‟s belief is that the whole is greater then the sum of its parts.

What a Team Leader Must  Do

•         Give feedback & resolve conflict

•         Help to keep team focused on the mission despite personality conflict, work style

•         difference and blockages by interpersonal conflict

•         Build trust and inspire teamwork

•         Coach team members and group members toward higher levels of performance

•         Facilitate and support the team decisions

•         Expand the teams capabilities

•         Create a team identity

•         Anticipate & influence change

•         Inspire the team toward higher levels of performance

•         Enable & empower group members to accomplish their work

•         Encourage team members to eliminate low-value work

Transactional and Transformational Leadership

• A leadership style whereby the objectives and goals are predefined and the leader uses reward and punishment to motivate his followers is known as Transactional Leadership. It focuses on improving the current situation of the organization by framing the steps and controlling the organizational activities. The basic purpose is to revamp the existing corporate culture and to enhance current policies & procedures.
• This style of leadership was first proposed by Max Weber followed by Bernard Bass in the year 1981.
• In this leadership style, the leader uses his authority and responsibility as his power as well as the style has a formal approach. Prize and penalties are the two primary tools employed by the leader to inspire his subordinates i.e. if an employee achieves the target within the stipulated time he is given initiative for his work, whereas if the task is not completed within the required time, then he will be penalized for the same.
• Many early leadership theories viewed leaders as transactional leaders; that is, leaders that lead primarily by using social exchanges (or transactions). Transactional leaders guide or motivate followers to work toward established goals by exchanging rewards for their productivity. 

    Assumptions of  transactionalleadership are:

1. People perform their best when the chain of command is definite and clear.
2. Workers are motivated by rewards and punishments.
3. Obeying the instructions and commands of the leader is the primary goal of the followers.
4. Subordinates need to be carefully monitored to ensure that expectations are met.

• Under the transactional theory of leadership, the leaders guide or motivate their followers in the direction of established goals by clarifying role and task requirements. The characteristic features exhibited by transactional leaders are as follows: 
• (i) Contingent Reward: The leader links the goals of the organization to rewards and clearly specifies and expectations , provides the needed resources and set SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely) goals for the subordinates;
• (ii) Management by Exception (Active): The leader actively monitors the performance of the subordinates, watches and searches for deviations from rules and standards, and take corrective actions to prevent mistakes;
• (iii) Management by Exception (Passive): In terms of passive management, a leader intervenes only if standards are not met and even use punishments for poor performances; and
• (iv) Laissez-Faire: In this for, the leader gives an environment to subordinates, where they can take decisions. In this form, the leader himself abdicates from responsibilities and avoids making decisions, due to which the followers lack the direction.
• This kind of leadership may not be suitable for all occasions and be suitable, where organizational problems are quite simple and clearly defined. The transactional leaders tend to be highly directive and action oriented and their relationship with the followers tends to be transitory and not based on emotional bonds. In taking this style of leadership, gender differences exist. Several studies found that, in using transactional leadership style, women were more likely to focus on the „rewards‟ component, while the men laid their focus on „punishment‟ component.
•  A transformational leader stimulates and inspires followers to achieve extraordinary outcomes. They pay attention to the concerns and developmental needs of individual followers; they change followers’ awareness of issues by helping those followers look at old problems in new ways; and they are able to excite, arouse, and inspire followers to exert extra effort to achieve group goals.
•  In transformational leadership, the leader acts as a role model and as a motivator too who offers vision, excitement, encouragement, morale and satisfaction to the followers. The leader inspires his people to increase their abilities and capabilities, build up self-confidence and promotes innovation in the whole organization.
• James MacGregor Burns first proposed the concept of this leadership style in the year 1978. The main idea of this leadership style is that both the superior and subordinate work for lifting each other for improving their morale and motivation.
• Transactional and transformational leadership shouldn’t be viewed as opposing approaches to getting things done. Transformational leadership develops from transactional leadership. Transformational leadership produces levels of employee effort and performance that go beyond what would occur with a transactional approach alone. Moreover, transformational leadership is more than charisma, because the transformational leader attempts to instill in followers the ability to question not only established views but those views held by the leader.
• Evidence indicates that transformational leadership is strongly correlated with lower turnover rates and higher levels of productivity, employee satisfaction, creativity, goal attainment, follower well-being, and corporate entrepreneurship, especially in start-up fir
• We use the term transformational leadership and define it as leadership that goes beyond ordinary expectations by transmitting a sense of mission, stimulating learning experiences, and inspiring new ways of thinking. Because of rapid change and turbulent environments, transformational leaders are increasingly being seen as vital to the success of business.
• A widely-circulated popular press article once identified seven keys to successful leadership: trusting one’s subordinates, developing a vision, keeping cool, encouraging risk, being an expert, inviting dissent, and simplifying things. Although this list was the result of a simplistic survey of the leadership literature, it is nevertheless consistent with the premises underlying transformational leadership.

