Contrary to popular belief, there isn't a one-size-fits-all leadership style; instead, there are myriad ways to guide and influence a team.
Your choice should depend on the situation, the team's dynamics, and your personal strengths.
Here are the top leadership styles and the ideal scenarios where they shine:
1. Transformational Leadership
Best suited for: Companies going through major changes and innovation phases.
A transformational leader motivates and inspires their team by setting a vision and rallying everyone towards achieving it. They're proactive, innovative, and usually prioritize employee growth and well-being.
Hypothetical Scenario: A software company decides to pivot from its primary product to explore a new, promising technology. A transformational leader would not only communicate the rationale behind this pivot but would also excite the team about the new opportunities and challenges, ensuring that they're committed to the journey.
For people interested to know more about it, we've written about transformational leadership in detail.
2. Servant Leadership
Best suited for: Teams that prioritize collaboration, empathy, and communal goals.
A servant leader puts the needs of their team above their own. Their main goal is to serve and ensure that their team has all the resources they need. They focus on personal development and well-being of their team members.
Hypothetical Scenario: In a healthcare setting, where professionals are often stressed and overworked, a servant leader would ensure that the team has sufficient breaks, access to training, and emotional support, making sure everyone feels valued and cared for.
For people interested to know more about it, we've written about servant leadership in detail.
3. Democratic Leadership
Best suited for: Organizations that value feedback, inclusivity, and collective decision-making.
Democratic leaders involve their team in decision-making processes, valuing feedback and ensuring that every voice is heard. This fosters a sense of ownership and collaboration.
Hypothetical Scenario: A marketing agency is deciding on its strategy for the upcoming quarter. A democratic leader would gather input from every department, ensuring that all perspectives are considered before finalizing a plan.
Strengths and Limitations
Studies have shown that democratic leadership ranks highly in effectiveness, resulting in increased productivity, more valuable input from team members, and a boost in overall team morale. This approach often yields superior ideas and innovative problem-solving due to the inclusive nature of decision-making.
However, it's not without its limitations. When time is a critical factor or roles within the group are ambiguous, the democratic style can give rise to communication breakdowns and unfinished tasks.
This leadership style flourishes when team members possess expertise and are willing to actively participate. Adequate time must also be allocated to facilitate meaningful contributions, formulate a strategy, and collectively decide on the most favorable course of action.
Democratic leadership yields the best results in places where team psychological safety is high. This allows for team members to respectfully challenge ideas, brainstorm effectively and utilize the combined minds of the team in decision making, and buy-in on action items.
4. Autocratic Leadership
Best suited for: High-pressure situations where swift decision-making is crucial.
An autocratic leader makes decisions quickly, without waiting for input from their team. This style can be effective in crisis situations where there's no time for group consensus.
Hypothetical Scenario: During a cybersecurity breach in a financial firm, an autocratic leader would make swift decisions, delegate tasks efficiently, and control the situation to protect the company and its clients.
Strengths and Limitations
This leadership style is effective in scenarios requiring quick decision-making and where there's little room for error, such as in the military or crisis situations. However, it can lead to lower employee morale and may stifle creativity and initiative. Additionally, the authoritarian style can contribute to a toxic work environment if taken to an extreme.
Overall, while the authoritarian leadership style has its merits, especially in urgent, high-stakes circumstances, it generally isn't suitable for environments that benefit from collaboration, innovation, and team input.
5. Laissez-faire Leadership
Best suited for: Teams of experienced professionals who thrive on autonomy.
Laissez-faire leaders take a hands-off approach, trusting their team's expertise and capabilities. They offer guidance when necessary but mainly let their team chart their course.
Hypothetical Scenario: An established team of research scientists working on an innovative project. The laissez-faire leader would trust the team's expertise, offering guidance only when asked and allowing them to explore their innovative ideas freely.
Strengths and Limitations
The laissez-faire leadership style can be effective in environments where team members are highly skilled, motivated, and capable of working independently. However, it may not be suitable for teams that require close supervision, clear directives, or are made up of less experienced members. A lack of structure can sometimes lead to inefficiency, poor productivity, or a lack of accountability among team members.
Laissez-faire leadership allows for great autonomy and can foster creativity, but it's best suited for very specific situations (and people) and can be problematic if misapplied.
6. Coaching Leadership
Best suited for: Dynamic environments where leaders must be agile and adapt to new situations quickly.
Situational leaders are nimble and flexible, adapting their style depending on the circumstances, task at hand, and individual team members involved.
Hypothetical Scenario: In emergency rescue operations, a situational leader would adjust their approach based on the urgency of the situation, the resources available, and the skills of the team members, making quick, effective decisions as conditions change.
Strengths and Limitations
In a coaching leadership style, the leader focuses primarily on the long-term development of their team members. They work closely with individuals to identify their strengths and weaknesses, set specific performance and career goals, and provide regular feedback. This form of leadership is highly interactive, requiring open communication channels between the leader and the team members. Doing this well can results in better morals, less attrition and better productivity in the long-term.
Coaching leaders aim to foster a positive learning environment where mistakes are seen as opportunities for growth rather than failures. This style is effective for organizations or teams that have the time and resources to invest in long-term professional development. However, it may be less appropriate for high-pressure situations where immediate results are required.
Coaching leadership is about empowering team members to develop and grow, making it highly effective for long-term success but potentially less suited for environments that require quick decisions and short-term gains.
7. Situational Leadership
Best suited for: Dynamic environments where leaders must be agile and adapt to new situations quickly.
Situational leaders are nimble and flexible, adapting their style depending on the circumstances, task at hand, and individual team members involved. To know more about it, read up on our article on effective delegation and the section on situational leadership there.
Hypothetical Scenario: In emergency rescue operations, a situational leader would adjust their approach based on the urgency of the situation, the resources available, and the skills of the team members, making quick, effective decisions as conditions change.
Your Leadership Formula: Changing and mixing up leadership styles
Most people will have one dominant leadership style. Something that they use most often and rely on the most.
However, it would be helpful for you to reflect on what scenarios in the past may have played out better if you had employed a different leadership style. Instead of switching completely from one leadership style to the next, you could also consider using a mix of multiple leadership styles.
If you're looking for a leadership style to adopt, we would recommend situational leadership. It is a meta-leadership style, and requires you have an understanding of the rest of the leadership styles, the current context you're facing, and the people you're working with. It may seem like a lot, but will enable you to come up with the best style for the people you're working with and the situation/timing at hand.
People
You might people, often in the same team who might respond and prefer different leadership styles. Some people might respond better to a more laissez-faire style and some might require a more directive approach.
Timing
Sometimes you might want to employ different leadership styles depending on state of your current efforts. For example, when kicking off a new project, it might be good to use a transformational approach, to get people inspired by a shared vision and rally around it. If the timeline is extremely tight or if it's a high stakes emergency, then you might want to switch to autocratic on a temporary basis.
Overall, this approach requires thinking about what success looks like, what is the current situation at hand (and what it needs to go towards success), what resources are available, what are the people you're working with (and what are their needs to enable their success) and how do they respond best to leadership, and then taking an approach customized for it.
