Leadership Styles are Labels

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Leadership Styles are Labels

I think most of the leadership styles we heard and read about are simply labels made by people, in particular social scientists, to interpret those demonstrable behaviors. They are after-thoughts.
The very basic definition of "effective leadership" is to drive the best result/behavior that you desire from someone. It is therefore hinged on one's ability to influence others regardless of style. Effective leadership though is different from the end result of the leadership.
Hitler, Napoleon Bonaparte, Jesus Christ, Genghis Khan, Abraham Lincoln, Saddam Hussein, Mother Teresa have different ends in mind but they surely are strong leaders.
While leaders may use different styles depending on what they are strong at, it is important that they are consistent, authentic, and most importantly, they believe in what they're saying... It's called passion and commitment.

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		1 David Wilson Manager, Canada
	Leadership Styles Make it Simple Most leaders tend to follow one style of leadership. I believe leaders need to learn how to lead different types of followers. Using 'categories' tends to simplify the analysis and the process. Most of your examples focus on charismatic leaders. I see two types in this category - power wielders and power yielders. However, we need to look at all types of leaders.

		2 Dilip Khanal CEO, Nepal
	Describing Leadership is Hard As Thelma commented, leadership is difficult to describe. When an event occurs, even the best description written afterwards misses some details. If we ask laymen, for them, leadership is simply leading, for various reasons and they can give us examples of people. We all have different belief systems and consider from our own background, a particular style better than other. A leadership workshop executed in the Everest region during extreme weather conditions explored that leadership also covers aspects like oneness with the team, caring like a family and submissiveness for the purpose.

		0 Dr. Alan Williams Professor, Thailand
	Leadership Styles Dear Thelma, suggest you research in regard to where the six leadership styles that Daniel Goleman discusses came from. Not from social scientists as you call them, but from real, long-term global research in numerous organizations. Research designed and managed by Dr. Davis McClelleand to explore his hypothesis that leadership behavior has connections to motivation etc., and higher performance. Further you'll find that the research findings are very well validated as real on the job behaviors and they do connect to motivation, innovation, creativity etc. Further investigation will show that numerous high performing organizations have installed this 'model' as their desired corporate leadership behaviors framework and short-term / long-term are very happy with the results.

		2 SATISH PANDE Business Consultant, India
	Own Leadership Style Must be Developed @Alan Williams : sir, I do not think that Ms. Thelma was undermining Goleman's contribution, and her calling, social scientists does not demean his status. All research done in human behavior even if it is done in corporate world qualifies as social research. The issue is that dividing the entire human leadership into six broad categories is too simplistic. Unfortunately in today's corporate world encouraged by many so called consultants, the tendency is to undermine the complexity and dynamic nature of human beings, especially employees, and stereotype them into various groups. It is convenient for the management also. The HR department and the behavior analysts think in virtual reality and treat the corporate functioning as a reality show; where things are comfortably predictable and scripted. One can not confine oneself to any particular style of leadership, it has to conform to his individual personality. What one can do is like all previous great leaders have done is learn from their predecessors and develop one's own style.