        The 4 I's of Transformational Leadership are: 

• 1. Individualized Consideration – the degree to which the leader attends to each follower's needs, acts as a mentor or coach to the follower and listens to the follower's concerns and needs. The leader gives empathy and support, keeps communication open and places challenges before the followers. This also encompasses the need for respect and celebrates the individual contribution that each follower can make to the team. The followers have a will and aspirations for self development and have intrinsic motivation for their tasks.
• 2. Intellectual Stimulation – the degree to which the leader challenges assumptions, takes risks and solicits followers' ideas. Leaders with this style stimulate and encourage creativity in their followers. They nurture and develop people who think independently. For such a leader, learning is a value and unexpected situations are seen as opportunities to learn. The followers ask questions, think deeply about things and figure out better ways to execute their tasks.
• 3. Inspirational Motivation – the degree to which the leader articulates a vision that is appealing and inspiring to followers. Leaders with inspirational motivation challenge followers with high standards, communicate optimism about future goals, and provide meaning for the task at hand. Followers need to have a strong sense of purpose if they are to be motivated to act. Purpose and meaning provide the energy that drives a group forward. The visionary aspects of leadership are supported by communication skills that make the vision understandable,
• precise, powerful and engaging. The followers are willing to invest more effort in their tasks, they are encouraged and optimistic about the future and believe in their abilities.
• 4. Idealized Influence – Provides a role model for high ethical behavior, instills pride, gains respect and trust.
• Transformational leadership is also equated to an extent with the charismatic leadership. In order to bring transformation in the followers‟ or employees‟ interest and reshape their capacity, one critical component that has been considered essential is the charisma of the leader. In this form of leadership, a leader inspires her/his followers to transcend their own self-interests for the betterment of the organization. Transformational leaders pay attention to the developmental needs and concerns of the followers, and inspire followers to give a new outlook for the old problems and thus motivate the followers towards achievement of the goals of the organization, by giving them new perspective. 

Characteristics of Transformational Leadership

• Strong Transformational Leaders perform exceptionally well in crisis
• Have a vision of what a new organization can be
• Strong bonds cultivated between leader and subordinates
• Followers willingly subordinate themselves
• Strong emotional bonds develop over time
• Charisma
• - Provides vision and sense of mission
• - Instills pride
• - Earns respect and trust
• • Inspiration
• - Communicates high expectations
• - Uses symbols to focus effort
• - Expresses important purposes in simple ways
• • Intellectual Stimulation
• - Promotes intelligence and rationality
• - Values innovative problem-solving
• • Consideration for the Individual
• - Gives personal attention
• - Coaches
• -Advises

Key Differences between Transactional and Transformational Leadership

1. Transactional Leadership is a type of leadership whereby rewards and punishment are used as a basis for initiating the followers. Transformational Leadership is a leadership style in which the leader uses his charisma and enthusiasm to influence his followers.
2. In transactional leadership leader, is lays stress on his relationship with followers. Conversely, in transformational leadership leader lays stress on the values, beliefs and needs of his followers.
3. Transactional Leadership is reactive whereas Transformational Leadership is proactive.
4. Transactional Leadership is best for a settled environment, but Transformation is good for the turbulent environment.
5. Transactional Leadership works for improving the present conditions of the organisation. On the other hand, Transformational Leadership works for changing the present conditions of the organization.
6. Transactional Leadership is bureaucratic while Transformational Leadership is charismatic.
7. In Transactional Leadership, there is only one leader in a group. In contrast to transformational leadership, in which there can be more than one leader in a group.
8. Transactional Leadership is focused towards planning and execution as compared to transformational leadership which promoted innovation.