What Leadership Style Works For You?

What defines a good leader?

Your natural leadership style may be a result of your personality, your values and your strengths and experiences. But effective business leaders avoid a one-size-fits-all approach to leadership. A leadership style refers to a leader’s methods and behaviors when directing, motivating, and managing others.

Why Should You Know Your Leadership Style?

Knowing your leadership style is critical because it can help you determine how you affect those whom are under your direct influence. How do your direct reports see you? Do they feel you’re an effective leader?

Ready to find out which leadership style you might currently have? Check out the most common ones below;

Visionary Leadership

A visionary leader is focused on unifying their team to work to a common goal. They focus on inspiring employees and establishing a strong organizational bond around their mission.  

This hands-off leadership approach does not usually outline specific expectations, but focuses on the goal of the company as a whole. Instead, visionary leaders encourage their employees to find their own way of doing things.

This type of leadership is most successful for fast-growing, smaller organizations.

Democratic Leadership

Democratic leadership is another highly effective leadership style. Often known as Participative leadership, in this style the leaders often ask help and collaboration from their subordinates.

This leadership usually reports higher levels of job satisfaction and the company can benefit from individualistic creativity. However, this style involves more than one individual in the decision-making process which makes the process slower.

Autocratic Leadership

The Autocratic Leadership style is defined by someone who directs decision making without consulting other team members. Team members’ opinions are not encouraged, but their obedience is required. Employees are expected to comply with a decision at a timeline determined by the leader.

There is often little autonomy in the team, as the autocratic leaders will make decisions on their own without consulting the group.

Servant Leadership

Servant leaders work with their team. Their goal is to achieve the best outcome. To do that, these types of leaders make themselves available to help with issues, work alongside those they manage, and develop those they manage into better employees.

Servant leaders are empathetic and use emotional intelligence to guide their leadership decisions. This type of leadership works well when handling big projects or when solving conflicts.

Strategic Leadership

Strategic leadership is a commonly effective leadership style. This leadership style involves a leader who is essentially the highest authority of the organization. Strategic leaders are not, however, limited to the top authority of the company. They include a wider audience at all levels who want to create a high- performance life, team or organization. This is because of this approach this is one of the most desirable styles of leadership.

Bureaucratic Leadership

Bureaucratic leadership models are most suitable for highly regulated or administrative environments, where adherence to the rules and a defined hierarchy are important. In this leadership style, the leaders set a strict set of rules, regulations, and policies which they follow precisely, and they expect their teams to follow the line.

Laissez-faire Leadership

The term ‘laissez-faire’ literally means ‘let them do’ in French. In leadership, this is typically translated to ‘let it be’.

In this leadership style, the leader allows the employees to make decisions. Laissez-faire leaders are known for their hands-off approach which is often criticized for poor role definition for managers.

Such leadership style is effective in creative jobs and workplaces with experienced employees.

Ultimately,

Find the most effective leadership style for you. If you recognize that there is one type of leadership style that dominates your work style, look for opportunities to put other leadership styles into practice when they’re appropriate.

If you haven’t connected with your team members on a personal level, put on your empathetic leader hat and have some one-on-ones with them. If you’ve taken a more hands-off approach to leadership, think about future projects where being more vocal can enhance the results.

Do you want help in figuring out your leadership style? Are you equipped with the right leadership and management skills? Enroll for this Leadership & Management Course that will ensure you succeed in all aspects!