There are a number of leadership styles varying from Authoritarian leaders, Participative, Delegative, Autocratic, Democratic and Laissez-Fair, but what does it all mean and is one style better than another?

Before anyone can make the determination that one style is “Better” than another, it is important to first understand what each style is, and how leaders have applied them.
Defining Leadership styles
An Authoritarian Leader as described by Kerry Cherry is a leader that provides clear expectations for what is required, what needs to be done and will dictate how to do it.
Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, is well known for his Authoritarian leadership style. He is described to be very demanding and slightly abrasive yet also encourages creativity and innovation from his employees. This style of leader will make the decision independently and requires little input from other members of the organization. This is the opposite of the Participative Leadership style that invites others to participate in decision making.
The Participative Leadership style is considered one of the most effective styles of leadership. This leadership style is also known as democratic leadership, where the leaders welcome and encourage members to provide their insight and contributions.
Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Group, and is a well-known celebrity, businessman and investor use a Participative Leadership style. He promotes a highly interactive style of leadership where his employees are motivated and empowering them to reach their goals.
Laissez-fair leadership is where the leader will use more delegation and practice a non-authoritarian style of leading individuals and teams. Leaders like Herbert Hoover provided the least amount of guidance to their subordinates and achieved control through less obvious means. This leadership style believes that people should be left alone to respond to their obligations and responsibilities in their own ways.

Autocratic leadership is the opposite to Laissez-fair and is considered the classical approach and managers retain as much power as possible. Bureaucratic leaders use the “by the book” method and everything needs to be done according to process or policy. Servant leadership prefers power-sharing models. Martha Stewart was well known for her Autocratic Leadership style.
Transformational leaders are considered to be the most desirable employee as they will inspire staffing through effective communication and create a work environment that promotes intellectual stimulation. Some of the well-known historical leaders that used this style include Walt Disney, Henry Ford, Alexander the Great, Aristotle to name a few. One well-known Transformational Leader today is Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.
Transactional leadership is one that is most commonly enforced throughout many organizations today. Transactional leadership focuses on group organization and the establishment of a clear chain of command that rewards “good” or high performers and punishes “bad” practice and non-performers. The concept of it makes sense, reward the “good”, punish the “bad”, but what I had experienced was that the definition of what was good versus what was bad ultimately became a matter of opinion. Employees see themselves one way, the managers may see them another way and then HR may question the manager. I am one who finds that form of management or the rather the enforcement of this style seems to have some level of inaccuracies.

The final leadership style is called Situational Leadership, that takes applied and conscious practice. This is developed by Paul Hersey and Ken Blanchard in 1969 and is based on unitizing leaders of different styles founded on the environment.
Ken Blanchard Situational Leadership training provides leadership with some valuable information and knowledge. While I agree with the concepts, this style of leadership is one that I found does take time to adhere to as it requires leaders to change their natural leadership style. This style focusing more on task-based challenges and the knowledge and experience of the employee as it relates to that particular task.
So which leadership style is the “Best”?
Clearly, the answer is will be highly depended on which leader you would ask. I for one feel that the best leader is on that can create unity and grow organizations through the innovations and input from their team.
What are your thoughts, is there a leader you feel is better than another?

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