Which Leadership Styles Suits You?

Every leader has a distinct style of functioning. The leader style is so uniquely identified with leaders that the style is often branded with leader. It is difficult to say which styles is the best as people with different styles have lead the nations and organizations in different parts of the world and in different times of the history. The styles of the leader depend upon the situation, the organisation, the followers and on the leaders himself.

The academicians have identified different types of leadership styles based on their behavior. The most acceptable work on leadership style was done by psychologist Kurt Lewin in 1939 who classified the leaders into three groups.

1. Authoritarian:
An authoritarian leader decides everything. He decides what is to be done, when is to be done and how to be done. He consults none and his words are final.

2. Participative (Democratic):

A participative leader consults everyone and gives his inputs. He tries to develop a joint vision by consultation and persuasion. The leader however retains the final power of decision making and once the decision is taken, everyone is obliged to follow the decision.

3. Delegative (Laissez-Faire):
A delegative leader does not take any decision and leaves the decision-making to the followers.

These leadership styles are taught in every business school and people. Most people believe that authoritarian style is the worst while the participative style is the best. Good leaders are however, known to use all three styles but their proportion may be different in every leader. A leader has to always balance his choice of style based on the situation and the brand that he has created for himself.

Can you even imagine, Hitler to be democratic or delegative? Could he ever have achieved success if he would have mixed all three rather than being autocratic? Can you imagine Gandhi mixing up all the three styles? Could he not lose the leadership by a single act of behaving in an autocratic way?

Every leader has a style which gradually becomes his trademark. All great leaders like Stalin, Churchill, Hitler, Mao or Gandhi had a style which was unique and associated only with such personality. They followed no styles and no theory of leadership.

If you wish to become a leader, you cannot afford to follow any style or any theory since the times have changed and the values of the society have changed. The requirements of the people are not same as those were in the time of any great leader. People are in the search of a leader not for the sake of the leader but for their own sake. They need leaders who can help them fulfilling their aspiration and dreams. A leader must select a style which matches his temperament and also o fulfill the aspiration of his followers.