Question

Do you believe that leaders can vary their style to demonstrate directive, supportive, participative, and achievement-oriented styles with respect to different employees? Or does each leader tend to have a personal style that he or she regularly uses toward all employees? Please illustrate your main points with examples from your personal or professional experience; you can write examples about yourself or about other people you have observed informal or informal positions of leadership

Answer 1

Leaders generally stick to a certain style of leadership on a day to day basis. However, they tend to switch it up based on the situation they are dealing with. The individuals in an organisation behave in different ways at different times in different situations. It becomes difficult for them during those situations to comply with a leader who follows only one form of leadership. So, the leader must understand this and change his leadership style accordingly. This way, the leader can bring out the best in people in every situation, just by adapting his leadership style to the situation. This flexibility in leadership is needed for the ever-changing dynamic of the organization and its employees.

A modern form of leadership has emerged, called the 'Situatuonal Leadership'. This type of leadership helps the leader change his or her style accordingly to the situation at hand.

Some important benefits of the leader varying his style of leadership according to the situation are listed below:

1. Creates a comfortable work environment for employees in all situations.
2. Improves employee engagement and commitment towards the task and the organization as a whole.
3. Increases employee retention by increasing employee satisfaction.
4. Gives scope for the leader to learn about every individual employee and what motivates them
5. This style of leadership has proven to be very effective in reaching short-term goals.
6. Provides the leader with enhanced awareness that improves his ability to reach organization's goals.

Example:

I lead a team in the organization that I work for. I am currently leading a team which has been assigned to the task of creating an effective promotional strategy for the new product that is about to launch. My teammates, some of them belong to different ethnicities. They behave differently in different situations. I, as their team leader always have to keep changing my style of leadership according to the situation, and according to the person I am dealing with. Having a same style of leadership will not prove to be effective in a multicultural work environment like ours. So, switching it up from time to time is the key to a successful leadership.